Robshaw hoping to rediscover his home comforts
CHRIS ROBSHAW has become part of the furniture at Twickenham — an immovable fixture of the England match- day experience.
And yet it would be understandable if the former national captain viewed the place as some vast, haunted house, in light of what happened there last autumn, when the hosts went from being potential World Cup contenders to crashing out of their own tournament in the space of just 16 days.
But flanker Robshaw has recovered from the ordeal of defeats against Wales and Australia. On Saturday, when England face Ireland in round three of this RBS 6 Nations, the 29-year-old will be returning to a venue where he has proved his resilience emphatically over recent years.
Consider his remarkable record at HQ. Since being appointed captain by Stuart Lancaster at the start of 2012, Robshaw has missed just four of the 48 Tests played by England — and only one of those was at Twickenham.
He was rested from the World Cup warm-up game against France in Paris last summer, as the coaches experimented with different combinations.
HE has started 25 of the last 26 Tests played by England at their home ground and has not been replaced in any of them. No amount of physical punishment has forced him to go off.
No other English player of the era comes close to matching that feat of endurance. And in the Six Nations, he has lost just once in 10 appearances at Twickenham.
Familiarity has bred contentment, rather than contempt. Robshaw has played once at the arena since Lancaster’s side were consigned to a pool- stage exit there on October 3, but that was for Harlequins.
Now he is preparing to make his home comeback for England, having doubted if he would be given that opportunity.
Asked if he thought he may not play another Test at Twickenham, Robshaw said: ‘ Yeah, of course. You always think when things haven’t gone well in the past, how are you going to try to rectify that. That’s just looking at it honestly; not knowing quite what to expect or what’s going to happen. I’m hugely honoured to have that chance again.’
England will be going back to the place where they suffered last September and October, but the mental rehabilitation process has been going on for four-and-a-half months. Many of the players who were involved in the World Cup are part of Eddie Jones’ new squad and according to Robshaw, they won’t forget what happened, but it won’t haunt them.
He was asked if memories of the Wales and Australia defeats would be in his mind and said: ‘I don’t think they’ll be there. Of course, whenever you speak about the World Cup, it will always be a big part… you’ll always remember what happened. But in terms of playing for England, you go out there fresh every game.
‘It’s a new game, it’s a new tournament and if you allow that (World Cup) to hang over you, it’s going to affect you. You’ve got to remember. It’s always going to be a big part of what myself and the other players went through, but it’s about moving forward.’
It will be fascinating to see exactly how the English public relate to their team, after the shattering of World Cup optimism. Under Lancaster, there was a prolonged and orchestrated campaign to make Twickenham vibrant and partisan.
There was a raucous atmosphere at the end of last year’s Six Nations and during the World Cup months later, and Robshaw is expecting that to continue, saying: ‘The noise level will be outstanding.’
Since the World Cup win of 2003, there has been a relative lack of success for England fans to acclaim but they have kept coming — ever hopeful and loyal.
Of late, they have become used to near-misses; narrow defeats against the southern elite or runners-up finishes in the Six Nations.
Robshaw hopes England can end that infuriating cycle.
‘The way we’ve played over the last couple of years, we’ve had some fantastic results, but we’ve also had some bad ones,’ he said. ‘The World Cup was pretty tough and went against us, but I don’t think we’ve had a succession of negative games — bad games. We’ve generally played pretty well, pretty well, then had a dip then played well again.
‘For us now, it’s about building that consistency and rewarding the fans. If you look back to the last Six Nations, we played pretty well, had a bad game against Ireland then finished phenomenally well against France. We’ve got to do that game-on-game and not have a dip. That’s been the important part for us in the last few weeks — making sure we focus and keep building so we don’t have any dips.’
Five days from now, Eddie Jones’ England will be confronted with their toughest challenge to date. After wins against Scotland and Italy away from home, the new head coach is preparing his men to take on — in his words — ‘tier one’ opposition from now on — Ireland, followed by Wales and France. While the champions are struggling with injuries after a draw and defeat in their opening two games, Robshaw won’t underestimate the Irish threat.
‘They haven’t got off to the start they would have wanted, but look at their experience and their key individuals, and they are a very dangerous side and a very smart side,’ he said.
‘They always have a couple of tricks up their sleeve. We need to be aware of that, but go out and show the crowd how we want to play.’