Leicester Tigers
With t he world of r ugby st ill t angling wit h Covid-19, we went behind the scenes at Welf ord Road f or a crowdless East Midlands derby
DERBY DAYS come with their own rhythm, their own patter. Syncopated by hits, bouts of shoving and bawled instructions, there’s a lot going on. To compete with Tigers v Saints, any game-day playlist over the stadium speakers must surely be selected to match in-play intensity?
As we discover to our delight, though, standing up in the control tower at Leicester’s Welford Road, the musical choices there are a little bit random.
It should be caveated that for a game like this, held in Covid times and with no fans allowed into the ground, there are not many folk around to listen to it. But there is something swell about Chuck Berry’s JohnnyB.Goode getting chased hard by Smells Like Teen Spirit and then The Beatles telling us immediately afterwards that they want to hold our hand. The final say, we are told, comes down to whoever is in control of the sound system that day and as long as some loose guidelines are adhered to – no Irish acts should be played if the opposition is, say, Leinster, for example – then just let the music play on.
It is nice to give something up to chance. Because at times like this, when we must all be so careful, everything else at an elite rugby stadium has to be controlled down to the tiniest of details.
We are in Leicester to see what a match is like behind closed doors, where temperature checks, paperwork and distancing is necessary for all but on-field competitors over 80 minutes.
And as the domestic season fizzles out for Northampton and Tigers try to claw back to winning ways at a time when they lie just above already-relegated Saracens, it’s a chance for either to taste victory and do so over their fiercest rival.
However, change is also a theme of the day. On the field before play, head groundsman Ed Mowe is spraying pads and flags with disinfectant. “It’s been soul-destroying when we were trying hard to provide something and then the team couldn’t use it,” Mowe tells Rugby World of the months of inactivity at Welford Road, before rugby returned.
There’s a joke from colleagues about Mowe being a celebrity in gardening circles during lockdown, after being featured on pitchcare.com, and he laughs about becoming the next Monty Don. But his approach has had to change.
He explains: “We’re a lot more cautious as a groundstaff now. We stay socially distant going through operations, and decide who’s doing what on match days.
“We try to get everything done on the day before a match now – we tend
not to go on the pitch on a match day. Keep away because it’s a ‘red zone’.
“And then now we’re just going around as we have to sanitise the post protectors, the corner flags, etc. But yeah, it’s really different, not seeing the crowds coming in, the stewards milling about the stadium on a match day.”
On the field the rugby doesn’t feel sanitised. There is a spaghetti of errors, three yellow cards for Tigers, a penalty try for Northampton and in the end it finishes 28-24 to the hosts. But a win is a win, for all that. Zack Henry, a late call-up to replace George Ford at fly-half for Tigers, snaps off a fine drop-goal on his way to getting 20 points, while England No 9 Ben Youngs plays game number 250 for the club. He even scores a try to mark the occasion. It is only Tigers’ second win in seven matches.
At another juncture we get the chance to talk with Ben’s brother Tom, as well as strength and conditioning coach Matt Parr. Both are understandably reticent to discuss in any detail what the plans for the future are from recently arrived coaching minds Steve Borthwick (head coach) and Aled Walters (head of physical performance). Parr does say that while competing for the rest of this season is great, another element now is trying to prepare players for the way Tigers want to play next season.
Continuing on the theme of transition, though, Youngs gives his thoughts about what the last few years have been like at Leicester and what is still to come.
“I think the club’s changed a lot to be honest,” he begins. “It’s shifted hugely but there’s still a lot to go. With Covid and Steve coming in, it probably gave the club the opportunity to really look at things and assess things. There has been a lot of change for the better.
“Steve coming in with his ideas, and the way he is as a bloke, suits Leicester down to a tee. Hard-nosed, no messing, he says it how it is. He demands high standards. And if you don’t fulfil them, you won’t be at Leicester Tigers for very long I don’t think.”
It sounds inspiring, if not a little familiar for tough Tigers talk. Youngs expands.
“You know where you stand with Steve, he set his stall out from the beginning. We had a great meeting where he talked about being a working-class city.
“For years going to Twickenham each season was a given. It’s been a wake-up call for us” Andrea Pinchen
That’s what we are and we have to be that in abundance on the field.
“We have to show our fans we’re that. We’ve got to fight for everything. And we know where we are in the league. We’re 11th, and when you’re 11th you’ve got to fight and you’ve got to get back up the table. That’s not going to be done overnight and it’s not going to be an easy journey. The successful environment, it’s not a comfortable environment. It’s tough. It’s a tough place to be. Because they expect things every day and you’re expected to work hard every day. And that has to be our DNA. But getting that DNA takes time.”
Tough decisions have to be made too. It will not have escaped any keen rugby fan’s attention that a small cast of well-known Tigers took the chance to leave Leicester, notably with Manu Tuilagi, Kyle Eastmond, Telusa Veainu and others heading out the door.
Games have been shut off from fans, commercial schemes flipped. And the issue of what happens out on the grass has not magically disappeared either.
“There’s been so much going on in my relatively short tenure as CEO,” says club boss Andrea Pinchen at half-time. “In what is affecting the world with Covid and also looking at wage reductions
– for everybody, not just players – and managing that across the board. Then, unfortunately, having to manage the redundancy process, which is something we haven’t been through in the past.
“So many things coming thick and fast, but a lot of businesses were like that. Where we really struggle is not having fans in, that’s our bread and butter, it’s
what we’re all about. And so once those finances dry up, it’s an opportunity if you like for us to look at all different avenues, explore possibilities that perhaps we wouldn’t have been thinking about because we didn’t have to.
“So in a way, whilst you’re in that crisis management mode, what it does do is it gives you a lot of opportunities to look at absolutely every part of the business.”
Tigers have changed tack while fans are away, securing extra sponsorship. They’ve explored new ways to interact with businesses, looking into offering lifestyle, nutrition or health advice.
Pinchen has been with the club for 16 years and was the commercial manager.
So having been part of the fabric of the club for so long, when success at the club was expected, how has a recent downswing in fortunes been felt?
“For many years the club going to Twickenham at the end of the season was a given,” she begins. “That has changed drastically. Of course it has. Actually it’s a wake-up call for us. It’s like, ‘Don’t rest on your laurels because people will follow you, people will look at what you’re doing, then they will overtake you.’ If you are standing still and everyone’s pushing forward, you end up going backwards.
“So now is a really good opportunity for us. It has been for a while, but really with everyone aligned, everyone joined up and saying, ‘Right, enough of this’. Nobody that supports Leicester Tigers – whether they work here or don’t work here, are season-ticket holders, sponsors or whoever – wants to see this club at the bottom of the table. So our goal is to get it right on the pitch, and then off the pitch we push on.
“And my vision is that anybody who wants to be at Tigers, and they’re good enough to be here, should be here. Anybody that doesn’t, whoever you are, and you’re not willing to be part of what we’re trying to achieve, then I have no issue at all with you and thank you for everything you’ve done for the club and I’ll shake your hand as you move on.
“I genuinely felt (as stars moved on) that it wasn’t, ‘Oh, it’s big-name players’ or ‘What are we going to do?’
“It was very much that this is not working for us. You know, it didn’t work for us when we had all these players. So for me it’s ‘If you’re in, you’re in’. And if it’s not for you, I totally accept that, don’t hold any malice or bear any grudges and shake your hand. We’ll move on.”
Back in the control tower, you get the perfect view of the stadium. It’s here that safety officer Steve Haylett, a former police chief inspector, can keep track of everything going on at Welford Road.
This is an easy derby to manage. He recalls the day that Saints’ Rob Horne suffered career-ending, life-altering nerve damage in his arm. The ambulance in the bottom corner of the ground is usually reserved for any serious injuries to the athletes. But that day, at the exact same time, someone else stumbled over to the medics to report they were having a heart attack. It was a horrid scenario.
On typical match days, they will have up to 180 stewards and 30 security staff scattered round the ground. Everyone calls in with walkie-talkies. But it’s not as stressful as previous gigs at the Olympics or football. Now, still vigilant, he sits back with a brew.
In the future this club relishes a return to the stress of success and deeply need fans to come see the Tigers.