YOU’RE HAVING A LAUGH!
Wales star Louis turned down Eddie’s England offer
WALES superstar Louis Rees-Zammit could have been wearing white next weekend in Cardiff had an audacious bid by Eddie Jones to lure him to England paid off.
Jones has revealed he approached the Gloucester flier before last season’s Six Nations in an attempt to persuade him to turn his back on Wales and qualify through residency for England instead.
His failure means England must deal with the scorching pace which brought ‘Rees-Lightning’ two tries against Scotland, including a majestic chipand-chase touchdown.
England coach Jones (right) said: “I gave him a ring. I heard he was very Welsh and wanted to play for Wales but said if he was interested, we would be.
“He had to do five years’ qualification in terms of residency and a young guy like him is not going to sit around for five years.
“I wished him good luck and am pleased he is doing well. I just hope he does not do too well against us.
Rees-Zammit has got something about him – footwork and pace and he finds the line.
“But like any young player, there are areas of his game that he is a little bit deficient in.
“And we have to be good enough to find those areas.”
The man tasked with stopping ReesZammit as the Guinness Six Nations resumes will be Gloucester team-mate Jonny May, who was also on the scoresheet in round two with a spectacular finish against Italy.
It will be rugby’s version of the Fast Show. “On a good day, I can just about keep up with Zam,” said May, who at 30 is a decade older than Rees-Zammit. “He is incredibly fast. As fast as I have come across. He is still very young, too, so has the potential to get quicker as well. He is a raw talent and has some skills too.
“I try and help him at Gloucester. It was part of the appeal of going back, being part of that backline with Zam.
“I will give him a wave when I see him, then you just crack on and get on with it.” May was clocked at 23.6mph against the Barbarians three years ago.
He has been honing his sprinting technique online with top American track and field coach Dan Pfaff, who is based in Arizona.
Rees-Zammit reached 22.6mph last year but has since hit a higher gear.
He said: “There are a lot of fast backs at Gloucester and it gets you faster each day, trying to outrun them.
“There’s me, Jonny May, Ollie Thorley, Charlie Sharples… it’s quite competitive. We have a bit of fun.”
Saturday will be fun too. Blink and you’ll miss it.
JaMal Musiala turns 18 this week – but the Bayern Munich midfielder has already crammed more into his career than some players do in a lifetime.
Last week he added a Club World Cup winners medal to a list of achievements that reads like a boy’s own football fantasy tale.
Musiala is currently the youngest goalscorer and debutant in Bayern history, as well as being the secondyoungest ever goalscorer in the German top flight.
Little wonder that his former head of football at Whitgift School in Croydon – who have 18 old boys now playing professional football – sometimes struggles to keep pace with a stratospheric rise in keeping with his rapid and twinkling feet.
Andrew Martin (right), Whitgift’s director of football, oversaw the progress of both Musiala and Chelsea’s Callum Hudson-Odoi during their time at the school.
And he will be watching on as both run out for their respective clubs for their Champions League last-16 ties against Lazio and Atletico Madrid on Tuesday evening.
Once again bursting with pride over two players who have the world, quite literally, at their feet.
And in the case of Musiala, a performer who is living out every kid’s teenage dream. “Jamal was always an
outstanding talent,” said Martin. “Did I foresee this happening as quickly as it has? Probably not, but he always had the ability and the desire to get to the top.
“It’s fantastic what he’s doing there. He joined us a Year 7 and then left us at the end of Year 9 to join Chelsea’s full-time programme.
“It’s funny really. He was a small lad, you could even have called him scrawny – a gust of wind looked as though it could have blown him over.
“But as soon as the ref blew that whistle he was incredible.
“His speed of thought, the pictures he saw of the game, his acceleration and his close-quarters dribbling was unbelievable.
“He was never intimidated either. He would be kicked, he would be fouled but he would just get up and get on with it. His determination and his tenacity really helped him.”
Having taken the Bundesliga by storm this season, they are the kind of qualities that are making him one of the most talked-about young players in Europe.
With Hudson-Odoi also likely to be in action on the same night, there is no shortage of celebration in this corner of south London.
“Both boys have been great,” said Martin.
“During the first lockdown, Jamal recorded an interview with me which we could show to the boys in school.
“He talked about his career so far, playing for England Schoolboys and his transition to Bayern from
Chelsea too.
“I sent him a message after he scored his first goal for Bayern and told him I was sure there were hundreds more to come. He replied:
‘thank you, sir’.
“I can’t call him a kid anymore, he’s a Bayern Munich player! He’s a fantastic young man.
“Callum is the same, he has been back here to speak in assemblies. They’re both fantastic role models.”
@MullockSMirror THROUGHOUT an era that spawned greats like Gordon Banks, Ray Clemence, Peter Shilton, Pat Jennings and Peter Schmeichel, the man nicknamed ‘Budgie’ was a shop steward for that unique breed of footballer.
Now aged 69 and still working as a keeper coach for Bowsher, a second division club in Oman, it breaks his heart to see his profession quite literally left in the hands of people he does not respect.
“The art of goalkeeping is dying,” said John Burridge, who started his career at hometown club Workington when England were still world champions and became the oldest player to appear in the Premier League at the age of 43 when he joined Manchester City.
“It absolutely makes my blood boil when I look at players getting capped for England who wouldn’t have been good enough to play in the Football League 30 years ago.
“The main criteria for a goalkeeper these days is to be 6ft 4ins – and it doesn’t matter one bit if you’re a coward.
“I saw David De Gea turn his back on the ball the other week. Manchester United’s goalkeeper, scared of getting hurt. I couldn’t believe it.
“But De Gea isn’t the only one. They’re all happy to pick up their £100,000-a-week wages – but they’re not prepared to get a smack in the teeth or the nose to keep the ball out of their net.
“People might say ‘John Burridge is a dinosaur, what does he know?’
“But when I talk to lads who I played against they all think the same as I do. The only thing
» THE MAIN CRITERIA FOR A GOALKEEPER THESE DAYS IS TO BE 6FT 4INS » THEY ARE NOT PREPARED TO GET SMACKED IN THE MOUTH TO STOP A GOAL
keepers do these days is the ‘star jump’ that Peter Schmeichel brought into the game. But Peter would only do that if he was close enough to the striker to be able to block the shot.
“If you saw a goalkeeper coming out feet first all the time, you knew he didn’t have the courage to get to the very top. Now, it seems they are actually coached to do it.” Burridge (left) played for 29 clubs during his career.
When he stepped out of the Football League, he became a ‘keeper-for-hire’, ready to join any club that needed him in an emergency.
He now works for free in Oman because he loves the game so much.
Burridge said: “Look at all the top clubs – they virtually all employ goalkeeping coaches who weren’t good enough to make it as players.
“Players earn so much money these days that they don’t have the motivation to stay in the game, so the coaching all gets left to failed keepers.
“They might have the certificates saying they’re qualified, but they are virtually the same age as the players they are giving advice to. This is a specialist position – and experience is massive. In my view, the ideal height for a keeper is 6ft or 6ft 1in.
“But if you’re not 6ft 4ins then you won’t be given a chance.
“It isn’t as though teams bombard keepers with crosses so that a big centre-forward like Andy Gray and Mick Harford could steam in at the far post to bury you and the ball into the back of the net. I look at someone like (Thibaut)
Courtois and it’s like watching a giraffe in goal.
“What would you rather have? A cat, a tiger or a lion who is agile and brave or a giraffe?
“It used to be said that you had to be mad to be a goalkeeper because you had to be willing to get hurt to keep the ball out of your goal.
“That isn’t the case these days – and it’s very sad.”