Five Nations free-for-all after Welsh dominance

THE 1980s, with Wales no longer on their lofty perch of the 70s, was an unpredictable decade in the Five Nations with four Grand Slams but no one nation achieving dominance, although France were usually the team to beat.

It started with a long overdue Slam for England, their first in 23 years, when Bill Beaumont captained a team that on paper should have been achieving great things for four or five seasons with a particularly gnarly pack featuring Fran Cotton, Peter Wheeler, Tony Neary, Roger Uttley and other warriors carrying all before them.

England finally got the right team on the park – so often their problem – and had the good sense to also arm themselves with the world class goal-kicking of Dusty Hare who could bail them out when things occasionally went wrong, notably in a nasty dog fight against Wales at Twickenham. This was the game that effectively decided the Championship and signalled the end of Wales’ glory years although they didn’t go down without a fight, so to speak.

England failed to bat on after 1980 with retirements and career ending injuries not helping and within a couple of seasons they were back among the alsorans where they stayed until the arrival of Geoff Cooke in 1988.

Under the captaincy of Jean Pierre Rives, France were outstanding Slam winners in 1981 clinching the title with a 16-12 win at Twickenham, yet 12 months later they were wooden spoonists managing just one win, at home to Ireland who nonetheless took the Championship. It was as if, in the absence of a dominant Wales team, everybody was determined to enjoy their moment in the sun.

That was certainly the case with Scotland in 1984. Their Slam was arguably forged in the disappointment experienced by coach Jim Telfer and his leading players on the 1983 Lions tour of NZ, a tough trip and occasionally humiliating experience. Things had to improve, and they did later that year when Scotland claimed a magnificent 25-25 draw against the All Blacks. Valuable lessons had been learnt.

Scotland got away to a quick start with wins over Wales and England but then came a testing visit to Dublin. Telfer takes up the story.

“We had a month ‘off ’ before the game and we had to keep the lads ticking over so we had a few sessions on a beach near Leith when we had bad weather. There were already a few ‘Grand Slam’ mutterings in the Press but we had to mark time and I started to fret a wee bit.

“The referee was Fred Howard from England – Fearless Fred – and he was a very good ref indeed but a disciplinarian who would allow no leeway if you infringed. In the build-up I stressed the need for discipline and not to get on the wrong side of Fred.

“I also opted for a bit of reverse psychology the night before the game and showed the lads a tape of the South of Scotland being thumped 30-9 by New Zealand just a couple of months earlier, a game which Fred refereed. Eight or nine of our team for Lansdowne Road had been involved that day and I could feel them all bristle watching the screen. Perfect, that was exactly what I had wanted. The following day, in difficult conditions, we thumped them 32-9 and that was as good a Scotland performance as I have ever been associated with.”

The Scots clinched the Slam against France at Murrayfield where they had to soak up huge pressure before coming back after the break, a massive tackle on dangerous No.9 Jerome Gallion by flanker David Leslie proving a mood changer with Scotland going on to win 22-12. Rather in keeping with the decade’s theme Scotland bombed the following year experiencing a Five Nations whitewash.

The 1987 French team was the one Grand Slamwinning team of the 80s that bucked the trend a little. Powerful and mean up front with exciting backs like Philippe Sella, Denis Charvet, Eric Bonneval and Pierre Berbizier, they looked to have longterm potential and to a degree they fulfilled that. Three months later they reached the inaugural World Cup final where, having emptied the tanks in their epic semi-final against Australia, they ran out of steam against NZ and lost 29-9. It was a wake up call for northern hemisphere rugby, the southern hemisphere were in charge now.