Fresh Thoughts On Test Rugby Preparations

Press, Volume CVII, Issue 31500, 14 October 1967, Page 11

Fresh Thoughts On Test Rugby Preparations

By

W. N. McMURTRIE,

SporU

Bditor of tho “Glasgow Herata”) 0N their tour of the 7 British Isles and France, the All Blacks will encounter revised views on the preparation for international Rugby. For the last decade the French have been on top, or near there, in European Rugby, but, ironically, just as they take a step backwards through the adoption of a defensive policy, the English and Welsh have each done something dellnite to improve their game. England introduced to British Rugby the “teach-in” held the day after each of the three trials last season, when the potential internationals and their reserves were together. Ideas were thrashed out and moves practised. Unfortunately, England seems to have paid little attention to the basics, particularly the use of the lineout and ruck as platforms for launching attacks. But that will surely come. England seta off for this month's tour of Canada after three practice games in which it beat a Midlands and Home Counties XV but lost to the South of England and to the North. Those three matches, however, obviously brought to light players who might otherwise have been overlooked until later and have given birth to the idea that the time-consuming county championship should be

abandoned in favour of a smaller event comprising four or five districts. The amount of non-international material that comes under the selectors’ eye* would thus be reduced. The victory over England was tile only Welsh success of the season, and until then there had been no sign that the national coaching plan was having an effect at international level. K. Jarrett’s match certainly gave hope* for the future, which were strengthened this season by the appointment of D. Nash, the former international backrow forward and a 1962 Lion, as the national team coach and by the Welsh 'union's decision to select a pool of about 20 players

from whom the totemattonad teams will be chosen. Regular discussion* and practice by this small band cannot but induce team spirit and understanding. It is, too, one way of overcoming the International Rugby Board’s law which prohibits a team practising together more than a day before an international match. Ireland, too, took a revised look at coaching with a course in August Scotland ha* held occasional national courses for schoolboys and their teachers, but the Scottish union has shown so little inclination to extend the idea to adult playeri that at least one Scot went to the Irish course to ses what was what.