If the scrum is the game within the game, then talking about it – something England and Australia do a lot – is very much the game within the game within the game. Hence this week when England and their forwards coach Graham Rowntree talked politely (some would say over-politely) about Australia’s scrum, James Slipper, the Wallabies vice-captain and loosehead prop, set about undermining England’s reliance (he says over-reliance) on their big men.
In essence, Rowntree was saying that England could not afford to write off the Australia scrum, despite what happened in Dublin last week, while Slipper asked if – presumably based on what he had seen so far this autumn – a scrum was all that England had and where would they go if Australia nullified that threat.
It was ever thus. Every time England meet Australia, the Wallabies have to address their traditional weakness and red rose strength. And not without success. Go back to the 1991 World Cup. England bulldozed their way through to the final only to get talked out of their physical ways by David Campese and Co when it mattered. Result: Australia took the final 12-6 and laughed all the way home.
OK, you doubt whether England will ever be suckered quite so conclusively again, but the scrum is so central to the game, especially as it’s played in the northern hemisphere, that you can’t blame Slipper for trying. The history of games between the two nations is, like no other, a history of scrum battles won and lost.
Even in 2003, England’s World Cup was won despite a chorus of claims that, in the final, the scrum was “de-powered” by the referee André Watson; Phil Vickery sacrificed for the more ref-friendly Jason Leonard. Four years later England again got to the final, but to many the highlight of a crazy campaign was the quarter-final in Marseille when Vickery, along with Andrew Sheridan and Mark Regan, had his revenge.
However, success is far from being one way. George Gregan may be remembered for many things in his 139 Tests but an overwhelming recollection is of a scrum-half who helped mask the weaknesses of the Australian set piece with an array of tricks and devices – the early hit, the soft hit – which fooled a legion of referees for more than a decade. And while you pick your low points from Martin Johnson’s time managing England, June 2010 in Perth has to be up there. It is rare for a Test pack to be so dominant that it is awarded two penalty tries and loses.
So the scrum is important and when the southern hemisphere, in particular Australia but New Zealand as well, tried to deny its relevance it was those coaches with a history of working up here who turned thinking around. Wayne Smith, part of Graham Henry’s World Cup-winning coaching triumvirate, put it in context when he pointed out that on a rainy day a scrum penalty could be worth an instant 60 metres whereas it could take his forwards a lifetime to make such ground.
So what about today? Well, the autumn has been and continues to be all about the England midfield rather than the pack which has done well, despite being without a couple of quality props. In Joe Marler, probably third in the pecking order a year ago, England have a rapidly improving loosehead, while the prospect of injury to the tighthead, Davey Wilson, is an ongoing nightmare.
Together they have been quite a weapon and with a French referee, Jérôme Garcès, in charge there is no reason to suppose Saturday will be any different, but – and it is a big but – they have to be used properly, and here we get back to that ongoing issue about Stuart Lancaster’s progress when it comes to selection and tactics.
England have been all over the place tactically since they decided on a running game in the autumn opener against the All Blacks and continued with it despite the downpour. On Saturday there can be no doubt. It’s a day for the kickers. The forwards have to beat up the Australian pack and the kickers have to make sure the game is played deep in Australian territory. Against Ireland, Australia showed they don’t mind running from inside their 20m line. Fine, let them.
Thus it should be the day when England field the best kickers available to Lancaster, but they are not. Last week against Samoa, when it was time to show adventure in selection, England didn’t. On Saturday, when Owen Farrell’s boot alongside George Ford would be a bonus, he starts from the bench and Lancaster might have also missed a trick not starting with the guy sitting alongside – Richard Wigglesworth, probably the pick of the England box-kickers in the Premiership.
Put the boots of Ford, Farrell and Wigglesworth behind a dominant pack and you are going places, particularly as three options help move the Australian back three around. Too often England have been kicking too soon and to a settled defensive alignment. Do that with Israel Folau at home and one of the more inventive backlines alongside him and you are in trouble, especially if the kick-chase has not improved.
To win and save their autumn, England have to do what Australia like least. And that starts up front.
