ENGLISH rugby inched closer to anarchy last night amid widespread uncertainty over how many of the 43-man national squad will turn up at today's training session at Bisham Abbey. A tug-of-war between the top clubs and Twickenham for control of England's elite players has forced them to make the painful choice between club and country.
A quartet of Leicester forwards, Graham Rowntree, Martin Johnson, Richard Cockerill and Darren Gosforth, were the first to announce they would boycott the squad session. According to Peter Wheeler, the Leicester chief executive, the players had made their own decision. "We didn't say to them `you will not go'," Wheeler explained. "We told them the position as we saw it and left it up to them."
Many players have come under pressure from the English Professional Rugby Union (Epruc) clubs to stay away from the first squad session of the new season, though the clubs insist that attendance at training is not an issue in itself. The players are divided, with some claiming they are confused by the clubs' threat to break away from the Rugby Football Union while others, notably Lawrence Dallaglio of Wasps, promised they would turn up whatever the relative merits of the dispute.
Several members of the squad, which was announced last week, spoke by telephone to Don Rutherford, the RFU director of rugby, who advised them to attend the training session notwithstanding the absence of a current contract between the players and the RFU. However, Epruc, which has no plans to talk further to Twickenham, declared that the players should support their employers, the clubs, since they were being paid good salaries.
The RFU issued a statement saying it understood "some clubs may have discouraged their players from attending a scheduled training session at Bisham Abbey". Dates for squad sessions had been agreed with the clubs, with a midsummer session being held on July 24th. Today's session would go ahead as planned, insisted the RFU.
"We had a clear understanding about squad sessions with Epruc which should work without any trouble, but the players have been put under pressure by the clubs," said Rutherford. "The training situation is only confusing to the players because it has been confused by Epruc, who seem to have issued some kind of edict."
Rutherford, who is expected to take over some managerial duties with England shortly, claimed the clubs "had put the threats on the players", possibly because they feared the players might sign contracts with the RFU for the new season. "In fact, no contracts will be offered this week," he said, "though we may discuss them with the players in addition to selection matters.
Dallaglio had said he would turn up and practise irrespective of the Epruc standpoint: the Wasps flanker has, of course, been widely tipped as the next England captain, following Will Carling's resignation last March. Other Wasps players such as Damian Hopley, Nick Green stock, Andy Gomarsall and Chris Sheasby are expected to take their cue from Dallaglio, who is their club skipper.
However, Donald Kerr, the chairman of Epruc, made it clear that the clubs had put their ease (for independence from the RFU) to the players and sought their support. "The players are the key to this dispute," he declared. "They are being paid reasonable salaries, we have stuck our necks out for them, and it's their turn to stick their necks out for us. But we do not wish to put them in an invidious position."
