Rugby Summer Tours Largely Useless

After a largely unsuccessful summer for the Northern Hemisphere teams, the unions of the major European nations are asking themselves the perennial questions about the sometimes painfully obvious gap in quality between the two hemispheres.

What precisely are the factors that make these tours south so humiliating?

This summer Wales took a fairly depleted squad to South Africa and England arrived in New Zealand with a largely experimental squad (a move that arguably backfired off the field rather than on it). Ireland suffered defeat to both Australia and New Zealand with as close to a first team as possible, following a grueling domestic season.

In fact, the only team out of the Home Nations and France to record a win on the road this summer was Scotland in Argentina.

England met a New Zealand side with momentum after a narrow victory against Ireland, still nursing their wounds from yet another early exit from a World Cup competition at which they were expected to reign supreme.

Under the guidance of Rob Andrew a fairly youthful squad competed at an average level throughout both of the contests, barely getting a look in from a rampant Kiwi side.

Their find of the tour was undoubtedly Topsy Ojo of London Irish, who capped a mercurial domestic season with a brace of tries on his international debut. However, any positives that the team could find on the field were quickly overshadowed by the antics of four players in an Auckland hotel. 

Surely, however, the future looks bright for what could be a very exciting group of players. One can only hope that Martin Johnson will have a calming influence and teach the younger members of his squad the responsibility that comes with being an international rugby player.

For Wales it was yet another tour that highlighted a deficiency in being able to kick-on from any decent performances beforehand.

Their electrifying performance in this year's Six Nations tournament proved that the flamboyance and grit of '70s Welsh rugby is still alive and well in the current crop of players. The regularity of superb performances from Shane and Martyn Williams and the positive competition for the No. 10 jersey ensured that any attempt to stop the Welsh juggernaut was swept aside during February and March.

However, this once again was not backed up by any sign of a solid performance in South Africa. The defensive reliability of Gavin Henson was sorely missed, meaning that Shaun Edwards’ previously unbreakable blitz defence faultered and any attempts to counter the South African physicality was limited.

The absence of Leigh Byrne at full-back was also highlighted, with Warren Gatland choosing firstly to replace him with the gargantuan Jamie Roberts, who had only played a handful of first-class games in the highly specialist position. This left out-and-out fullback Morgan Stoddard on the bench.

In the second Test, Gatland put James Hook at 15. Hook had no experience with the position at a competitive level. Gatland’s reasoning behind this was that he simply had to have Hook and Stephen Jones on the pitch.

This was not the case at any point during the Six Nations, so why did he change a winning formula? Is it the case that Northern Hemisphere nations feel the need to experiment on these tours? If so, then perhaps these tours are of little use.

Even then, the records of Six Nations sides against Tri-Nations teams are abysmal, when World Cups and Autumn Internationals are taken into account. The fact that rugby is not the first sport in England, France, or Scotland gives backing to the argument that the game needs much more care at a grassroots level and more financial backing.

In the Southern Hemisphere the sport enjoys pride of place as the priority sport in both South Africa and New Zealand, with Super 14 games boasting crowds regularly above 60,000, compared to a measly 10,000 in England.

Hopefully we can expect an improvement in the quality of touring parties in the future, but the inside scoop: don’t hold your breath.