REMEMBER WHEN...
That was our verdict when Stuart Lancaster’s team toured New Zealand a decade ago
IT’S TEN years since the last England tour to New Zealand, writes Alan Pearey. To nobody’s surprise, Stuart Lancaster’s team lost the series 3-0, with Stuart Barnes picking Danny Cipriani as the star tourist in our August 2014 issue. Barnes was less enamoured with England as a whole, accusing them of “delusions of grandeur” for trying to engage in an open-style battle with the world’s running masters. “The series was lost in a tactical miasma,” he wrote, slamming “the folly of England’s fast-paced, loose-thinking ambition”.
It wasn’t all doom and gloom for England, though, because their U20s had just won the Junior World Cup in Auckland under Maro Itoje’s captaincy. And the Kiwis were heading for a fall. “If you had to bank your house on something,” wrote Ali Donnelly, “the Black Ferns appearing in the Women’s World Cup final in Paris would be one of them.” Oops! NZ’s crown slipped as England defeated Canada in the final. Current England boss Steve Borthwick had just retired as a player at Saracens, while we had features on newly capped Celtic half-backs Gareth Davies and Finn Russell, the latter wide-eyed after making his Scotland debut against the USA in Houston.
Stephen Jones addressed the question “Is TV ruining rugby?” in his inimitable fashion.
