Rugby Nut

A game for all

Posts tagged ‘reflection’

Worlds Collide  Featured

By on May 1, 2023

On Saturday England women took on France in the TikTok 6 nations grand slam decider, A world record crowd for a women’s game witnessed something very special. I am not hear to talk about the game though

Many people have talked about the diversity of the crowd but there was something even more important: Within that younger, and more female crowd was also a demographic that have been around the game for many years. The old boys who have been the fabric of the game for generation after generation. The ones who have been priced out of the modern, corporate Twickenham of the men’s game. They were in the on the trains and in the cafes on the way to the game, they were in the pubs having a late breakfast, they were not the majority, but they are an example of one of the many defining moments in this event.

For the women’s game to truly succeed, it can uniquely attract new viewers as well as providing a new and very different experience for these more traditional fans of the game. They are rugby fans; they are not the ones who now fill the stadiums for men’s games, to whom the rugby is now a secondary experience.  Those traditional fans that were there on Saturday, possibly seeing a women’s game maybe for the first time, will have nothing but positive experience to share. In a way the rugby was the peripheral but not in a beer swilling, lads, lads, lads way. This was more than a game it was a celebration of where the women’s game has gone and where it is going.

I met up with countless people I have known in my rugby journey over the years, I drank too much, repeated the same stories and probably bored many people to tears, but it was a moment in which I felt the women’s game deserved; It was a thank you to the giants of the game from the past, those people who have banged the drum, the scrumqueens, the journalists who have pushed to promote it, and all of those pioneers who set the standards .

How do I measure success now? When 2025 comes around I hope I can’t get a ticket for the Twickenham final. 

Leave a comment

The Final Whistle

By on March 31, 2023

After nearly 17 years I have finally decided to hang up my whistle as a coach at the end of this season. There are multiple reasons – which I will touch on in this blog – but in truth, the passion that drove me for as long as it has is just not there anymore. I would say in fact for the last half of this season I probably have not done the team I coach justice as I have been so out of love with it. When you lose that spark, it becomes very hard to reignite. I am not saying never again, but for now no more.

I have had a ball coaching; I have loved it. I have been lucky enough to coach some great players and even greater people. I have had some success and some failure, but none of that matters as much as seeing the player who goes on to achieve the potential you thought that they could. The sense of belonging I see in players who come in, new to the game. Most important of all, watching some of the young players I have coached grow into really nice people is far more rewarding to me than any accolades they may ever achieve in sport. 

I will never lay claim to being the best coach, I have tried to make the game enjoyable and different from prescriptive coaching styles, I have tried to be fair. I have tried my best to empower players to make mistakes without fear, so they can learn from them as part of the coaching process.  I am certain I didn’t always get it right, and certainly not every player will have liked my approach or style. That is something you have to accept as a coach. 

I have two important lessons from involvement in coaching grassroots sport #1: You have to put what is right for the majority 1st and suffer the consequences of the individual’s annoyance at these decisions. #2 You can’t fix everything, so find the biggest problem and try your best!

I am pleased I am calling it a day at Bletchley Rugby Club as it is the one place where I have always felt valued and respected as a coach in my own right. It has been one of the most enjoyable coaching periods of my time. Coaching a team of really nice humans. This was a team I coached in the past; that asked me to help out for a few sessions, and here I am 2 seasons later. This is a group of players and volunteers who have had to really battle to survive. Some players moved on and all manner of vultures circled the team waiting to pick at its bones. They have had ex-players set up a team a couple of miles away; contacting oppositions of the teams they were to play and telling them Bletchley had folded. County coaches actively tried to poach players, despite fielding two sides at their own club. These situations were what motivated me to stay involved for as long as I did; to stick two fingers up to those people who wanted the team to fail.

The team knuckled down and got on with the job. The first season we won one game conceded over 600 points and got relegated: I have never enjoyed a season more. As mad as that sounds, over my coaching career I have coached unbeaten seasons, I have coached relegation seasons and yet this one was a group really digging in and trying their best, in a league that was far too tough for where they were at.  We put enjoyment at the centre of all that we did, we made sure every session was fun, every game we set small targets and they just embraced the challenge and the reality of the situation. I would say, maybe this season I lost some of that original spirit in an attempt to improve the way we played.  

Bletchley came at the right time for me: the club I was coaching at before, I don’t feel ever really took my coaching seriously, or I feel, valued my thoughts on where the club was going. In many ways my desire to coach was always motivated for many years by a dream to be the head coach at that rugby club. The club I had been part of for 20+ years. I applied for the role and set out a 3-year plan, laying out the challenges that were coming to the club and what I felt we needed to do. 3 people applied I didn’t get past the 1st round. 2 coaches less qualified than me did. One dropped out as it was too far, and the one the club choose didn’t make it to the start of the season. I was told it wasn’t personal, it was business, just like the mafia when they kill someone off. It may not have been personal to the decision makers, but it was to me: deeply personal. Everything I laid out in my interview about the challenges the club was going to face this season have come to pass.

I think what my experiences have taught me have been that in grassroots coaching you are not in control of very much really. You can be in control of trying to make rugby as enjoyable and welcoming as possible. You have to develop a thick skin, which isn’t something I am particularly good at. You have to accept criticism from people less qualified and less experienced than you and your pathway is often completely out of your control. 

In my opinion, grassroots coaching isn’t about winning things, that is a by-product of getting the little things right. It’s about creating a place that people can come to escape, to spend time with their friends and be part of something that supports them as people. Teach and inspire people to love the game, to love their clubs and let that be the only measure for success.

Personally, I’ve just completed a mentoring course through the RFU for mentoring new coaches. I’m hoping that I can find some use for that. I’m going to write my book, I’m going to watch rugby and I’m going to be a fan of the game. The challenges facing rugby at grassroots are multiple, and we need to go outside the box in the need to find new ways to engage people. I will always love the game and always be inspired by the people who play it. It’s been a privilege to be involved.

2 Comments

Time Featured

By on February 5, 2023

I thought as a follow up to the blog I posted a couple of weeks ago:  https://itsnotclever.wordpress.com/2023/01/22/all-roads-lead-to-where-i-stand/ I would follow up with another discovery I made far too late.

As my group of friends and I sat around the table last Saturday night, the realisation came to me of the importance and value of time. I joked that having a meal was great, but if they had just all put £20 in a pot, they could have got me something really nice. 

The truth is getting 8 people with busy lives’, and great responsibility’s, around a table these days is a logistical nightmare. There are now children, grandchildren, aging parents, and all manner of other things to consider. 

The value of time in the modern world, is now a gift that is more precious than any financial reward. Giving up time to someone else, to be present in someone else’s life, in a world where we are stretched and spread around so thinly is a valuable gift and it shows we care. 

I have reached a time in my life where I am conscious of the fact the time ahead of me is less than the time, I have behind me. My desire to spend it in a way that feels worthwhile is important to me. I made a pledge to try to stay present in all my encounters with other people, to avoid being distracted by devices and to try an improve an area in my life that I have been poor at. To truly be there in the moment – this oft repeated cliché – is so important to how we ensure that we are not ticking boxes but trying to connect with other people. 

We must be careful of thinking it’s possible to ‘make time’ to do things. This delusion that time is something we can conjure up. The truth is we can’t make time, we must be willing to spend it. The finite hours we have are valuable and we must treat them as such. We never know what is around the corner, or even if there is a corner. I am not the most sociable of humans, but one of the greatest pleasures in life, is talking and sharing our lives with friends and even strangers. We discover something new, we reminisce on something past, and we connect with each other, and this to me, is the real meaning to life.  

Leave a comment

All Roads Lead to Where I Stand Featured

By on January 22, 2023

What would you tell yourself 5 years ago: actually, what would you tell your young self if you could write them a letter? 

I heard a song by Don Mclean over the festive holiday it is called “Crossroads” it is a beautiful melancholy song, and one of the parts in it that really spoke to me was:

You know I’ve heard about people like me,

but I never made the connection

They walked one road to set them free

and find they’ve gone the wrong direction

But there’s no need for turning back

‘cause all roads lead to where I stand

and I believe I’ll walk them all

No matter what I may have planned.

To think to yourself that in life no matter how up and down things are, you ultimately always end up in the place you are standing. The reason this interested me so much was because it made me think about all the times, I held back from doing or saying the things I know I should have done. 

We need to accept the river of life is not something we can navigate risk free – I thought about this a lot over the Christmas season; turning 50 obviously acted as a period of reflection, coupled with the lurgy that seemed to engulf the country – In truth life will always present us with many challenging events. We cannot be protected from the losses and the moments where life dishes out its most painful realities. In those moments we must just hold on as best we can. Trying to make sense of what feels senseless. However, what it really made me think about was all those things I was afraid of confronting: how they all came to pass anyway. Whether it’s a difficult person, career choice or any number of things, rather than be afraid of the outcome, just do what you know is right.

This weekend I have a group of friends treating me to a meal as part of my 50th celebration they are a group I’ve never had to tiptoe around, I’ve never had to worry about doing my own thing, or that in doing that, they will sulk and have issues. Like all true friends they know my failings and they don’t make me feel bad about it. That is what friendship is about and ultimately what life is about. 

I would like you to think about all those people in your life who made you feel like a bad friend or family member. The people who you tiptoed around trying to avoid upset. In the cold light of day if you need to do this with anyone; the relationship whatever it is, is ultimately doomed. So again, you will end up where you are no matter how you avoid it. 

It’s often the same with your career as well, you get into a routine that is comfortable and we care about. We allow ourselves to be overlooked and mistreated as we are afraid that we may not find anything else. Yet in truth we could be let go at any point. So far better to speak up when we have the opportunity. 

So, the message I would give to my younger self is a simple one; don’t allow your life to drift by, fearful of things you cannot control. Value those people who make you feel valuable, stand up for what you can stand up for, and confront those people that do not treat you fairly. Ultimately, you want to be wherever you end up; knowing you are there on your own terms.

1 Comment

Red Rose Legacy

By on November 15, 2022

There is a time and place to critique all that has gone on with England women’s world cup campaign and I am not the person to do that. As I said in my previous blog, I have attended the last 3 world cup finals. This was the 1st I had not been able to make, and I was genuinely more upset about this defeat than I was in 2017. 

I am invested in the England women more than the men for many reasons, but they are so much more accessible to their fans than the men. The men have themselves on a pedestal and as such have become so removed from the fans that it is hard to relate to them. The women on the other hand, have been embracing their fans, they have been wandering around the pitches for hours after games, sacrificing time with friends and family to sign balls, take selfies and to chat to the kids that they will inspire for years to come. 

The goal of this team was to win the world cup. We know that everyone knew it. However, in the cold light of day to pin the success and failure of a team on one game every four years is such a tough thing to live up to. Sport is brutal, the variables over 80 minutes mean that an outcome can be decided by a thousand different moments in the game. The fact this is a game that finished with only a 3-point deficit, goes to show how good this team was. The game though wasn’t decided by one red card or one failed lineout, it was decided by lots and lots of moments from within the game. Moments that resulted in try’s for the Black Ferns, moments that opportunities were missed. 

The issue with sport is outcomes drive narratives. If England take then final lineout and score to win the game, they are the bravest team ever who fought against the odds, when they fail, then the narrative turns to decisions made, game management, substitutions, and all manner of other things. The truth is the outcome is irrelevant to the real impact this team has had on the game in this country and around the world. The All Blacks lost every world cup between 1987 and 2011. They came into every world cup as favourites. Jonah Lomu is not any less a rugby legend because he never won a world cup and Their legacy as great sides and the most influential sides in rugby isn’t diminished by their losses in World Cup Finals and neither is the legacy this Red Roses side leaves behind.

During the last three years this England team has been the driving force behind change across the rugby landscape—this is not taking away from all those individuals that fought for change within their own unions—however, the England team was the measure by which they could argue their case. The investment, the growth and they quality of the rugby they produced provided evidence that the investment could work. Would Wayne Smith and Graham Henry have been drafted into the Black Ferns side had they been successful on their tour of the northern hemisphere? Would they have been drafted in if they had won half their games? Would Wales, Scotland, and Ireland seen the changes they have had England not gone out so hard and paved the way.  

As the dust settles, I hope that team, that squad, and all that went before realise, despite the outcome there is an awful lot to be proud of. 

Leave a comment

This Rose Has Thorns

By on November 9, 2022

England came into this world cup so far ahead of the other teams it was expected to be a coronation as much as a competition; with an extended tournament, and teams who have never had this much time together that distance has decreased. France and Canada both pushed them and now they face the resurgent hosts in the final. These England rose’s have been cultivated over the last 30 game, and they have been growing on stems bristling with thorns.

It is hard to talk about finals as exciting as very often they are not, if you have skin in the game they are terrifying. I have been lucky to be at the last three women’s world cup finals. Lucky enough to witness England lift the trophy in 2014. I spent the day of that final as nervous as I have ever been. I had good friends in that team, and I had seen what they had been through to make that final. I had seen what they had sacrificed and what their friends and family had sacrificed. Not just in the preceding months but in the years and years of preparation for those days. I wasn’t worried for me, I was worried for the way they would feel if they didn’t achieve their goal. 

The history of sport is filled with people who deserved to win trophies that never did. This is because winning has no loyalty to anyone. Winning is only possible if you go out and take control of it. 

I really hope England can achieve their ultimate goal on Saturday. I think England wanted to meet New Zealand in the final, in Eden Park, the minute the final whistle blew on the 2017 World Cup final in Belfast. I sense it matters to them to win by beating New Zealand. I really feel they want maybe not revenge but a reckoning against the Black Ferns. The Black ferns themselves have inspired their country to finally take them seriously. Despite years of being their most successful World Cup team, they are now changing attitudes, and in many ways that is more important than my body clock being utterly screwed by 3am rugby.

I have been lucky to have watched the England women many times in the past, I’ve really had some of my best rugby experiences following them: from the drunken night in Paris after they won, to the slightly more sober end to 2017 and I have nothing but respect for all of them. When the dust settles on this world cup, and whatever the outcome on Saturday; in the last 30 games this team has transformed the landscape of the women’s game. In doing so they have forced other countries to step up. They have proven that investment works, support works, and the future is an exciting place for the women’s game. 

Leave a comment

Life is a Rollercoaster.

By on September 4, 2022

Two years ago, I was struggling to come to terms with the loss of a job and the loss of some key relationships in my life. I wrote about the epiphany I had when I realised the reasons behind so many of those feelings. https://wordpress.com/post/itsnotclever.wordpress.com/947 The sense of failure that had been introduced to me at school, and I had carried with me through into my adult life, had left me with an inability to process things with a rational brain: this had left me so afraid of failure it effected all aspects of my life.

I vowed to go out and take that GCSE and prove to myself that I could achieve something—I had been told by my teacher at school—I could not achieve. 

There is an irony that I found myself in an even darker place when my exam result came through. In the week my result was due I took myself away on holiday. I was going off to Devon to walk the coastal path and relax. This became one of the toughest times I have experienced. Devon was packed, there were people everywhere. I sat, one morning on the beach with a coffee; I watched as families and groups spilled down the ramp onto the beach slowly covering every part of it. In that moment – surrounded by thousands of people – I had never felt more alone. I was lost with far too much time on my hands and unable to process the multiple things that I had experienced over the past three to four years. I was overwhelmed.

I packed up my car at two in the morning, drove to a secluded spot and walked to the edge of the cliff. I sat there and I questioned every part of my life. The things that had happened, my responses to them and the damage I had done to myself through my own actions. It was a very dark moment in my life, in those moments there is no light, there is no pathway that is going to lead you into feeling ok. It is a long a winding road, and you must it navigate without a map. Those thoughts and feelings that had inspired me to take that GCSE had come back and were louder than ever. 

It is hard to explain to people what creates these moments, what starts it and ultimately what brings it to an end. I would suggest that it isn’t simple. Life is a complex and emotional rollercoaster. Finding balance is key, having people you can turn to is key, and honest conversations with those people I trust have helped massively. If I could offer any advice to people it would be: ultimately, if you are ever trapped in that darkness, and uncertain of what the future holds; remember that your time may not be now, but your time will come: for me it took 34 years. 

This is not all doom and gloom, when I finally got my result, it was better than I could have hoped. I achieved a 6 which is equivalent to an old school B. I wept with emotion; this was my proudest achievement. I had proved to myself that I wasn’t stupid. No matter how hard it may all feel at times, I would never change anything; I am the person I am because of the way I feel and process life, and slowly bit by bit I am becoming happier with that person: he may not be perfect but who is?

2 Comments

2021 It’s All About Me.

By on December 31, 2021

2021 I entered the final year of my 40’s. I also discovered more about myself than any other year before. I came to terms with a lot of unresolved issues, and I made some inroads into addressing them. 

The year started for me as it did for so many in a lockdown. I was one of the many people whose jobs were not possible to do remotely. Jobs that kept companies afloat while others were able to protect themselves: I needed it to be honest. I needed the routine of work. However, my work routine had become something I didn’t sign up for. A company where I had more than proved my ability time and time again had put me in a position, simply because I was there. That left me feeling my career was going backwards at a time where I felt it should go forward. 

Then to my shock I was presented with a life changing decision. I was told that I could take a new contract, or I could leave. An offer was made. I had never been let go from a job before and here I was facing a feeling that despite always hitting my targets always improving my area of responsibility and making it more efficient. They still didn’t want me. It is hard not to take that personally. It was clear there was no future for me there. During this same period, I also decided that the time had come to step away from a long-term coaching commitment with my rugby club. I felt that relationships had changed and that I wasn’t able to move forward in a way I had wanted to.

In a space of a week, I was no longer coaching, and I was no longer working. I felt a failure. I wasn’t sure I would recover. I didn’t know what to do and I didn’t know where to go. Sometimes in life things happen for a reason we are not sure of. The grand design of life takes us places we never intended to go. I was lucky in many ways. I was supported by so many people. People stepped up and helped me with advice, listening ears, and beer.

I put out CV’s and I started getting interviews. It soon became clear that all the skills I had built up were valued. I regularly got down to the last two people in an interview. I also started helping with some coaching with a team I had coached in the past. A team I had had a lot of success in that was now in a rebuilding phase. 

I then got a job offer. I was happy, I get a lot of value from working it’s important to me to feel the purpose of going out and earning my money. I had responsibility again and I felt that there was the scope for me to improve the working practices of the business. I had the job I wanted in my previous company, but I had to leave to find it.

The coaching was also going well. We only won one game, but I have to say it has been the best coaching experience of my time coaching. There is a sense of everyone understanding the task. Understanding the way it is being done and what we measure success and failure by.

2021 taught me that sometimes you need to be knocked down to realise you didn’t have far to fall. When you get back up you can find yourself taller and stronger. That there was more out there that you could do you just needed to believe you could do it.As for failure, like the rugby we need to decide what we measure failure by: Life’s failures do not need to be fatal. We need to frame them in the context of the winding journey that life takes us on. Success is just simply a case of being honest enough with yourself to know how to move on and start again.

2 Comments

Clarkson’s Farm and Southgate’s England

By on July 12, 2021

It may surprise those that know me that I watched Clarkson’s farm on Amazon Prime and what may surprise people more is that I enjoyed it. Maybe it’s because there is a part of me that has always wanted to be a farmer. I loved the thought of running the land and managing animals and being outside. It was an entertaining and enjoyable series I warmed to what Clarkson was trying to do. He hams it up a bit when it comes to some sensible regulations like not storing fertiliser with highly flammable items. His general lack of listening to sensible advice is good TV but makes no sense, but there was one overriding issue that got bigger as the series went on. 

It wasn’t that Clarkson was his usual blunt self it was the fact he like so many others nowadays seem to get more out of trying to be offensive just to be offensive rather than because he believes what he is saying.

I’m very much for free speech. I believe in it wholeheartedly, I believe that when you try to silence people they just go underground, create anonymous accounts, and go about sharing whatever warped view they have in a far more sinister way.

The truth is most of the people who want free speech fail to understand that it comes with responsibility and consequence. Some feel it should be a chance to say what you want and for it to be unchallenged. To make racist/homophobic or insulting statements and then become a victim when your employer decides he no longer wants to employ you. 

Not everyone agrees with this, but all arguments made by racists, sexists and homophobes fall apart under scrutiny. In fact, they don’t just fall apart they are humiliatingly weak and based on unverifiable straw man situations. The risk of silencing them rather than arguing is Opinions become facts when they go underground and that’s why freedom of speech is so important however uncomfortable it may be to hear.  

Anonymity is in fact the biggest issue with the internet. I don’t want everyone to be identifiable to everyone, but I want everyone to be identifiable for their posts. The fallout from last night’s Football has highlighted again the cesspit that is social media and the struggle to hold people accountable for the things they post. 

On the field and off the players conducted themselves with an awful lot of dignity the manager showed you don’t have to be abrasive and dominant to get the best out of people and they bought a large section of a previously divided country together for a brief period.

There is always a comment when sportspeople mention issues “keep politics out of sport” but the truth is politics is as entwined with sport as winning and losing. How we treat women athletes, gay transgender black and ethnic sportspeople say a lot about our politics. 

The demographic that sees Clarkson as their hero are now so afraid of any form of progress or a move away from what they are comfortable with they are just intent on trying to upset anyone who isn’t a meat eating, straight, white man. Not because they really believe it but just simply to get a feeling, they have the power. If you can still upset people, you can feel relevant and that’s what these people crave and need to be relevant.

There will always be people who will make money through dividing us. Generating vitriol on the back of big national issues is a goldmine that has no depths some people aren’t willing to climb into just trying to shock people. What we must cling onto is that they are simply the death throws of a group who are losing control of what previously was their right of birth. It’s scary for them and as such we must realise the more extreme either end of the political spectrum becomes the more normal people move to the centre and start to normalise the Gareth Southgate approach to life.   

Leave a comment

“Winning” Culture. Featured

By on June 28, 2021

Much will rightly be made about the success of Harlequins this season. The journey they have been on as a club, the success of the women’s team and now, against the odds wins, in the semi-final and final of the Premiership. There will be talk of how they did it, how the “culture” created success. I think it’s important that if you want to be successful as a team to never try to copy a culture and most importantly believe it to be the reason why success has happened. 

To put it in perspective Quin’s semi-final and final produced a total point scored of 157 yet Quins winning margin over both games was only 9. This isn’t written to diminish Harlequins achievements it is written as a warning to those who try to copy any “winning” formula. Grassroots community clubs will all be looking for what they can replicate.

Results will always drive the narrative, it’s important to realise that had Harlequins lost the semi-final, we would be talking about the winning culture of Bristol or Exeter. I imagine both are very different to the one at Quins. The same for Saracens the All Blacks, South Africa, or any other successful sporting franchise.

England in the world cup in 2015 were pilloried and ridiculed for exiting the group stage of a home world cup. What would the narrative had been had they scored a driving lineout try and lost in the quarter final?  Stuart Lancaster would probably have been put through a far more dignified assessment of his role and maybe would have had a chance to prove his qualities as a coach which he has since been able to prove elsewhere.

While we talk about coaches a lot is being said about how Paul Gustard’s time at Quins. Brian Clough, arguably one of the most successful sports coaches England has ever produced, went to Leeds and lasted 44 days before he was turfed out. He wasn’t successful there, not because he wasn’t successful and capable, but he simply didn’t suit that club. Gustard likewise didn’t suit Harlequins and as I don’t wish failure on anyone, well not anyone just not people I don’t know. I hope, like Lancaster he is able to go away and take something from his time there that helps him in the future.

So beware of trying to manufacture “Culture” at the cost of the individual. The success of most teams is not about creating something to live by but harnessing all the individual needs to be successful. Every player on that pitch for Harlequins would have had a different reason to be there. Joe Marler’s drive to win the game would be different to Louis Lynagh’s. Some wanted to prove a point for their team or for themselves. Some would have been driven by a need to beat someone in the opposition. Some wanted to do so to make someone proud. In some simply a fear of losing. There was a squad of 23 players each one would have a unique reason to drive them towards their goal. That requires an ability to motivate each person, in a unique way, to harness all those strands of desire and in some cases fear. When it works it’s almost impossible to stop.

In Community sports clubs, culture is ever changing it should never be written on a wall it should be decoration that at some points needs to be repainted and updated. The only marker that should count is how many people come back next week, next month and next year. It is about clubs that can overcome losing as well as celebrate winning. What grassroots community clubs should take from Harlequins success is that playing rugby to win is a lot more fun than playing it to avoid losing.

Leave a comment