Thugs and violence in rugby? Poppycock!!!

Tally hooooo!
By The Major
March 10 2004

So just what is all this stuff and nonsense I read from some misguided folk this morning about this Corne chappie being a thug? Thugs in our great, good and honourable game? Tommy rot absolute 100% tommy rot. Let me tell you this, my dear foundlings of the shire, today they simply don’t exist.

Let me tell you about so-called violence in rugger!!!

In my day, considered by most (well myself and fellow old Harrovian Blenkers-Forthrop) as the heyday of the game, the rough stuff was paramount. It counted above all else in showing that a chap had had a decent upbringing and could stand proud in the company of his elders. It was a golden age for the oval ball, never bettered before or since. And let me tell you, in those halcyon days, violence was the very essence of the rugby game!

And nowadays, I mean how trivial can you get? On reading the postings yesterday I fully expected to see the man Krige of South Africa having a record that showed at least a full decapitation or disembowelment of his opposite number. When I actually hunted down the video tape thingy of the alleged incidents at Twickers on the rotund chap's programme on Sky television I was utterly dumbfounded. Call that a punch, call that a headbutt, call that a lunge? Poppycock!

I've seen people hand far worse out to their butlers and footmen for passing the port in the wrong direction or failing to properly clean their 12 bore at one of my shooting weekends. And as for the supposed injury on the English johnnies at this game, well I've received worse myself in the pleasant country pursuit of piggy sticking at Rawlpindi in the last days of the Raj from a particular slippery piglet called Tusker.
Violence? These lily livered individuals don't know the half of it.

That's the inherent trouble with most of your professional rugger types nowadays, they just don't know what real blood and guts violence is like. They've never been through a war or an armed conflict to teach them the finer art of sportsmanship. And sadly it's all too plain to see.

I can remember, quite clearly, the first season after returning from service with the 7th Hussars in WW2. We'd given Johnny Bosch a sound thrashing all over Europe and chased the Italians back over the Alps in some style. We were all chomping at the bit and raring to go on our return to these shores and that first season after armistice was probably the game played at its purist.

Halcyon days! Sometimes we never even bothered with a referee in the second half and more often than not a ball either. We just stood toe to toe and battled it out for forty minutes, until we ran out of opposition or we answered the call of glasses clinking at the bar. Now that's what rugger's all about, not this namby pamby passing game the nancy boys play today.

One particular incident comes to mind which always makes me chuckle over my Remy Martin as I reminisce. It must have been early '46 and we played London Scottish in a particularly free flowing encounter at Richmond which ended up 0-0 in score but with six chaps from either side in Guys Hospital. Anyway after a few snifters and a few verses of Eskimo Nell in the clubhouse we all climbed aboard the vehicle to take us home.

Picking up the patched up chaps at Guys along the way all was quiet until we reached the outskirts of Stony Stratford when a large cheer emanated from the rear of the charabang. I turned to see ‘Roly’ Roland Henderson-Green, our hooker of the time, astride the aisle holding aloft the leg of his opposite hooking number that afternoon, sock, boot and all!

The cheers from all lasted the whole journey and long in the night as we paraded said detached leg shoulder high around all the hostelries of the town. The incident goes down in the annals as one of the great days for our club. Of course we made old Roly return the limb at season end which was somewhat of a shame as it looked so at home propping up the clubhouse bar.

But oh how we have laughed about that incident over the years. Unfortunately old Roly is no longer with us, he's in a home for the bewildered out Wellingborough way but Macaroon Robertson the opposition 'legless' hooker that day from Scottish stills pays a yearly pilgrimage to see us. He even donated his last wooden limb, (before he went over to aluminium), to the new clubhouse extension and it now takes pride of place on display between one of Fran Cottons ears and a cutting of that young scamp Austin Healeys real hair, which is quite a rare relic I believe.

Old 'Roony' as he is affectionately known didn't care a jot about the initial injury, just patched himself up, got himself a mahogany trotter then joined Quins and was their highest scorer in 9 out of 10 years of the next decade. A true gentleman of the sport. Now that is what the game is all about not this drift defence the wooly wooftahs play today before they drink their isotonic drinks. Stuff and nonsense absolute 100% bally stuff and nonsense.

Now you can see what sportsmanship and camaraderie existed in the golden age of the game and why these modern players should not be allowed to drag rugger any further down the track towards syncronised swimming. Lets face it, the only Bosch the current players are going to have trouble with is their damned washing machines as they wash their silken undergarments.

But I say enough is enough, action has to be taken, and now! To combat this I, amongst others, have devised a little plan to teach this latest generation the true art of the game, to toughen up and be prepared to kill, maim and disfigure for Queen and country but most importantly for their rugger clubs.

My plan is a simple one. In conjunction with several other prominent rugger old boys at the MOD I've arranged to invade France two weeks on Thursday. Immediate conscription is to be meted out to all England and Zurich Premiership players to take part in the initial invasion party. The immediate plan is to muster at the Calais hypermart complex where I hear there’s a very reasonable Cabernet Sauvignon on offer.

By Friday, if all goes well, we'll be lunching on the Champs Elysees with a weekend in Paris to look forward too. And hopefully well stocked in the best wine for a triumphant return to blighty.

The players, the England troop included after being shown up by Johnny Irish last week, will have been suitably licked into shape by then to take on allcomers, ball or no ball.

Tally hooooooooooooooo!

Now does anyone know if there's anything happening in Paris on the weekend of March 27th? Or is it just like ’44 and a dashed good night down the Moulin Rouge with those French fillies again………ah the memories come flooding back………

Pass the port Blenkers.

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