Steve Phillips resigns from Welsh Rugby Union, England squad update, Saracens edge another win

The Welsh Rugby Union has long been criticised for backwoodsmen overseeing an elite game better left to the professional experts.

On Sunday, one of those supposed experts, Steve Phillips, resigned as chief executive of the WRU over the handling of past allegations of sexism and misogyny within the Union’s staff, leaving the reputation of the national body at a depressingly all-time low.

Phillips’s temporary replacement Nigel Walker spoke of “an existential crisis” and “a wake-up call – perhaps it is a call that has been overdue”, while the recently elected WRU chairman Ieuan Evans said he will be working with the Welsh Government and Sport Wales on an independent taskforce to investigate the Union, and revive the move – that previously failed to gain the required majority – to install an independent chair.

As arguments continue over central funding to the regions, the alleged quashing of desperate WRU employees’ complaints of savage remarks and behaviour has invited comparison with Yorkshire cricket’s tolerance of racism.

Is there something particular about British sport that permits this apparently brutal culture, or is it present in pockets throughout society?

The rugby calendar still confounds

The powers-that-be have promised the rugby calendar will eventually change, and the number of fixtures cut so international dates no longer clash with club matches, but the mixed-up season continues to confound.

“Rugby’s weird,” said Phil Dowson, the Northampton head coach, and he was not referring to his side’s first away win since last April, 19-18 at Leicester.

A near-26,000 crowd at Mattioli Woods Welford Road watched a big Premiership derby lacking Northampton’s five players in the England training squad, while Leicester have not only lost their top two coaches, Steve Borthwick and Kevin Sinfield, to England permanently, but also temporarily at the start of this Six Nations period the spine of their team in full-back Freddie Steward, centre Dan Kelly, scrum-halves Ben Youngs and Jack van Poortvliet, tighthead props Dan Cole and Joe Heyes, and lock/flanker Ollie Chessum.

It does allow us to enjoy fringe players and youngsters getting their shot, and with England deciding against a trip abroad for warm-weather-training, Maro Itoje, Ben Earl and Jamie George, among others, joined the crowd to watch their club Saracens beat Bristol 20-19, with George gripping the handrail at the front of the grandstand like Rose and Jack on the prow of the Titanic as Francois Hougaard nabbed the winning try in added time at the end.

Unusually this year, a Six Nations coach has had to stand down from his club too, as Harlequins’ attack guru Nick Evans is on secondment to England – and while the Quins boss Tabai Matson said Evans would be available on the phone from the national team’s hotel during Sunday’s match at London Irish, it did not stop Irish winning 42-24.

Another of the resting players, Sam Simmonds, who missed Exeter’s 24-17 win over Gloucester, says Sinfield made an immediate mark as England defence coach during last week’s four-day get-together.

“You can see what it means to him to be here and it’s filtering down throughout the squad,” said Simmonds. “You want to follow him into battle… I think he is going to do good things for our defence.”

In comes Watson

Head coach Steve Borthwick updated the England squad on Sunday, with the return of Leicester’s back-three maestro Anthony Watson after injury, and the withdrawal of Exeter centre Henry Slade, who was revealed to have carried a hip problem into last week’s training camp, and has not recovered sufficiently to face Scotland in the Six Nations this Saturday.

Saracens look certs for top two

Saracens have a 22-point advantage over third place in the Premiership, so a top-two finish and a home semi-final in the end-of-season play-offs appear all but nailed on – indeed, someone cleverer than this column might do the maths to say it is already assured.

“We’ve won four games in the last minute so maybe it’s a lot closer than that [table] suggests,” Sarries’ boss Mark McCall told.

As for the rest of the league, it should be an enthralling scrap for the play-offs – and one we can savour at length, as with Wasps and Worcester having dropped out, the 11 remaining clubs have either seven or eight league matches left to play between now and May. The gaps are filled by bye weeks, the Champions Cup/Challenge Cup (note to self: stop referring to it as “Europe”) and Premiership Cup – or just having a rest.

Back to work

Southern-hemisphere referees coming off their summer break into the Six Nations were blowing the cobwebs away, as well as their whistles, over the weekend.

The New Zealanders who will handle England’s first two Six Nations matches – Paul Williams, the referee for England vs Scotland this Saturday, and James Doleman, who has charge of England v Italy the following week – pitched up in Connacht and Edinburgh respectively, in the URC.

And Australian’s Jordan Way, an assistant referee in each of the Six Nations’ first two rounds, did that job at London Irish vs Harlequins on Sunday. It may be a pipe dream to imagine every referee seeing the laws the same way, but World Rugby are chasing consistency, and all the officials involved in the Six Nations‘ opening fortnight – as well as being candidates for the World Cup later this year – will be together in London over the next three days.