The Friday Blog: Four Teams Under Duress
It was a tricky weekend for Great Britain’s national sporting teams. Blimey! I am really not sure what to make of the Welsh Men’s rugby team’s performance in Paris. Daft as it sounds, given the score and the non-contest nature of the affair, I did not think that Wales played at all badly. The players stood up but were simply not good enough. The game plan probably did not help. I suppose if you run hard enough, often enough at a brick wall, eventually it might start to give way a little. Just not on Friday night. On Friday night the brick wall was 15 blue jerseys, each with its tail up and buoyed by a crowd which, when it does deign to get behind its team, provides the proverbial 16th man. Not that this French team needs any metaphorical extra players when it has an actual one who is worth two, three or maybe even four of anyone else. Not much I can say about Antoine du Pont that has not already been said, except that he is, by some very considerable distance, the finest rugby player I have ever seen. Annoyingly, he is also a charming and humble man, with a lively sense of humour and, as I found out via a BBC podcast, a more than passable singing voice. What was most ominous for every other team was that not only did France not seem to get out of second gear, they were comfortable and confident enough to remove Du Pont and four other key starters after less than 50 minutes. Not that it made much difference, the game continued looking pretty much like a training ground run for Les Bleus, and Wales suffered the ignominy of failing to register a single point.
My Saturday morning snooze was punctuated by Test Match Special as I tuned in to hear if England’s Women could manage to salvage some semblance of pride in the final game of the multi-format Ashes series. They could not. English cricketers are not unaccustomed to being humiliated on Australian soil, but this one will smart. England arrived ranked second behind their hosts and thought they were close. They were not. In all honesty, you only had to look at the two teams standing next to each other and how they carried themselves to see that the Aussies had a steely intensity that England could not match.
A few lifetimes ago I used to coach and referee some Prep school rugby. On the occasions I had the whistle, I always made three points to the coaches in my pre-match briefing. Firstly, I would let the game flow as best as I could and not be too technical. Secondly, I would play on for as long as necessary to establish if an advantage had accrued. And, finally, if the margin reached 40 points and was going away, I would stop the game. These were, after all, 9- and 10-year-old boys in whom we were trying to instil love for a game which, if you are being seriously outgunned, can be a pretty miserable way to spend an afternoon. I thought of that “preventing unnecessary suffering” approach as I followed events in Paris and Melbourne, and, indeed, in Mumbai too where England’s men suffered a record T20 defeat. They managed to lose by 150 runs. 150 runs in a 20 over match! 150 is not a bad score in a T20, so to lose by that many must qualify as some sort of achievement.
Meanwhile in Dublin England’s rugby players were absolutely magnificent. For about 30 minutes. After which time they ran out of steam and Ireland piled on the agony and reminded us why they have been rated so highly for so long. I am now going to alienate my Irish readers by saying that the side’s recent success owes much to an Englishman, but not the one you think I am thinking of. No, not the current Head Coach, Andy Farrell, even if he is a handy fellow to have around, but one of his now somewhat distant predecessors and fellow North Westerner, Brian Ashton. Ashton’s legacy was to ensure that Ireland’s best players returned from England, France and elsewhere and played their club rugby at home. That is really important for a small country with a limited player pool to be able to create a sense of common purpose and unity, something New Zealand has always done well. If you think I am talking rubbish as usual, consider this for a statistic. Of Ireland’s starting XV in Dublin, 12 had come through the Leinster Academy, and of the others, two learnt their trade in Australia and one in New Zealand. These guys know each other instinctively and how any individual is likely to react in any given situation. That provides a cohesion that England might never, ever achieve, its side drawn from nine different clubs and being asked to play in a style alien to all of them.
Only the Scots of the home nations did the business, although I thought that the score flattered Scotland in victory as much as it flattered England in defeat. Ireland were two scores better than England, but Scotland were not two scores better than Italy. That said, with Ireland heading to Murrayfield this weekend, Scotland will be pleased that they were clinical in converting their chances and defended solidly in the last 10 minutes when Italy threatened an unlikely comeback. But for England, despite what might be being said, the camp will have been very jittery this week. They arrived in Dublin believing they had the plan and the personnel to beat Ireland who were considered as being vulnerable. But reports of Ireland’s demise are much exaggerated, and as the game went on, they grew in strength and confidence as England wilted. Although England now have three games at home, this week they entertain France who posted 50 points last time they came to London. After that it is Scotland, who England just cannot seem to beat. That, then, presents the very real prospect that England, some people’s pre-tournament favourites could be no wins from three games. If that comes to pass, the Italians will be licking their lips, and can you imagine being part of an England squad, shorn of confidence, having to travel to Cardiff in what could be a wooded spoon decider. That does not bear thinking about, it really does not. No wonder people are talking about siege mentalities in the three squads that lost last weekend.
There is also likely to be something of a siege mentality in Wellington House where some believe the writing might well be on the wall for NHS England. Young Wes has been bumbling on about that he would not invent NHSE if it did not already exist, and blaming it all on Andrew Lansley’s ill feted 2012 Health and Social Care Act. I do feel sorry for Lansley because that will be forever his legacy. Mind you, even then a lot of people thought it was bonkers to hand over £120 Billion of taxpayers' money to an arm’s length body. The phone calls from Richmond House continued but the levers that DH had over the NHS were, at least in theory, much reduced. We can debate as to what extent it was an attempt to retain authority whilst transferring accountability elsewhere (never works) or how much it was a product of Lansley’s wishes to supercharge Primary Care commissioning being thwarted by him being a Coalition, rather than a Conservative Health Secretary. In any event there has subsequently existed a rather uneasy tension between the Department and the newly created NHS Commissioning Board (NHSE does not actually exist). Even if Streeting has said he will not abolish it, if you were CEO Amanda Pritchard you might well wonder. Sat alongside the Health Secretary and presenting to an all-staff meeting, Pritchard announced that 15% of them (2,000) would be on their ways as part of cuts. That might be reasonably manageable had it not followed around 7,000 posts having already gone during a major restructure over the past two years.
Officials believe the move is necessary to free up more money amid a tight settlement, and to show leadership as local organisations are asked to make “tough decisions” about staff and services. Pritchard said that the move “does not require a full restructure, but our first step is to review all our activity as part of our 2025-26 planning, to make sure we are as efficient and effective as possible… We need to reduce duplication and add real value to the work of the NHS, complementing DHSC’s role…
“It is also right that we are taking the same steps we are asking of the wider NHS. We all have an equal responsibility to look at where we can make savings and efficiencies, maximising the resources available for patient care.
“This means we will be taking actions to save £150m of non-pay resources and reducing our staffing costs by a further £175m, equivalent to around 15% of our new NHS England structures – giving £325m to support the frontline over the coming year.
“We want to complete this work as quickly as we can to give you clarity. National directors will lead work in their areas to identify where the targeted changes may need to be made. Then, in around a week’s time, the executive will review this work and agree where the focus will be. We will then lay out the next steps and engage with the staff and functions affected.”
It is understood the restructure will look at moving staff to focus on the new government’s priorities, particularly delivering the smaller set of core targets; eliminating some duplication with the DHSC; and devolving more responsibilities to Integrated Care Boards. And good look with that. Here in the Midlands three ICBs have announced the departure of their CEOs in the last two weeks, and there is no sight of the changes that might be required to local governance to make ICBs actually workable in the long run.
Reflecting on all that makes me think that the job of England’s sports coaches seems relatively easy, and by the end of the weekend the Rugby team will be right back in the hunt having kept DuPont quiet and the ball away from the huge French forwards, and the Cricketers will have taken a two nil lead in the One Day International series. If you fancy that as a double, you are a braver man than me, but enjoy the ride anyway.
