Concerning the French tackle on Johnny Sexton which would have cut the Wellington monument in the Phoenix Park in half: incredibly, it was legal. Its primary purpose seemed to be to disembowel him, by means of a shoulder-charge into the midriff which was made “lawful” by the flapping presence of two otherwise irrelevant arms. This was a tackle in much the same way that the grunted invocation “Brace yourself, Bridget” is foreplay.
Trailing giblets and various severed tendons, Sexton then left the park. I assumed we’d next see him at his farewell testimonial, a plaid blanket across his lap with perhaps a tea cosy on his head, and looking as bewildered as the grandad in Mrs Brown’s Boys. In fact, he has miraculously recovered, in part because he is largely titanium, with joints made from the hinges on shipbuilding cranes. But what would have happened to a player composed of ordinary flesh, bones and blood? Ground staff with bags and pointy sticks would still be out collecting the pieces.
Rugby has never been more effective as a non-political unifier of the peoples of Ireland. But that shouldn’t blind us to certain truths, nor prevent us asking whether the sport is going in the right direction. The internet is filled with debate about illegal spear-tackles, tip-tackles and clear-outs, all of which can cause spinal injuries. Yet, curiously, there’s little real debate about the tackle by Louis Picamoles that could have transformed Sexton into a one-man body-part farm.
It was entirely legal, yet it was morally criminal. Its purpose was not to dispossess or stop the Irish No 10 but to incapacitate him, which it did, if only temporarily. However, its ramifications were even more profitable for the French, because his replacement Ian Madigan, still off the pace of the game, soon kicked directly into touch. The resulting line-out, deep in the Irish half, required such desperate defending that the heroic Paul O’Connell incurred his international career-ending injuries, and was borne from the pitch on his shield, like Horatius from his bridge.
The icing on this Gallic gateau was that the Irish pack had to fight that bit harder with the Limerick giant gone; and thus also exited also that near- cyborg Peter O’Mahony, not just from the match but from the World Cup. So, in military terms, Picamoles’s assault on Sexton was a perfect example of the economy of effort: one ruthless tackle, three casualties. Ireland nonetheless won because Joe Schmidt — the best coach in the world — had trained his replacements to slide into his game plan like the interchangeable, machine-tooled cogs and cams of a Mercedes engine.
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Now, the only sporting venue where a horizontal shoulder-charge into someone’s midriff at near-sonic speed could be justified would of course be Wimbledon, if Cliff Richard ever looked like singing there again. No true lover of sport or music could possibly object if Venus Williams did a Picamoles on him, propelling his oesophagus into the English Channel, his tonsils into Berkeley Square and his teeth into earth-orbit. Otherwise, such tackling is a cynical abuse of the laws of rugby and a violation of the few shreds that remain of the sporting code of Corinth.
Rugby law-makers, understandably, tend to yawn politely when assailed by the opinions of outside amateurs such as myself. The offside laws are Norwegian subjunctives to me, and I have long since abandoned any hope of understanding the legal intricacies of rucks, mauls and scrums. Indeed, the art of scrimmaging seems to require the skills and knowledge of Isaac Newton, Heinz Guderian and Judas Iscariot, though Hannibal Lecter is not without some influence.
Yet, even in the absence of any technical expertise, I still have opinions. Though tragically lacking both the offspring and the downstairs plumbing that would qualify me to do so, I venture now to speak for the mothers of Ireland. And with a suitably fallopian fervour, I murmur the following words into the ears of rugby’s law-makers: “I would not let any son of mine play a sport that legally tolerates the kind of tackle that nearly bifurcated Jonathan Sexton.”
Once upon a time, such an intentionally disabling tackle as Picamoles’s — a flying shoulder deep into a player’s abdomen — would have been deemed ungentlemanly and a violation of the code of the game. Not merely would the offender be punished officially, within the game generally he would be regarded as a pariah to be boycotted even in Coventry. However, in the 20 years since rugby went professional, we’ve seen a steady erosion of rugby culture.
Top rugby schools now invest in the sport as though it were a branch of science, with highly paid coaches, medical equipment and computer technology dedicated to the production of teenage super-athletes. Nobody knows much about the long-term consequences of young boys doing weight training to build muscle on still developing bones, all aided by high-protein diets and legally dubious growth additives.
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Today’s rugby international players have known only the culture created by professionalism. Some even spend their nights in oxygen tents to ensure their bodies don’t use the excuse of the eight hours of exercise-free indolence known as “sleep” to accumulate unnecessary fat. What happens to ex-players in middle age, as muscle becomes adipose? Nobody really knows, because the most comparable sport, American football, doesn’t make such unremitting demands upon a single group of players as does rugby on the pack.
Apologists for the game may say all is fine; that the existing laws might need some fine adjustment, but player welfare remains paramount. Such considerations will become purely hypothetical if mothers refuse to let their sons play a sport where the intentional bodily deconstruction and evisceration of participants, using blunt force, remains lawful.
It’s 10 years since the great Brian O’Driscoll was spear-tackled by Keven Mealamu and Tana Umaga in New Zealand, so ending his Lions tour — and nearly his life. Had Mealamu and Umaga been banned for life, in punishment for what looked like a professional hit in an unlit alleyway at midnight, maybe an alternative culture, based on respect and duty of care for an opponent, would now be more evident.
Instead, violent, self-pitying sectionalism still prevails. Scottish rugby is currently in a childish tizzy about the “unfairness” of what were in fact outrageously brief suspensions of two of its players. Video replays clearly show one lifting up a Samoan, then trying to send him back home to the South Seas the short way, via the Earth’s mantle. The Samoan is lucky not to be spending the rest of his days in a neck-braced wheelchair, doubly incontinent and breathing through a tube.
Yet that tackle of course violated rugby laws. The Picamoles tackle didn’t. And mothers will rightly stop their sons from playing rugby, while deliberate, match-ending tackles remain culturally and legally acceptable. They’re not necessary. End them.