Today should have been Jonny Wilkinson's day.
Instead the Calcutta Cup clash with Scotland today is set to be overshadowed by the row over England coach Brian Ashton's handling of Danny Cipriani, the youngster who has been anointed as Wilkinson's heir apparent.
England's next big star in waiting, who should have been making his first start for his country, will miss the match after failing to sidestep a photographer waiting for him when he emerged from a London nightclub just after midnight on Thursday.
The result was an unceremonious return to the sidelines and, as Cipriani spends the weekend contemplating what might have been, Wilkinson will almost certainly be entering the history books.
The International Rugby Board ruled this week that the star flyhalf's 20 points for the British Lions in a match against Argentina in May 2005 should count toward his total Test haul.
As a result, Wilkinson has already equaled Neil Jenkins' record of 1,090 points and will claim it all for himself with his first score at Murrayfield.
If it had not been for the Cipriani rumpus, England would have been heading north in confident mood, having disposed of France so clinically in Paris two weeks ago.
But there must be a question mark over how morale in the camp will be affected by Ashton's decision to take a very tough line with the 20-year-old Cipriani.
Ian McGeechan, the former Scotland and Lions coach who is now in charge of Cipriani's development at Wasps, is among those who believes Ashton has got it wrong, describing England's response to a minor misdemeanor as "very harsh."
"Danny, at worst, was naive in his actions but no more than that," McGeechan said.
Ashton may disagree, but there is no doubt that he will now be praying that Iain Balshaw, recalled to the side after initially being dropped to allow Cipriani to come in, will demonstrate greater confidence under the high-ball than he has done in his recent appearances for England.
With Scotland having scored just one try in three defeats so far in this year's tournament, Ashton will be expecting his men to come away with a comfortable win.
But skipper Phil Vickery admits he would gladly settle for the scrappiest of narrow wins against an old enemy with form when it comes to derailing confident English opponents.
"There is no doubt we have the capability to win this weekend, but it's no good talking about it, we have to go out and perform, and we haven't performed consistently well enough at Murrayfield," Vickery said. "If you don't perform you go home as a losing team, full stop."
Vickery admits he is at a loss to explain why Scotland have failed to fire this season, but added: "If they do get it right I think they could pose a huge amount of problems for us."
Bayer 04 Leverkusen go into today’s match at TSG 1899 Hoffenheim stung from their first league defeat in 16 months. Leverkusen were beaten 3-2 at home by RB Leipzig before the international break, the first loss since May last year for the reigning league and cup champions. While any defeat, particularly against a likely title rival, would have disappointed coach Xabi Alonso, the way in which it happened would be most concerning. Just as they did in the Supercup against VfB Stuttgart and in the league opener to Borussia Moenchengladbach, Leverkusen scored first, but were pegged back. However, while Leverkusen rallied late to
If all goes well when the biggest marathon field ever gathered in Australia races 42km through the streets of Sydney on Sunday, World Marathon Majors (WMM) will soon add a seventh race to the elite series. The Sydney Marathon is to become the first race since Tokyo in 2013 to join long-established majors in New York, London, Boston, Berlin and Chicago if it passes the WMM assessment criteria for the second straight year. “We’re really excited for Sunday to arrive,” race director Wayne Larden told a news conference in Sydney yesterday. “We’re prepared, we’re ready. All of our plans look good on
The lights dimmed and the crowd hushed as Karoline Kristensen entered for her performance. However, this was no ordinary Dutch theater: The temperature was 80°C and the audience naked apart from a towel. Dressed in a swimsuit and to the tune of emotional music, the 21-year-old Kristensen started her routine, performed inside a large sauna, with a bed of hot rocks in the middle. For a week this month, a group of wellness practitioners, called “sauna masters,” are gathering at a picturesque health resort in the Netherlands to compete in this year’s Aufguss world sauna championships. The practice takes its name from a
When details from a scientific experiment that could have helped clear Russian figure skater Kamila Valieva landed at the World Anti-Doping Agency (WADA), the leader of the organization’s reaction was unequivocal: “We have to stop that urgently,” he wrote. No mention of the test ever became public and Valieva’s defense at the Court of Arbitration for Sport (CAS) went on without it. What effect the information could have had on Valieva’s case is unclear, but without it, the skater, then 15 years old, was eventually disqualified from the 2022 Winter Olympics after testing positive for a banned heart medication that would later
RSS