RUGBY - OUR INTERNATIONAL DISGRACE

It is a very great shame that after all the hype, PR and financial investment poured into the England Rugby Team over the last few months, that our performance was nothing less than shameful.

And I do not hold the players to account. Individually we saw massive commitment and devotion. Sure, lessons are to be learned by each and every player. But that is the norm.

No. The fault is in the leadership, or more accurately, the lack of leadership.

Martin Johnson was a brilliant player and will always be remembered so. But as a manager it requires a different kind of leadership. He will always be respected as a former player and captain.

But the art of winning lies in perception, foresight, planning and ruthless implementation of individual and team spirit. It is time for Johnson to hand in the towel and with him his entire coaching team. Start afresh.

We need leadership of Churchillian proportions. We have the players - outstanding - every one of them. But the business of management off the field and captaincy on the field is a team effort that requires very strong interpersonal relationship. It is not right that Tindall should leave Johnson to just get on with the job, and thereby, for Johnson, inadvertently creating an autocratic style of leadership that fails to take advice. And that is not Johnson's fault. That lies firmly at the door of Tindall and his colleagues who just presumed that a former captain could take them to glory.

And whose decision was it to take on the new team colour? If ever there was an affront to the "All Blacks" then surely, we affronted them and New Zealand. That was a very bad decision.

Martin Johnson opined that he has no massive regrets, nothing jumps out at him and says that may be we should have done things differently. Ummmm.

That is not what one wishes to hear of one's trainee officers at Sandhurst, Dartmouth and Cranwell. An inability, after defeat, to see where the mistakes were made and then to see how not to make the same mistakes again, is crucial on the battlefield. It is no less so on the sports field.

Ian Bradley Marshall
LIVERPOOL