England resolve to avoid glaring defeat

Martin Johnson has one of the most expressive faces in sport. It is as if a conventionally handsome man had been sculpted by an Aztec. In the years leading up to England’s World Cup victory of 2003, we were used to seeing this face express defiance: the sheer impossibility of his team ever taking a backward step.

This was varied with a look of puzzlement mingled with veiled threat; the expression he used on referees when a decision went against the England team he captained so gloriously. So gloriously that he was made England team manager without having any previous practice of managing anybody. It was as if the Rugby Football Union believed that one glare would turn any 15 rugby players into a team of world-beaters.

It’s been a year and I have grown used to Johnson’s face of defeat. A terrible mask of pain, mingled with face-the-facts grittiness. I dread seeing it again, but as his injury-ravaged team face Australia this afternoon, I am bracing myself. I long to see England playing well — not for patriotic reasons, but so I won’t have to look at Johnson’s losing face at teatime today.

New Zealand offer impeccable defence

If the England rugby union team want to learn about the art of defence, they could hardly do better than to watch the New Zealand rugby league team, who play England in the Gillette Four Nations tournament, also today.

Better put a video in, chaps, because New Zealand’s defensive performance against Australia a couple of weeks back was the finest I have seen in any code of rugby. It was accurate, selfless, ferocious and gang-handed, for play after play — phase after phase, if you need the translations, boys — but that was not the whole of it.

The crucial fact was that it never stopped. Every time you expected this relentlessly attacked team to crack and crumble, they didn’t. This showed not only extraordinary spirit and brilliant technique. It also points to stratospheric levels of fitness: to get up, tackle again, absorb the shock and do it all over again, and still feel that you haven’t done your bit yet — that was the wondrous thing. Certainly, if the England union team defend anything like those Kiwis in the 13-man game, Australia will lose. As for the England league team, let’s see what dancing Sam Tomkins can do to the finest defence in rugby.

United adept at winning domestic rows

Joe Cole was talking cheerfully about global conquest in midweek as Chelsea went into the latest round of Champions League matches. But his team must concentrate on a minor domestic matter tomorrow afternoon, when they have a visit from Manchester United.

It’s one of those matches that will set the tone for the middle third of the season. If Chelsea are serious about conquering the world, they need to conquer England first, and that means a win here.

What they have to consider, though, is that United are really rather good at maintaining their hegemony over English football. Over their years of dominance, they have established a way of slapping down insubordinate clubs: I’ll not forget the way Arsenal’s “Invincibles” were finally conquered at Old Trafford. The old order, briefly threatened, was majestically resumed. The pressure is on Chelsea, as league leaders, home team and would-be usurpers. They have the talent to beat United by a couple of goals, but time and again, a team who really fancy themselves look at United and find themselves settling for second best.