MARTIN JOHNSON, the England World Cup-winning captain, whose dramatic return to rugby as supremo of the national side is expected to be confirmed this week, has been urged to take a full coaching role to launch the revival of the team by Sir Clive Woodward, Johnson’s head coach at the 2003 triumph in Australia. Until now, the idea of Johnson coaching the team has run against the accepted wisdom that, given his lack of experience for such a role, he would be a hands-off manager, albeit with sweeping powers to select the team, and to hire and fire his own coaches.

But as Sir Clive says today in an exclusive article for The Sunday Times: “Simply being Johnno is not enough. If he does not take an active part, he will find it very hard to gain the respect of the players. If he simply stands there watching and snarling he will soon be unpicked by everybody.” Woodward endorsed Johnson as the man to reestablish England as a world force in rugby. However, he warned that he must not be distracted by “parasites” and “termites” within the Rugby Football Union in making the demands that he feels are necessary.

In insisting that Johnson should operate on the field in a tracksuit, he suggests that he could turn to football. “Martin should look at Arsène Wenger and Jose Mourinho. However big and dominant and even aloof they seem, they are also serious coaches.”

Woodward suggests Johnson should insist on the title “head coach” and not team manager, and rejects the idea that he should trawl the world and the ranks of coaching galacticos to fill out his management team. “Martin should surround himself with people he gets on with, people he can have fun with and people he can trust when the pressure comes on.”

Woodward is severely critical of the influence of Rob Andrew, the RFU’s director of elite rugby, and is worried that Andrew will not be the kind of ally Johnson needs in the political minefield of Twickenham . “Andrew has never coached or managed Test teams. He and his teams seemed dull and boring, and he was, to me, a million miles away from the profile of a successful coach, let alone an international one.”

Remarkably, Sir Clive believes Johnson should turn to members of the 2003 World Cup-winning squad, even though none of that group is far along in their coaching careers. He recommends Neil Back, Mike Catt, Lawrence Dallaglio and Graham Rowntree. “It would be a mistake thinking Martin has to bring in a massively experienced coach. If he goes to the 2003 World Cup team, there are people he knows and can trust, they are special people who operated in a fantastic environment.”

He sees little likelihood of Brian Ashton, the current coach, being absorbed into Johnson’s panel. Nor does he see a role for Jake White, South Africa’s 2007 World Cup-winning coach, who has expressed an interest in the England job. “I cannot imagine Jake or Brian sitting down having a few beers with Martin and chewing the fat all night.”