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England hierarchy sorely out of touch

For sheer, total and utter misconception about the media and the views of England rugby supporters, the utterances this week of the England hierarchy take the biscuit. Bear in mind now that we are in the fifth year of the England management asking for patience, claiming that the revival of the England team from the grisly and apparently bottomless pit into which it has sunk is a work in progress.

This was Rob Andrew on Tuesday. "They [England followers] understand what the team is going through, where the team is in the Test cycle and what Martin Johnson has been handed in terms of trying to rebuild..." His overall contention is that it will be a "long job".

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In every one of those assertions, Andrew is wrong. As Conrad Smith said last weekend: "The All Blacks don't do development plans" and this endless English chase for tomorrow is wearing, on the point of scandalous, self-serving and dangerous.

How many times does it have to be said? The future is here. England are playing rubbish rugby. Time is passing, matches are slipping by. When is the exact date when the team gets real and we can expect it to start winning any games that matter?

It may be a comment on media-driven conceptions and lack of endless patience, but it is life, it is real and it has to be dealt with. While England are in this ruinous cycle of not fronting up to each and every game, while they are still harping about the future, all their coaches and hierarchy are a step closer to the chop with every defeat. Sad maybe, but true. If they play as abysmally in the Six Nations as they have these past four weeks, the pressure on Andrew and the coaching group will become intolerable. Out they go, in come another lot, bleating as did the previous two regimes about what a bad hand they have been dealt and why patience would be a virtue.

If England fans have a clue what is going on, then I haven't met any. The usual bleat comes out about England being a young side with few caps. Fine, for goodness sake, pick a team with more caps and more nous then. The bleat comes out about the Guinness Premiership, and that it should be better at producing players. Andrew had the cheek to point to the RFU academy system and said that the Premiership clubs should take up the baton now that the academy has produced James Haskell and Danny Cipriani.

Rubbish. The pair have been brought through a hard school by Wasps, by Ian McGeechan and Shaun Edwards. The system run by the RFU produces gym monkeys. If only some of the academy "products" to whom I have spoken felt able to tell Andrew exactly what they thought of the English "system", he would very quickly become disabused.

The autumn was no-one's fault but England's and the England hierarchy - their selection and their coaching. With the time that the squad have spent in camp, we had a right to expect even a bunch of 21-year-olds winning their first caps to have more shape and focus than England did.

There is no future, Rob. Only the game against Italy. Why not look inwards for the problems and find a system and some players to win that game. Bigger, older, craftier, better ones. Then, England supporters might have the first clue what on earth is being done in the name of England rugby, because at present amongst all the excuses, no-one can work it out for the life of them.

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