The Players Gave Real Opinions for Once, Only to Join the Blame Culture

Summary

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Maybe it is the journalist in me, but the thing I found most alarming about the leaked reports into England's World Cup shambles was not in the details of the dysfunction itself. No, the single most alarming thing to me was simply the forthrightness of the players' opinions. Listen to the majority of England players answering questions in an official media capacity and you will not be able to find the opinions for the cliches and play-it-safe sound- bites. It is almost as if opinions are frowned upon, with the massed ranks of the Rugby Football Union's media and public relations department regularly handing out prompt sheets to the players based on the kind of questions they think they will be asked - and suggesting the dull answers they should offer in response.

But put them in an environment they assume is confidential - which it was in as much as, even when leaked to a national newspaper, individual quotations were not attributed to specific players - and these polite but inoffensive young men turn into bold and opinionated shop stewards.

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Extract

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The Players Gave Real Opinions for Once, Only to Join the Blame Culture

During the 2003 World Cup in Australia, I ghost-wrote Mike Tindall's column for this newspaper. Back then, Tindall was about as far from a celebrity as it is possible to be while turning o...

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