Cancel the inquiries, all three of them. Tell Rob Andrew to go back to whatever it is he does with the rest of his time, instruct the Professional Game Board to get on with something useful and stuff Fran Cotton's questionnaires into the shredder, because it no longer matters that most of the players concerned refuse to fill them in. England's captain has just provided all the answers anyone could require to questions about the performance of the team in New Zealand and, by extension, the governance of the Rugby Football Union, a body surely without a rival for the always hotly contested title of the most dysfunctional in sport.
On Wednesday the RFU's directors meet at Twickenham to consider the future of their acting chief executive, Martyn Thomas. They have been warned that if they do not remove him a special meeting of their 60‑strong council will be convened to consider a vote of no confidence – hardly a novelty where Twickers is concerned, since the board survived an earlier no‑confidence vote as recently as July, when Thomas stood down as chairman. The Rugby World Cup shenanigans have only made matters worse, as the words of Lewis Moody, extracted from his forthcoming autobiography and published at the weekend in the Mail on Sunday, make plain.
Soon after the start of the tournament, Moody sensed things were not going well. "I had been growing concerned about the attitude in the camp, which had become apparent pretty much from the moment we arrived in Auckland," he writes. "We were on the other side of the world, a lot of the guys were young, well known, wealthy and believed they were invincible. I remember thinking that some of them were not in the right mind-set."
Moody admits he has to take some responsibility. "I don't think I helped by introducing things like joke of the day, brown nose of the day and dick of the day. It was designed to inject some fun but instead added to the feeling that everything was being taken too lightly. After a week I canned the awards."
Johnson gave Moody the captaincy because he knew him well from their many seasons together with Leicester and England. You cannot share a dressing room for such a period without gaining some sort of insight into a team‑mate's character, so Johnson must have known that, as well as being a magnificent flanker, Moody was the sort of chap whose idea of captaincy might involve setting up a dick-of-the-day competition.
In the skipper's account, things started to get worse after their first pool match, when Johnson sent them off to Queenstown for some rest and recreation and they located the now‑famous Altitude Bar and its Mad Midget Weekender. "When the sport was over I decided to make my way back to the hotel. Alarm bells had already been ringing. I was acutely aware that, as England captain, I needed to be very careful in everything I did. We had spoken about this time and again. Be sensible was the message. So that night in the Altitude Bar I was on my guard, and growing increasingly worried. When the drinks really began to flow and the people in the bar began to crowd us, that was my exit sign. I smelled problems looming."
Did he do anything about it, such as getting the players to leave with him? Evidently not. His inaction can be criticised, but it says less about his own qualities than about Johnson's judgment, and even more about the fitness for purpose of those who put the manager – an authentic hero as a player, but a man who had never even coached a schoolboy team – in charge of England's World Cup campaign.
The RFU board will have a lot to think about on Wednesday. They could start by asking themselves how Thomas, the man who appointed Johnson and presided over the departure of the chief executive John Steele in June, can remain in any sort of position of authority. And how an organisation with assets of around £200m, holding an entire sport in trust for a nation, can have got itself into such a blithering mess.
García's surge back to title-winning form is a major joy
One tournament victory spelled relief. A second, back to back with the first, suggested that Sergío García may be back as a contender for big tournaments. His wins in the Castello Masters and the Andalucia Masters on consecutive weekends were his first since 2008 – a year in which he earned $6,979,959, more than any other golfer. The long slump that followed Sergío's early success saddened those who had followed his progress since he turned professional in 1999, the year in which he became the youngest competitor in the history of the Ryder Cup. Not everyone warmed to his character, but few did not enjoy watching him strike the ball and there was no shortage of sympathy with the putting agonies that eventually undermined his game. When he took a break from golf after the 2010 US PGA, Colin Montgomerie made the wise decision to invite him to become an extra vice-captain of the Ryder Cup team at Celtic Manor, and Garcia played a big part in strong sense of comradeship that propelled the team to a victory that came bathed in the glow of approval from the dying Seve Ballesteros, his compatriot. Two weeks ago Sergio dedicated his win in Castellon to Seve. At 31, and with the hierarchy of golf still in its post-Tiger flux, he may yet have a major in him. That would make a lot of people happy.
Burning India rubber
Bernie Ecclestone must have been delighted with his first Indian Grand Prix. There were lots of local celebrities in attendance (including Sachin Tendulkar to wave the chequered flag), what looked like a full house on race day, and all the drivers dutifully on-message when asked about the new track designed by his tame circuit architect to conform to the current stereotype, meaning virtually no overtaking despite all the gimmickry of boost buttons, adjustable wings and endless run-off areas. A perfect weekend, in fact, topped off by the essential ingredient of a Formula One race in 2011: a collision between Lewis Hamilton and Felipe Massa, followed by harsh words in the paddock and the promise of a continuation of their season-long vendetta. Does Bernie charge the promoters extra for that, or is it included in the basic contract?
