Peter Jackson: Warren Gatland’s Law only applies to James Hook

The writing has been on the wall for so long now that James Hook could be forgiven for ignoring it and concentrating on the day job instead. Should the advent of another Six Nations tournament result in Wales discarding their most versatile player, then the man whose long-range penalty toppled Saracens on Friday night will scarcely be that surprised.  They have been trying to get by without him for some time.
Wales told Hook as far back as October 2013 that they were dropping him, then did a volte face the next day. Twelve months later, they did drop him only to bring him back after Dan Biggar injured himself in the opening match against Australia.
This time, with the conversion of Gareth Anscombe, they have more reason to push Hook down the pecking order and out of the squad, like a prophet without honour in his own land.
Should it come to pass within the next fortnight, a New Zealander born 12,000 miles away will be claimed as a long-lost son while, at the same time, a bona fide Welshman will be deemed a foreigner because he lives a few miles within the English side of the border.
How ironic can you get? It will be all the more so should Warren Gatland decide to find room for Rhys Priestland despite the fact that from next season he, too, will be relocating to England.
As Gatland keeps reminding the players: “It’s always a risk if you are playing outside Wales.”
Is it? Really? Again Hook could be forgiven for thinking that it seems to apply only to him just as it seemed to apply only to Dwayne Peel in the aftermath of his move from the Scarlets to Sale seven years ago.
Even when Wales do get round to putting Hook on the bench, they keep him there even when the team performance cries out for change as it did, most wretchedly, against Fiji last November.
None of the other non-Welsh based players have found even the faintest threat from Gatland’s so-called law. Had he wished to do so, he could have made an example of Danny Lydiate by reminding him that the golden fields of France can be injurious to your national health.
Racing Metro had turned their Welsh import into the Invisible Man of the Top 14. Gatland ignored that and picked Lydiate as per normal, a decision that did nothing to disabuse the notion of there being one law for the chosen few, another for Hook and one or two whose Test careers have hardly got off the ground, like props Rhys Gill (Saracens) and Ben Broster (Biarritz).
Jamie Roberts may have lost his starting place at Racing to Alexandre Dumoulin and may have regained it because the France centre has been laid low by a troublesome Achilles tendon but there has never been any question over Roberts’ selection despite Scott Williams’ presence as a credible alternative.
The same goes for Mike Phillips, chosen ad nauseum by Gatland irrespective off on-field location and off-field scrapes. His time may be drawing to a close but untouchables like Leigh Halfpenny and George North will always be above Gatland’s Law.
And, of course, the man himself is far too pragmatic to enforce it in any way which would, in his opinion, undermine his team’s prospects of winning. That’s where the concept falls down.
The Welsh Rugby Union argue that a reinforced version of the law will take effect once six players have signed dual contracts although why it needs six, not five or seven or 77 is beyond public comprehension. Even then, Gatland will not be in any danger of backing himself into a tight corner.
He will be able to pick any Welsh player operating outside Wales by invoking the ‘exceptional circumstance’ rule, his get-out-of-jail card. In other words, if you are good enough, it doesn’t matter where you are.
In that respect, Owen Williams is to be commended for extending his career as a Leicester Tiger rather than allow himself to be coerced into returning to Wales on the basis that the WRU consider it the politically correct thing to do.
At 22, Williams could hardly be learning his trade at a better place. The prophets of doom back home argue that in doing so he has made it harder to overtake Biggar, Anscombe, Priestland and Rhys Patchell in the national pecking order. Leicester guarantee the boy from Ystradgynlais the platform of the biggest theatre in the
British rugby, at 24,000 twice as big as his former employers, the Scarlets, manage against the Ospreys and four times as big for too many other Pro 12 fixtures.
If, for argument’s sake, Williams should end the domestic season reuniting Leicester and the Premiership title, then who’s to say that wouldn’t be the ‘exceptional circumstance’ to fast-track him into Wales’ pre-World Cup squad?
His choice to stay just happened to coincide with three other fly-halves confirming their imminent arrival in the Aviva Premiership.
The official announcement of Priestland’s end-of-season move to Bath, as predicted in these pages over the last month, came with confirmation of JJ Hanrahan transferring from Munster to Northampton Saints and Jimmy Gopperth from Leinster to Wasps.
Meanwhile, over at Gloucester, Hook will probably be free to concentrate on Premiership affairs throughout the Six Nations.   He has hardly started for Wales since the World Cup semi-final against France in October 2011.
A few months earlier, Anscombe had converted 11 of 14 tries as the U20 All Blacks butchered Wales 92-0 at Rovigo en route to winning the junior World Cup. There was no talk then of him turning out for Wales on the basis of his mother, Tracy, coming from Cardiff.
At that stage, Anscombe’s goal was to be an All Black. And if Beauden Barrett, full-back in the world-beating juniors of 2011, had beaten him to it, there would be no lowering of his sights until a £250,000-a-year contract cleared the way for his move from Waikato to Wales.
Funny old game. Try telling that to James Hook.