Jeff Probyn: French laissez faire makes English exports play better

What is it about the Press that always makes them want someone picked by England who is not in the squad? Week after week we have endured continual calls from various sections of the media for the recall of Steffon Armitage to the England side.
Admittedly, both he and his brother Delon have been playing some of the best rugby of their lives with the star-studded Toulon team and they, along with a bevy of other English qualified players, seem to be obvious choices for England and the Lions tour this summer.
Andrew Sheridan, Simon Shaw (although they would never pick him because of his age), Iain Balshaw, Ollie Barkley and Jonny Wilkinson are just a few of the English contingent that seem to have found the magic spark playing in the Top 14.
What is it that has enabled these and many other players that were plagued with injury while playing in the Premiership not only to survive virtually injury free – but positively flourish in a league that plays more games at a higher intensity in front of bigger crowds on average than the Premiership?
The Premiership will say that the competition in the Top 14 is not so hard on the players as the  French clubs don’t have a wage cap and most have larger budgets so they can employ bigger squads allowing players more down time, which is partly true.
The French don’t have a wage cap as small as the Premiership’s and they don’t have the expense of building and maintaining their stadiums, but they don’t rotate players as much as would be expected, only changing the ‘first team’ if injuries are picked up.
What is interesting is, if you question any of the players as to the difference between the life of a Premiership player and those in the Top 14 most would say lifestyle.
Actually, it’s not as simple as that. Living and training on the sunny Cote d’Azur (Toulon) is slightly better than living and training in rainy Watford and St Albans (Sarries) or the fact that French cuisine may be marginally better with all its fresh produce, olive oil and wine verses fish and chips, a pie and a pint. Overall, though, it’s more to do with the slightly less professional laissez faire attitude that the French take to training.
Even way back in the days when I was playing there, concerns were raised by Rex Hazeldine (the godfather of elite sports fitness) about over-training.
When we started the athletic training in the build up to the 1991 World Cup in 1988-89 he said he was worried there was a danger in making us too athletic, hard to believe when talking about the likes of yours truly, Jason Leonard and the Judge.
As he said, when Sebastian Coe comes round the last bend in an Olympic final he is not hit by a 17 stone prop and then expected to get up and win the race as rugby players are.
In fact, he said, the fitter you are (less body fat) the more likely you are to be injured in a contact sport. You are rugby players not athletes.
The French are far less inclined towards the gym monkey culture that has pervaded many of the Premiership sides, instilling a mentality that says the more muscle you have the less you’ll get injured, whereas the reverse is true as less body fat leads to impacts creating deeper haematomas which take longer to recover.
Then there is what we English call the French joie de vivre style of play which we all love to watch particularly when it goes wrong! It’s the style that says let’s give it a go from anywhere at any time no matter what the consequences.
Ok, so we are defending our own try line and have won the ball, now is the time to run, why would we kick it to clear our line and relieve pressure?
Only the French do that and we admire it, better still it is something we English long to do but dare not in the strict confines of our coach-led game but those who cross the Channel to play embrace that style like a local.
That freedom to play in a game with fewer rules can make players look better than those we see in the Premiership – but it may just be an illusion.
Many of the players that have taken the euro have done so because they feel their best rugby is behind them or that they have gone as far as they can on the representative ladder. They knew that Stuart Lancaster, whether under pressure from the RFU and Premiership because of the player release agreement or not, had stated that he would not pick players from outside the Premiership and still they went.
They made a commercial decision knowing the consequences and taking the money and there is nothing wrong in that.
French rugby has always thrilled and excited and part of that excitement is the uncertainty of what a French team will do or as all commentators say ‘who will turn up?’
During this Autumn‘s Internationals, Lancaster wants certainty, so he will stick with the premiership and the certainty of the coach led game but come the summer when Gatland picks his Lions he may (with so many of his Grand Slam Welsh team no longer in Wales) look for a little je ne sait quoi and call on the foreign legion to bolster his squad.