Brendan Gallagher continues his series looking at rugby’s great schools
FORTUNES invariably ebb and flow with most School XVs – it’s the nature of the beast – so Cranleigh are well aware that their current hot streak might not last forever.
Back-to-back winners of the Rosslyn Park Sevens in 2016 and 2017, winners of the St Joseph’s tournament in 2016 and Daily Mail Merit Trophy winners last season, Cranleigh are, by any standards, now a major force in the Schools game, but they still consider themselves underdogs.
That was the mentality that saw them hurtle up the rankings and that is the approach that still gives them the best chance of maintaining their status. Train like a contender not a champion.
With barely 400 boys and 200 girls, the Surrey public school are small in numbers and they also adhere strictly to a philosophy that no one sport or activity – such as music or drama – should ever dominate a student’s life. Everybody is encouraged to participate in everything on offer and, despite producing an increasing number of recruits for the professional game, Cranleigh is most certainly not a rugby academy.
As Andy Houston, the head of rugby at Cranleigh for the last ten years, explains: “My favourite moment of the entire rugby season is the last weekend before half-term when the school not only play the Old Cranleighans, who pretty much field the 1st XV from the previous year, but, as a curtain raiser, our current 5th XV play the 5th XV from the previous season.
“That match is as eagerly anticipated as the main event, lads come back from Uni and gap years specially to play and we have special jerseys done. It sums up our philosophy. The game is totally inclusive here with almost everybody playing at some level and masters – some with no great expertise in the game – enthusiastically coaching and managing the lower teams and building a great rapport with the players which helps enormously in the classroom.”
Perhaps because everybody is involved and enjoying themselves such an approach also encourages an interesting fluidity in player development. There is a considerable history of late developers at Cranleigh. Six of the Daily Mail-winning team were humble U15 B or C players. Harvey Stiles – a talented cricketer and hockey player – started in September 2019 as the 3rd XV scrum-half and ended up as openside flanker for the 1st XV in their deciding game against Canford
“That ethos is important,” continues Houston, who next term becomes director of sport at the school. “In a typical year I reckon we will have four or five players the equal of almost any on our circuit, five or six solid performers and another five or six who perhaps would be 2nd or even 3rd XV players elsewhere but are mustard keen, totally committed and improving quickly. The challenge is always to integrate those mixed abilities and getting the team playing to each other’s strengths.”
When Houston took over, Cranleigh had a goodish reputation in modern times of winning more games than they lost without perhaps ever hitting the heights and Houston recognised that in his first season when again they generally performed well but took an absolute thumping at the hands of Wellington College.
“We needed to get much fitter and pay more attention to core skills but how to fit that into an already busy school schedule in which we rightly emphasise producing the balanced allrounder, not the rugby specialist?
“We had a talented lower-sixth group that year with four particularly impressive blokes – prop Harry Elrington who is now at London Irish, Saints scrum-half Henry Taylor, Henry Lamont who went on to win five Oxford Blues and James Thompson who went up to Cambridge University. “I put it to them that we could be really successful the following season ifwe committed to putting in some extra work in the months ahead. We didn’t have a gym but I would kit out a little sideroom off the sports hall – not much bigger than a big cupboard if I’m honest – and organise three sessions a week.
It would mean a 6.30am start because it had to be done outside of their existing schedule and as I lived in London at the time that meant a 5am start for me!
“That highly motivated quartet drove the project forward and the whole thing mushroomed. Other rugby lads noticed what they were doing and insisted on joining in, they got the buzz as well and I also organised extra skills sessions. Before long the school agreed to build a dedicated fitness room. That next season we claimed a fine 27-10 win over Wellington, confirmation that hard work pays off.”
That in a nutshell is surely what schools sport is all about. You can see how hard work and dedication result in an improvement on an almost weekly basis. When you are head down in a book in the classroom it can be difficult to see the wood for the trees but those who play sport know for certain it will ‘come good’ if you keep the faith.
There is an interesting parallel here with an early chapter in the school’s rugby history. Up until 1916 Cranleigh was a football school but it was a group of students who wanted to play rugby – egged on by the arrival of a rugby-mad teacher L C Gower – that persuaded the school to allow one term of rugby. It was student driven and Cranleigh quickly produced a number of outstanding players, not least H J Jacob who was ever present, at either wing or centre, for England’s Grand Slam-winning side in 1924.
Last season the icing on the cake was that first Daily Mail trophy after only their fifth unbeaten season in history, the others being 1955, 1993, 2005 and 2017. The team conceded just six tries in their nine games as they amassed 334 points and conceded a miserly 59.
From that triumphant squad England U18 representatives Oscar Beard – the Cranleigh skipper – and Will Trenholm have signed with Harlequins where they join recent Cranleigh graduates Harry Barlow and Hugh Tizard. Hayden Hyde meanwhile is making his way with Ulster. Before them there has been England prop Will Collier at Quins, Sam Arnold who won an Ireland cap with Munster and the aforementioned Taylor who was a standout when England won the Junior World Cup in 2014 and is beginning to push for a full cap.
Going back a little further the back-to-back Rosslyn Park 7s Open titles in 2016 and 2017 were memorable occasions and they only narrowly missed out on a hat-trick in 2018 when they were losing finalists.
In 2016 it was the first time they had competed in the Open competition for all schools, not just one term rugby schools, and they arrived with limited expectations only to go on an unstoppable run beating favourites Wellington (22-15) and Millfield (30-0) en route before defeating Harrow 27-19 in the final. Tom Nicole was named as player of the tournament and that evening had to rush back to star in the school production of Les Miserables.
After that hiccough nothing could stop Cranleigh on a particularly emotional afternoon after the funeral that morning of a popular student Jake Andrews who had died from cancer.
