Brendan Gallagher delves into some of rugby’s most enduring images, their story and why they are still so impactful
Iconic Rugby Pictures:
PART 43
Tim Stimpson lines up a kick for Leicester against Neath
January 18, 2003
What’s happening here?
Its January 18, 2003 and Leicester’s points machine Tim Stimpson is lining up another big kick against Neath in a Heineken Cup pool game at Welford Road. Reigning champions Tigers are looking for a third consecutive title and have already won the Pool but are looking to secure the highest possible seeding and a home quarter-final while memories of a 16-16 draw down at Neath earlier in the competition linger. Tigers and Stimpson badly want this.
The story behind the picture?
Stimpson was a remarkable goal kicker and a curiously underrated player who should have won more than his 19 England caps plus the one Test for the Lions in 1997. Between 1998 and 2003, first with Newcastle and then with Leicester, he was a member of five consecutive Premiership winning sides while also contributing massively to Leicester’s two Heineken Cup triumphs.
For those five years there was no better or more reliable goal kicker in the game and it was during his four seasons with Leicester that he garnered most of his 1,255 Premiership points. If not the first name on the team sheet he wasn’t far behind Martin Johnson and Neil Back.
Stimpson’s USP is that he was possibly the most consistent long range goal kicker the English game has seen. Kicks of between 45-50m appeared no more taxing to him than simple mid-range pop-overs for most top-class marksmen while I can’t remember any goal kicker landing more penalties from his own half than Stimpson.
He might not quite have matched Paul Thorburn’s 70 yard, eight and a half inch boomer for Wales against Scotland in 1986 although I remember one he kicked for Durham University in a UAU semi-final at Welford Road that must have been close.
I was sitting next to Les Cusworth in the stand and Les had already spotted a special talent. He knew what was coming as Stimpson lined the kick up some yards behind his own 10m line wide out on the right. “You watch, he will kick this with yards to spare,” insisted Cusworth. And he was right, the ball sailing through the posts and landing flush in the Welford Road terrace where the Goldsmiths Stand now is.
The season before this match against Neath, Stimpson had famously broken Llanelli hearts in the European Cup semi-final with a 63 yard effort which first hit the crossbar and then the post before bouncing over to clinch a 13-12 Leicester win.
What happened next?
The ball sailed between the posts, naturally, one of four penalties and two conversions he kicked on the day as Leicester dismissed a strong Neath side 36-11. When Stimpson was in the groove there was no stopping him. Earlier in the season he had scored 32 points in a game against his old club Newcastle while the season before he helped himself to 31 points against Saracens. In the 1999-2000 season he scored 321 league points, still a club record for Tigers in the Premiership.
“For five years there was no better or more reliable goal kicker in the game”
Why is the picture iconic?
As a study in concentration of a premier goal kicker going through his routine this image from Shaun Botterill can scarcely be bettered.
Contrary to popular belief, Jonny Wilkinson did not invent the idiosyncratic kicking routines. The first I distinctly remember were Bob Hiller and Scotland No.8 Peter Brown but just before Jonny came on the scene Neil Jenkins – obsessively wiping his hands on his jersey – had cornered the market with Stimpson not far behind.
No matter what type of kick – routine mid-range penalty, touchline conversion or his speciality long range howitzers – Stimpson went into this yogalike position after placing the ball on the kicking tee.
It was partly reassuring ritual and partly the start of a visualising process but there was also an element of stretching the back and the butt, warming the muscles up, and feeling the reassuring latent power in those quads. Centring they call it these days with Ronaldo an arch exponent. Before his big free kicks the Portuguese maestro adopts that statuelike pose and tenses up all his muscles before channelling and releasing everything into his free kick.
Phrases such as centring didn’t exist then but that is exactly what Stimpson is doing here as he lines up the ball with the distant posts. Before stepping back to begin the process of kicking the ball he also needs to get rid of the tension in his body. As any yoga instructor tutoring you in Pranayama breathing techniques will tell you, a short explosive expulsion of air is required.
Footnote: Leicester’s big win over Neath ‘earned’ a home quarter-final against Munster which they promptly lost 20-7 bringing to an end their supremacy in Europe although they rallied later in the decade when they lost two finals. And this was Stimpson’s last season for Tigers. After leaving Welford Road there was an abortive move to Perpignan before he briefly returned to Premiership action with Leeds Tykes before retiring. If not quite the last hurrah this is nearly it.
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