A decade ago if you suggested that a huge amount of international rugby players would run on to the field with significant crops of facial hair and legs shaved as smooth as marble many in the rugby world would have scoffed at the idea. What advantages a stubbled face and hairless legs provide to a player’s performance remains a mystery. Sociologists may describe it as conforming to a cultural norm. Or putting it more simply, it is a fashion.
It is not just the players who are influenced by fashion. Many of our referees are also part of the “man-scaping” phenomenon with muscles sculpted in the gym and haircuts straight out of the Tom Cruise guide of How to look like Maverick from Top Gun. To give today’s referees their dues, their fitness levels and athleticism are well above those who blew the whistle in amateur days.
A well-known Australian referee from the 1980s was renowned for being an excellent referee, a great guy and highly unfit. He always carried a significant balcony over his toy shop. He officiated me at schoolboy and grade levels for many years, across which we shared plenty of friendly banter.
I was playing in a Sydney club match he was refereeing when his whistle shrilled after a ruck and he pointed at me. In a stern tone, he said, “number 10, over here”, implying I had performed an act of foul play, which I had not. He walked far enough away so no one could overhear our conversation. While he frowned at me and shook his finger so the optics for all those looking on were aligned with a caution, he quietly said, “sorry Matt, I needed a breather. I will even the penalty up in a few minutes.” Then in an act of public disgust he waved me away to retreat the 10-metre walk of shame.
Sure enough, about 15 minutes later his whistle again stopped play as we received a totally unjustifiable penalty. I remember laughing as the innocent opposition player was remonstrating with his captain that he hadn’t done anything wrong!
Referees are the sole judge of fact and law. Especially when they need a break.
I jogged past the referee as we approached the set-up for the following lineout. I politely inquired “was it time for another breather?” He stared fixedly at the upcoming play and while not looking at me he mumbled out of the corner of his mouth, “yep.”
In the hairy-legged, chin shaved clean amateur days dark humour was a constant team-mate.
To win the upcoming World Cup it may well require a hairy-legged talented disrupter. Someone brave enough to break with the current fashion of negative tactics that has dominated recent editions. Someone who will challenge the status quo of how the game is being played in the clutch knockout matches of the tournament.
Since 1999, with the notable exception of the brilliance of New Zealand in 2015, World Cups have been won by teams relying on the negativity of scrummaging for penalties, kicking for touch and then mauling for the try. All smothered in a thick layer of shots at goal for penalties.
This type of game plan has won South Africa three World Cups. It was a significant factor in New Zealand winning in 2011 and England in 2003. It will take more than a new haircut to disrupt and defeat this low-risk horrid but highly-effective game plan.
It is possible that one truly great, stellar, disruptive individual performance can break through this cycle of negativity and change the course of World Cup 2023. As John Kirwan did in 1987, David Campese in 1991 and Sonny Bill Williams in 2015. And but for a mysterious illness striking down the New Zealand camp on the eve of their 1995 final we would be placing Jonah Lomu at the top of this list.
Antoine Dupont is a special player who can place his name beside these legendary greats. He has already changed our understanding of how scrumhalves can play because he is the master of an astonishing array of skills.
While he kicks with perfection from both feet and the quality of his passing is equal to any on the planet, what sets him apart is his almost superhuman level of accurate, split-second decision-making. This has empowered him to evolve into an attacker of staggering proportions.
Added to which, like all greats he makes it look so easy. While individually exceptional, Duponts also embodies the French tradition of “le petit genera.”. Which is the French theory that it is the scrumhalf, not the outhalf, that is the conductor of the attacking game plan.
That is why the loss of Romain Ntamack is significant for France, but with a game based around the genius of Dupont it is not as devastating as Ireland without Sexton or Scotland without Russell.
Dupont’s brilliance has forced his opponents to adjust their defensive systems. Many have returned to the 1990s defensive structures that were first put in place in attempting to limit the great George Gregan’s running game. Teams are once again locking in defenders close to the ruck in an attempt to deny Dupont attacking opportunities.
While this has worked to an extent, and Dupont is making fewer breaks close to the ruck, the fact that defending teams are placing six defenders around both sides of the tackle to mark one man means that there is far more space for his team-mates to attack on the flanks. And wouldn’t you know it, Dupont has the smarts to exploit that extra space for his team.
The once-in-a-generation brilliance of Antoine Dupont may be the deciding factor in determining who will lift the William Webb Ellis Trophy in the most tightly contested World Cup in its history.
