He is also the most powerful man in world rugby.By rejecting the plans for a British League, Pugh and the WRU took the only course open to them. In doing so, and again contrary to so much of the woefully uninformed reporting on the subject, they had the full backing of the Scots and the Irish. He possesses a formidable intellect and is a skilled negotiator. But with the clever wheeze of a British League, floated incidentally by Brittle months ago, they suddenly found one in Vernon Pugh QC, a committee member of the Welsh Rugby Union and chairman of the International Rugby Board The only problem is that Pugh is a tricky adversary. It has to be said that the success of this strategy has owed much to the inability of the opposition to mount an effective counter-attack. The home unions, divided since the start of the professional era, have been guilty not so much of scoring own goals as of leaving the goalmouth unattended and Sir John Hall and his cohorts know just enough about the sport to score every time.
Since the defeat of Cliff Brittle at last month’s annual meeting of the RFU, the lack of a whipping boy has been a problem for the clubs. THIS TIME, maybe, the leading English clubs have gone too far.

If there is to be a healthy future we must hope that they are made to pay. For the past 18 months they have been running such a well-orchestrated campaign of disinformation that they have pulled the wool over the eyes of the majority of those involved in the game. Time and again they have risen from the muckheap, created largely by their own greed and ambition, smelling of roses. Standing at centre, he jinked his way through the Australian cover to score under the posts with 11 minutes remaining.South Africa: P Montgomery; S Terblanche, A Snyman (F Smith, 80), P Muller, P Rossouw; H Honiball, J van der Westhuizen; R Kempson (O le Roux, 48), J Dalton, A Garvey, K Otto, M Andrews (B Skinstad, 52), J Erasmus (A Aitken, 7), A Venter, G Teichmann (capt).Australia: M Burke; B Tune (N Grey, 78), D Herbert (J Little, 6), T Horan, J Roff; S Larkham, G Gregan; D Crowley, P Kearns, A Blades (G Panoho, 67), T Bowman, J Eales (capt), M Cockbain (O Finegan, 58), D Wilson, T Kefu (W Ofahengaue, 50).Referee: J Fleming (Scotland).. The Australians never looked capable of breaching the solid Springbok defence, but four penalties by Burke, who missed an easy chance which cost his side victory over South Africa in Perth, kept them in contention.At the interval, Australia only trailed 16-12, but the rampant South African scrum became even stronger after Skinstad’s arrival His try was a gem for a loose foward. “If Scully was playing for Norwich, they would have scored 10,” he said.. South Africa 29

Australia 15
SOUTH AFRICA revived memories of their 1995 World Cup triumph at Ellis Park yesterday when they overcame Australia to claim their first Tri-Nations trophy at the third attempt.Scoring the only two tries of the match, the Springboks equalled the winning streak of Francois Pienaar’s World Cup heroes with their 14th successive victory – 13 of them under the current coach Nick Mallett.

“I learnt in June that there is no cash for players,” he said despondently. This is despite John Spencer, Trevor Sinclair and recently Nigel Quashie all moving on for large fees.The only optimistic words Harford found were for the Ireland Under-21 International Tony Scully, a constant threat on the right But even here his comments were barbed. The second and third were both from the penalty spot but he tucked them away with a composure which belies his years. He was also instrumental in winning the second penalty, after Steve Yates finally gave up the unequal contest and hacked him down in the area.By contrast, QPR have had precious little to cheer about from the opening exchanges of the season. Only one point has been gained from nine and they badly need to add fresh players if they are not to have another disappointing season.But their manager Ray Harford sees little hope in the near future. “He said as a striker, so we put him up there and he’s done a lot of damage.” Bellamy now has six goals this season and recently signed a four-year contract.The teenager’s main weapon is his pace and he found it easy to reduce QPR’s back three to bystanders as Norwich powered their way to a 3-1 lead in a breathless first eight minutes.Bellamy’s first after two minutes was deceptively simple as he latched on to Keith O’Neill’s through ball and sprinted away to slide the ball coolly inside the far post.

Afterwards it became understandable, though no more defensible. Bellamy celebrated his 19th birthday last month and played the game of his career to score a hat-trick here yesterday and ensure Norwich maintained their 100 per cent start to the season.Bellamy was a trainee at Norwich and is already a Welsh Under-21 International, but he now looks ready for a step up in class as well as finding his best playing position.”We were playing him in midfield in pre-season and then we asked him where he wanted to play,” said the Norwich manager Bruce Rioch. England’s earlier 2-0 defeat in Chorzow was the direct result of his defensive attitude. Unlike his successors, he simply ignored press criticism, but in those days it was never as crude or personal as that suffered by Taylor and, particularly, Bobby Robson. Robson proved his worth in the 1990 World Cup but had realistically accepted why people called it “the impossible job” as early as September 1983 when, in his 13th match in charge, England lost 1-0 to Denmark and failed to qualify for the European Championship finals The knives twitched.