At least Freddie Burns is in good company. Virtually every sport, at some stage, has produced a fall guy whose ill-advised showboating has gone viral and reminded us all of the value of humility. For Burns read Leon Lett of the Dallas Cowboys, guilty of a similar error in the 1993 Super Bowl, or the great American jockey Bill Shoemaker, who stood up in his stirrups to celebrate victory on Gallant Man in the 1957 Kentucky Derby only to be misjudge the finishing line and finish second.
The word “showboat” came from the United States where gaudy river steamers used to act as floating theatres, going up and down the Mississippi and Ohio rivers. Beside the River Avon on Saturday, however, none of Burns’s employers were remotely amused having seen a potentially crucial home pool victory against Toulouse in the Heineken Champions Cup squandered by one of rugby’s most painful and public misjudgments.
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The fly-half had initially done everything right, slicing through the Toulouse defence late on to clinch, so it seemed, the win Bath needed to stay competitive in a horribly tough pool. Given he had just missed a penalty from in front of the posts, there was visible joy and relief on his face as he crossed the line. Maybe that was what encouraged him to blow a kiss to his home crowd – Burns grew up in the city – and pat the badge on his shirt, giving Toulouse’s Maxime Médard just enough time to sneak up behind him and dislodge the ball before he put it down.
At such moments, human nature instinctively divides into opposing camps. Anyone who has ever been on a sports field and cost their team victory through a single, glaring mistake – and some of us have been there more than once – will have felt a degree of sympathy for Burns as he lay on the grass, head in hands, wishing the ground would swallow him up. Plenty of others, not least Jeremy Guscott and Sir Clive Woodward, were rather less forgiving, suggesting professional sportsmen who make such errors deserve all the criticism they receive.
Both sides are right: it is possible to feel sorry for Burns on a personal level – he is a justifiably popular figure throughout the game – while simultaneously asking what on earth he was playing at. The first thing you learn in mini-rugby, after tying your laces and wearing a gum‑shield, is to put your team first. Touch the ball down and then snog your badge, if that is what floats your showboat. But do not, under any circumstances, disrespect a game which, more than most, will bite you on the backside if you do so.
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It is not just Burns who will be reminded this week of that particular life lesson. Maro Itoje is a potentially world-class player but his antics in Glasgow on Sunday – mockingly celebrating behind the Warriors’ players when the home side had a try disallowed – was only funny if 12-year-old humour is still your adult preference. It is another variation on the condescending pat on the head whenever an opponent knocks the ball on and is no less unattractive. While on the subject, what on earth was Munster’s Andrew Conway doing crashing into Gareth Steenson and catching the Exeter fly-half with a leading elbow whilst supposedly trying to charge down a conversion? Both acts were against the spirit of the game and should have been punished with a yellow card at the time.
What is it with fully grown rugby players acting like drongos? Even a couple of decades ago a try would be followed by a perfunctory handshake and a brisk jog back to the halfway line. Not any more. At Worcester the weekend before last, the South Africa centre Francois Venter did a forward roll before scoring against Bristol. The merest glance at YouTube confirms incidences of “doing a Freddie” are very much on the rise. Willie le Roux, Juan Martin Leguizamón, Sam Vesty … click on them all and weep.
The one man not on the list, interestingly, is Chris Ashton, the original “Splash” merchant. His defence is that is well aware of what he is doing, that sport without the odd dash of individual colour is much less fun and that worse things happen at sea. Which is fine until the day he drops one which costs, say, England a World Cup knockout berth next year. If so, do we think Eddie Jones will adopt the humanitarian position or, perhaps more likely, tell him his fortune?
Alas for poor Freddie, there is not a humble pie shop in Bath big enough to buy the number of portions he currently requires. The club’s owner, Bruce Craig, will be seething if Bath’s European fate, as may well happen, is sealed by the calamity on Saturday. It will also surprise few if Todd Blackadder, Burns’s director of rugby, does not pick him to start at Wasps on Saturday, if only to issue a message – do your job properly and only celebrate when you’ve won something – to every staff member from the assistant janitor upwards. Burns, either way, is about to star in every pantomime in Somerset this Christmas. “All together now, children: He’s behind you!”
TV Times
These are increasingly interesting times for rugby on television. Channel 4’s debut as a terrestrial home for European rugby in the UK was highly promising, offering yet more choice in an increasingly competitive field whether your taste is for excellent tactical analysis or a more lighthearted approach. Those who can do both – step forward David Flatman and his comedy coat – are to be especially cherished. The weekend’s most memorable rugby-related show, however, was Shoulder to Shoulder, a fascinating documentary fronted by Brian O’Driscoll about the island of Ireland and its split rugby personality. If O’Driscoll is not yet Sir David Attenborough, few are better placed to quiz those on either side of the sectarian divide. The result was a thought-provoking, sometimes poignant and, hopefully, attitude-changing piece of work.
And another thing …
This week we will discover whether tweeting during a disciplinary hearing is as serious an offence as hitting someone. Nathan Hughes’s ill-advised foray on to social media while awaiting the verdict on a charge of punching was none too clever but to halt the entire process as if it were a trial in the Old Bailey felt slightly excessive. Maybe other factors were involved but, if not, the smarter option would have been to increase the sanction on the night and then tweet the news to the Wasps No 8.