For the players of England and Wales this feels like a timely week to recall Rudyard Kipling’s most famous poem. “If you can keep your head while all around you are losing theirs …’ The threatened Welsh players’ strike may have been averted but only now, with both teams announced, is Saturday’s game of rugby at the Principality Stadium finally emerging from beneath a huge, steaming pile of off-field issues.
It is not simply a question of whether Wales can rise above a uniquely turbulent, fractious week. Contractual negotiations have also been ongoing east of the Severn Bridge and England’s senior pros have been monitoring the situation in Wales as closely as anyone. A new professional game agreement in England, potentially involving some belt-tightening, has to be finalised before 2024 and the Saracens hooker Jamie George is among those keenly aware that difficult conversations may yet await closer to home.
