Persona is important though. As an Englishman in Wales I had years of bull about English arrogance thrown at me, all untrue- until now- Eddie's public team talks are for everyone else apart from England. Every time he settles down and you think he has perhaps learnt his lesson, he pipes up.
Haskell spoke about this in his book. He references Lancaster, whereby all press conferences or appearances by players they had to speak about culture, respect etc... the players were never allowed to go out there and say "We've been playing well. The opposition are quality but have looked a bit shaky so we're looking to take full advantage of that and go out there and smash them!" and so often mentally had given the opposition too much ground before they'd even set foot on the pitch.
Eddie talks about openly about wanting to beat teams, sometimes it's running the opposition off of their feet, sometimes it's steam-rollering them. But he does it to help the players mindset and give them the confidence to openly talk about winning. Woodward was similar.
You'll always have the odd game where it comes back to bite him. Wales are a classic team that seems to be put all their energy into beating England in the 6N and play on emotion a lot.
Wales certainly do, that is for sure. However, for me Eddie's comments are nothing like Woodwards' though- Woodward was respectful of Wales, Scotland, Ireland- there were no, to quote Eddie, "sh1t countries" moments with Woodward, no "scummy Irish" or "united nations" jibes. I can't imagine Woodward saying "Well, guys, can you just send my best wishes to Warren to make sure he enjoys the third and fourth place play-off"- Woodward would have rose above it- and often did when sparring with Eddie- and if he did make a barb it was not prior to the game. In advance of the event when we are not playing them what on earth was "Scotland....again they're big darlings aren't they?! How excited do people get when the ball goes from side to side with Scotland!" supposed to mean?
Talking about wanting to thrash Italy is fine, talking about opposition scrums being illegal is also universal. Woodward openly talked about wanting to beat teams, about our strengths, he was very confident, and but even when was putting together ten on the bounce vs the SH big three he was more respectful before the match, and he certainly did not comment on other teams we were not playing, save for his comments about who he thought we might get if we got to the final in 03.
Worst for me is rounding on the press- it does nobody any favours.
I think I would tolderate Eddie's comments more if we beat the best teams most of the time- but realisitically since 2015 we have played NZ twice and won once each, SA 6 times and won 3 each. His record vs Australia is outstanding, but then they have sunk to 7th or whatever in the world quite recently. His trophy cabinet has got some stuff in, but the 6N win PC is lower than Lancaster's. For the level of stick he gives out, I expect a better record. A couple more grand slams and I might cut him a bit more slack.
Always a Wasp
