Was it the right decision to drop Cipriani?

[Hieu]

BBC Sport - news.bbc.co.uk - Last Updated: Sunday, 9 March 2008, 13:04 GMT [

Woodward slams Cipriani decision

Former England coach Sir Clive Woodward says current boss Brian Ashton made a "massive error" with his controversial decision to drop Danny Cipriani.

Ashton axed Cipriani from the side to face Scotland after the 20-year-old was pictured leaving a London nightclub in the early hours of Thursday morning.

"It was a massive over-reaction," Woodward told BBC Radio 5 Live.

"I think that a lot of those England players will be feeling pretty poor about what happened."

Cipriani was set to make his first Test start at Murrayfield after being named at full-back, but he was dropped after meeting friends at the Number 50 Dover Street club in Mayfair.

England went on to lose 15-9 on Saturday and have been widely criticised for lacking inspiration.

Ashton said Cipriani's behaviour had been "inappropriate for an international rugby player", but Woodward believes the coach missed a chance to form a close bond with his players.

"Cipriani is a highly professional person and someone England should be building their team around," said the 2003 World Cup-winning coach.

"To me he has not done anything wrong. I think they made a massive error there.

"They had a big opportunity to put their arm around him behind closed doors and say 'come on, that was a bit of a daft thing to do' - but no more than that.

"If I dropped every player who had not got to by bed by one o'clock I wouldn't have had anyone in the team.

"When I was in charge, people like Martin Johnson and Lawrence Dallaglio were not 'yes men'.

"If they thought one of the team had been hung out to dry that would have caused a lot of problems within the team group so I wouldn't underestimate what that can do to a team environment."

Earlier in the week, Wasps coach Shaun Edwards also came to Cipriani's defence. "In my eyes he has done nothing wrong," Edwards, who is also the Wales assistant coach, told BBC Radio 5 Live.

"He wasn't drunk, didn't offend anyone and to me that's not a crime."

Edwards said Cipriani was used to a much more relaxed coaching regime at Wasps.

"It was his day off before the biggest game of his life and the last thing he wants to be thinking about is his rugby," said Edwards.

"I would actually encourage him to go out with his friends and relax.

"Maybe he went out because he's only been used to the environment at Wasps where it would have been absolutely no problem.

"I'm not concerned about England, I'm just sticking up for my friend and player."

Former England player and BBC pundit Matt Dawson said he was "flabbergasted" by Ashton's decision.

"His reputation has been tarnished and Brian Ashton has a lot to answer for," said Dawson.

"It was a fantastic opportunity for him to form a real, hard relationship and friendship with his players but goodness knows what they are thinking now.

"They're going to be fearful about getting chopped from the team."

--------------------------------------------------------------------------

What are your thoughts on the drop following the result yesterday? Personally, pre-match I thought it made no difference but when the coach axes someone like that it shows what a negative impact it was on team. It's history now so no looking back but in all honesty that was a shocking result yesterday for England. Ashton and Robinson are both the same - they will never bring England silverware. And when Jonny Wilko retires, England will definately be in a 3rd class team then.

 

[Vambo]

Well... it's easy to view things with the benefit of hindsight.

I do think it was an over reaction to drop Cipriani but it was Ashton's decision to make and he made his call.

I do believe however that Ashton underestimated the knock on effect of dropping Cipriani and he's copping it from all quarters at the moment.

Personally I think England will achieve nothing with Ashton & Andrew at the helm.

 

[Cymro]

I agree bad decision to drop him! For England yesterday Cipriani could have easily replaced Wilko at 10 and the game could have been different!

 

[Hieu]

he was actually going to start at fullback instead of Balshaw but still an outrageous decision by Ashton.

 

[Mr.cyclopede]

Don't know if it would have changed something on the result

Stupid decision to fire someone because of such behavior. there are so many ways to make understand someone that some rules have to be respected, whenever before or after a match

Even if Ashton considered Cipriani was not fundamental to the team, It would have been smarter not to change the composition and the team mental balance for a private behavior, but reorder discipline after the match.

Making examples is oftently counterproductive

 

[bacon]

there also the reputation that cips has of arragance (i'm don't need to follow the rules etc) and apparently he's had trouble with curfews all the way through. (don't know how true that is but if it is it, it explains ashtons descsion a bit more. but it shows we don't know all the circumstances)
foolish from both parties.
unlucky for cips to be pictured but he shoud have played it safe and a bit of an overreation from ashton.
it also means we still have balshaw at fb :rahh:

 

[RC]

In the long term, however, i don't see how Cipriani being dropped will affect him.
He's a class player and will no doubt find himself on that field more and more often..hopefully surrounded by the other exciting backs England have but refuse to give international duties.

 

[Sir Speedy]

Cipriani just proved you right, RC. :huh:

 

[Busko]

Cipriani just proved you right, RC. :huh:
[/b]

I was about to write the same thing.

A point of discipline it's right from a manager point of view...but as long as a player's behaviour outside the pitch doesn't affect in game performances no coach can honestly oust a player. Also for such little reasons, and in the middle of a Six Nations... :whip:

 

[Feffo]

I think it was a really bad decision...He's only 20 Y.O.,he had just spent a night getting fun...I don't think he is like Cristiano Ronaldo or Adriano...

 

[chinwaggler]

I really dislike Ashton. I'm all for strict wow there's a fox in the neighbours garden lol... I'm all for punishing what's been done wrong.. but apparently all Danny did was give some tickets to his mates and was 15 minutes late.. no drinking or partying. Then he used Wilko as a scapegoat for how badly we did against Scotland. How can he drop Wilko after 1.5 bad performances when Balshaw has had... And why is Lewsey not full-back. And whenever he's being interviewed he's such a defensive prick. Someone said 'what do you think of introducing a backs coach' or something like that and he said 'Why, do you think I'm not good enough?' What a prick. And his winning record is pants. People say that coming second in the WC and 6N isn't bad but we should have won at least one of them and could have won both. The only reason that our situations wasn't 'should have won' is because Asthon's been there for such a while along with Andy Robinson. And he's ugly.

Here comes Mr Martin.

 

[Bullitt]

Not to completely **** on your bonfire, but Wilkinson had more then 1.5 bad performances... He's been shite since 2002.

 

[Prestwick]

Wrong. In intensive care since 2002 and crap since 2007.

 

[Bullitt]

No, just crap since 2002.

 

[nick_w]

Intensive care since 2002 yes, shite from 2007, can't really agree with that. He hasn't exactly been outstanding since 2006, almost there just for kicks, and even that area of his game has depleted in recent years.

As for the Cipriani issue, i'm of the impression that it doesn't really matter what he was doing, he was late for curfew. It may have been different under other coaches, but you have to stick to what your told, no matter who you are. Ashton showed that it didn't affect his selection by starting him the following week. And if this weekends games are anything to go by, Ashton (or whomever it may be) will be a fool picking Wilko over Cipriani.

 

[Prestwick]

No, just crap since 2002. [/b]

Thats incredibly unfair considering he barely played between 2003 and 2007. After January 2007/any period of time away from the guiding influence of Mike Catt however is fair game and he just hasn't made the grade at all in the last 13 months.

So. Just hasn't played between 2003-7 and crap since then on.

 

[chinwaggler]

Yes, he has not been performing well for a while.. but Ashton thought him good enough to be chosen in the first place.. why drop him after Scotland and no-one else when he was not the only one who hasn't performed consistently.