Dean Ryan explains why England's scrum lost its power
Monday 5 October 2015 13:07, UK
Dean Ryan explains why the omission of Dylan Hartley meant England lost their powerful scrum
Hartley was excluded from Stuart Lancaster's World Cup training squad after being banned for four weeks for heading-butting Saracens' Jamie George while playing for Northampton, ruling him out of England's three warm-up matches and the tournament opener against Fiji.
England's scrum has struggled to get the ascendancy we are used to seeing them get - and the image of Australia shoving England all over the Twickenham pitch on Saturday will haunt many a England front-row aficionado.
Worcester director of rugby Dean Ryan says that England should have looked to rehabilitate Hartley and explains why losing him meant the scrum was found wanting.
"The omission of Dylan Hartley changed the way England were able to play," said Ryan.
"They lost the front-foot pattern of how they marched up the field. None of us can say that in the last three weeks we were going to find a backline that could operate like the Australians do - not a chance. But we could have found a forward pack who could have run over the top of them.
"That key man was having Dylan Hartley in the middle of the front row. As soon as England did not have him, it changed the nature of the second row. England had to select Geoff Parling to look after Tom Youngs and Rob Webber when he came on. It changed the nature of the back five which had an impact on Robshaw.
"We then ended up in scrums when we had to play the ball where we have always got a penalty and kicked for touch and then got the drive on.
"By playing the ball we are then highlighting the fact that we have not got a cohesive midfield."
Worth the risk
Hartley's disciplinary record is not pretty reading, the head-butt ban took his career suspensions tally to 54 weeks and while Ryan is not trying defend Hartley's record, he believes his exclusion has done little to help him.
"We have to go back and ask why did we not play Hartley? He was only banned for the Fiji game," asks Ryan.
"This is international rugby and international rugby is not played by angels. We can't sit here and defend Dylan Hartley's disciplinary record - I am not going to even attempt too.
"England have excluded him to solve a problem but that doesn't solve the problem. New Zealand are outstanding about keeping people within the organisation when they make mistakes and working with them.
"They have clear value sets and when someone makes a mistake they run a programme and give them a second chance, not a third mind you, but definitely a second chance.
"We have always thrown our players out and said it is your problem, when you have solved it then you can come back in, but excluding him didn't solve anything."
