Bear-faced assault

By Hobbledehoy's Dad
June 13 2005

It's a clichè that Sale have always been a team of phenomenal backs with eight other guys basically running around. How good would we be with a pack that could guarantee good ball? We may be about to find out: H's Dad casts his eye over PSA's kitchen re-fit.

Any Sale watchers this season will have witnessed a fundamental change at the club. Sale now have a powerful pack; more specifically they have a scrummage to be reckoned with!

You can always tell when your front row are making progress in the dark pressured arts of the scrum. When coaches and supporters of quality tight fives like those of Tigers, Bath and Wasps start crying foul after their game-plan becomes grounded unexpectedly, you know you are there or therabouts! And they have been bawling their heads off on several occasions this year.
Many supporters have put this down to the man mountain that is Andrew Sheridan

Sherri not the man to trifle with up front

It is no surprise; according to Mick Cleary, “Sheridan bench presses well over 440lb, squats around 594lb and dead-lifts a couple of laden mules.” Zorba transformed his massive frame last summer, reducing his body fat from 20% to nearer 12% whilst getting him bigger and stronger. He visibly does the business on the field. No more obviously than vs Pau, when according to some commentators he almost single-handedly dismembered the Pau front row.

But I would like to present a slightly different opinion, gleaned from several sources and a bit of amateur nous, which paints the same picture, but from a slightly different perspective.

In the 2003-4 season I saw Sheridan almost exclusively as a developing talent. To me he was only comfortable in the loose, with powerful head down surges around the ruck, maul and lineout. He frequently demonstrated awesome power in matches but always seemed unable to keep it up for the full match and often left the field early in the second half visibly exhausted. His head-first technique caused occasional problems and two jaw breaks later he now no longer leads with his chin, and perhaps those absences accentuate the differences from this year, but nevertheless...

In the set-scrums I was far from convinced of him having international quality ability. Too often smaller grizzled wily opponents seemed to either better him with technique or fool the ref into giving penalties against him. He always seemed to be struggling with his loose-arm binding and was penalised far too often. He was, after all, a relative novice in the front row. I thought he was still a couple of years off from being a regular international. Last year our front row players often seemed to struggle to hold their own against the stronger scrummaging sides.

This year has been completely different. I am not sure how much nous Trevor was able to impart to Sherri during summer training and whilst trying to recover from his back injury, but what is certain is that Sherri has been “up for it in the set-piece” all year. In the majority of matches only the ref’s interpretation of correct binding has stopped our front 3 from dominating. True, his loose arm binding is still a cause for concern, but he is now relishing the set-piece. It has become his bread and butter, in fact to my mind he is now also putting jam on it as well! So much so that England's scrum coach, Phil Keith-Roach said “He has been the form loosehead in the Premiership over this past season,'' He is now on the verge of being selected to front up to Carl Hayman (often thought of as the bedrock upon which the all-black scrum has been founded), this after a single off-the-bench cap for England in the 6 nations. Quite a meteoric rise!

I have kept wondering why he has made such progress all season. Recently I have heard reports that the whole approach to the set-piece was transformed in the Sale squad over last summer and in the run up to Christmas.

A combination of correct diets, fitness and live scrummaging have contributed enormously, but for me the single most important influence in this may have been the arrival of our crowd favourite ankle tackler Sebastien Bruno. I understand that since this most intense, contained brooding hooker arrived, the binding of the front row has altered slightly, our “set” is different and the step into contact has also changed. Our scrum has both looked and performed differently. A good coach knows his areas of expertise, but he also knows when to step back and let others have their input. PSA: what does he know of forward arts? A lot more than this schoolboy hooker of course but at Gloucester he brought Olivier Azam with him and at Sale he brought Sebastien Bruno. Kingsley is a back row man and I think he too may have taken heed of Sebastien’s obvious prowess in gallic war arts.

What has been fundamentally apparent to me is how different our scrum performs when Bruno is hooking! Please don’t get me wrong on this, I am a big Titterell fan (after all I selected his shirt last year in the shirt-off-their-back competition), but to me when Bruno hooked it made a huge difference in the set piece during the first half of the season. After the first couple of matches I was amazed how often Bruno and Sherri, working in tandem, were able to buckle opposing front rows. Some fairly famous international heads complete with grimacing faces recurrently popped out of the scrums to be penalised by the ref. We truly dominated! To me, Bruno has significantly helped focus pressure on opposing tight heads or hookers to dramatic effect. He is an awesome scrummager in his own right. I am not sure if Bruno’s prowess is down to being superfit for the first time in his career, or if there is some other factor, but what is evident is that at full strength we have a front 3 to be reckoned with.

But this is in danger of belittling the contribution of Stuart Turner and Barry Stewart. When PSA first arrived we already knew Trevor was coming to join our front row, replacing the problematic and apparently very expensive Lecter. But we also heard rumours of a young South African international prop being recruited; CJ Van Der Linde. This came to nothing eventually, which is just as well, as by Christmas both our long-serving tight-heads had far exceeded the expectations of PSA, who became intent on retaining them and not signing any replacements. Whilst sharing the role of tighthead this year, Stewart and Turner have occasionally come back on to prop again when injuries intervened in Sale’s best-laid plans. Stewart, covering both tight and loosehead and Turner tight and very occasionally hooker have been extremely useful in this respect. Together they have been the mainstay of our pack in holding the tight side steady. Unsung heroes in many matches they do an awful lot of donkey work without adequate recognition. I must remind myself that with a tight five the whole unit must work together and all should share the praise. Schoey, Daisy and Lobbe deserve their own article but suffice it to say they provide ample power.

But I must come back to the player I think was our key signing last year and I am not talking of Seabass. I know Nick Johnson and his team have been instrumental in getting the players bodies in peak condition for this year; but the results have been truly remarkable in the case of Bruno who lept up the rankings about 6 places to become the first choice french hooker. The fact that he was the fittest player in the 60 strong French National assessment squad raised quite a few eyebrows in France.

For me whilst Sherri has provided the brute power, Titters has provided the dynamism and Turner and Stewart steadfast resilience, Bruno has brought the nous, and has been a true catalyst to our success!

There was an anecdote circling at the party after the European Challenge cup win that must be shared; It goes something like this: Due to his limited English, Bruno hardly said not one word to Sheri during the whole of the summer training and this left Sheri slightly concerned; Would they get on? The answer came at the start of their first game of the season together at the first set piece with Bruno and Big Ted starting. According to the version I heard Sebastien turned to Andrew, cocked his head at the opposition and produced his first ever perfect heavily accented anglo-saxon phrase directed at Big ted.”Let’s do it!”.. (or something similar but equally clear in its meaning)
And they proceeded to “do it” all season long… It doesn’t matter if it is a true anecdote or not, I do not think you can isolate Sherri as “a dismemberer of front rows”, what is clear to me is that everyone has contributed to our pack’s success this year!

At the Kassam the performance vs the Pau front row firmly reminded me of Bruno’s elevated national position. I don’t know how many other fans noticed, but at the end of the match Bruno clearly went over to the opposing coach and hooker wagging his finger. To my mind he was telling them in no uncertain terms, clarifying exactly why he was the French number two, putting both Terrain and Tincu firmly in their places. “Four balls against the head; I am the French two!

But I must retain balance whilst frimly intending to continue chanting Bruno at every opportunity next year! In marked contrast to this superlative side to his performance, at the beginning of the season his throwing was appalling it was a very weak, weakest part of his game. I often willed him to be subbed in the hope of us winning lineout ball! But he has steadily improved during the season and is now fairly reliable. Similiarly the disparity in scrummaging between Andy and Seb has markedly reduced.. I have certainly noticed that towards the end of the season Titterrell’s set pieces were much more solid. Overall I am firmly of the opinion that their relationship is symbiotic, both are improving with the intense competition, and by sharing the two slot they are both suffering less from injuries. But that is not the only effect Bruno’s arrival has had on Andrew Titterrell. Freeing him up to occasionally play in the back row has had a significant unforeseen impact. In my humble opinion, Titterell has earned his Lions place, not because of his hooking, but because of his dynamic abilities in loose play evidenced far more frequently when he plays seven! More specifically his usefulness on an international bench in covering both two and seven has gained him a considerable advantage over Chuter et al! His dynamism was there for us all to see vs Pau being metres ahead of other players in taking a classic scoring pass out of the tackle for a supporting seven, from Frank..

In selecting both Titterell and Sheridan for the lions on the back of very little six nations international exposure this season, Woodward has referred to the rapid progress made as a result of Sale utilizing live scrummaging practice. This is unusual in the premiership, only a couple of teams do it, but it is also a significant factor. Each week our front row practice against fellow squad players who are emulating the techniques and binding of the forthcoming opposition. This must surely help technique far more than driving a heavy inanimate scrum machine backwards with just coordinated raw power required. Having a larger squad is paying dividends in many different ways.

Looking forwards I am aware I have not mentioned Ben Coutts; he has certainly played his part in the squad towards the end of the season with some impressive clearing out but in all honesty I haven’t noticed a lot as yet apart from his lack of fitness! He certainly shows promise for next year. I look forward to his impact after the Hood has finished with him! I understand Lionel Faure will also benefit enormously under our very own sadist. If, as pundits indicate, we can control his fists and channel his natural aggression we may have ideal cover at both loosehead and hooker. With Roddham seeking more gametime elsewhere we are still, imho, one player short in the front row. It will be interesting to see who PSA finds and how they slot into the new Sale Meat Grinding Machine. If Nick Johnson has the same impact as last year on the new intake of Lobbe, Coutts, and Faure and progresses yet further with existing 2nd year pupils, we have nothing to fear. In fact, I am totally optimistic as to next year! So let us spend part of this off season rejoicing in our new found front row prowess whilst also giving thanks that we aren’t personally subject to Zorba’s particular brand of summer school!

In the meantime let us all focus on the Lions tour; on what could be the making or breaking of Andrew Sheridan’s international reputation. The big question is whether he can repeat his dominating performances in the most difficult rugby theatre in the world, or will his inexperience be his ultimate undoing. In order to compete for a test place he will certainly need to focus on his mobility, modify his groundwork and control his aggression, but from what several of us have seen already there are the first signs that Woodward realizes what he has in Big Ted.