'We made a mistake... I've apologised to the club and I apologise to the wider public too'
Let’s tackle the giant, stinking African elephant in the room first, the rather damning photographs of Sean Maitland and four Saracens team-mates apparently flouting social distancing restrictions that appeared in the Daily Mail on Thursday. The pictures show the five of them – Scotland wing Maitland, Billy Vunipola, Nick Isiekwe, Alex Goode and Josh Ibuanokpe – chatting and supping coffees within what looks like suspiciously less than two metres of one another.
Saracens have issued a blushing statement, saying that the players had “accepted they made an error in judgement and apologised for any upset they may have caused”. Maitland has said sorry privately and does so again when questioned on the gathering. With two young daughters at home, it is hard to see why he would take any risks. “We made a mistake, we were too close together,” he told RugbyPass. “I’ve apologised to the club and I apologise to the wider public too.”
Saracens need more controversy like Mike Tyson needs a stronger uppercut. In November, the English and European champions were docked 35 points and fined over £5million for breaching the Premiership salary cap. Two months later, the league confirmed their automatic relegation from the top flight. It was a story and a scandal that reverberated through the game like a tsunami, and that is way before we get to the fielding of an ineligible player that nearly cost them their place in the Champions Cup.
Maitland had been back from Scotland’s dismal World Cup campaign for less than a fortnight when the squad was summoned to a meeting with former CEO Ed Griffiths, who outlined the bleak path ahead. “There was a massive shock and obviously a bit of anger there as well, I can’t lie about that,” Maitland said. “The anger was probably just more, how did we get to this point? Obviously, you hear that other clubs might be doing it, but we won all these trophies in the past, and everyone is going to be second-guessing that now.”
It wasn’t as if Saracens were thunderously well-liked before all of this. Whether for their rampant success, big personalities, a chunk of towering England internationals or talk of their much-vaunted ‘Wolf Pack’ defence, they were about as popular across the continent as Margaret Thatcher is in Glasgow. When news of the punishment broke, there was a sense of smugness that the villains so many loved to hate would get their comeuppance. Fans lined up to swing a gleeful boot at the disgraced juggernaut.
Exeter Chiefs owner Tony Rowe and director of rugby Rob Baxter, who had seen their team beaten by Saracens in successive Premiership finals, were quite understandably among the longest and loudest voices in the press. “That’s normal, that’s part of the game we’re in,” accepted Maitland. “When you do win, if anything happens negatively, people are going to jump on that. We knew there was going to be a lot of talk in the media after this came out – clubs, players, ex-players, owners.
“But that was all outside noise. We spoke about that as a club, you’re going to expect that. For us, it’s staying tight, staying together and that’s what we did. I don’t feel that (Saracens’ success is tainted) at all. It’s all down to us as a squad and how hard we’ve worked for those trophies. People are going to look at that outside of our Saracens bubble and think these trophies and titled are tainted. But I don’t think that’s the case – it’s all down to hard work, us winning those trophies.”
Days after the docking of points was made public, Saracens faced a trip to Gloucester in the sizzling cauldron of Kingsholm, missing a heap of their World Cup galacticos. They ran out to boos and were jeered with cries of “same old Sarries, always cheating”. Some home fans brandished fake £50 notes. Still, they got the job done. It was, remembers Maitland, an exercise in ruthlessness and stubbornness and blocking out the tumult in a 21-12 win. “It’s one of the toughest away games in the Prem and the reaction we got was outstanding. It just shows how much character was in our team.
“A lot of young boys were playing because most of our internationals were still at the World Cup, but it’s sort of been the story of the season. We can’t control what’s happening, it’s been difficult, but the way I think the players have handled it, in the media, especially on the field, we’ve just gotten on with our work.
“Not only the salary cap stuff but you look at European season, going down to 13 men against Ospreys and winning, getting Will Skelton red-carded in the first half against Racing 92 and winning, it’s been a year of fighting through those tough moments on and off the pitch and that comes down to the way our leadership group have led us and the way internally we have handled things.
“It’s been about living up to our standards, not giving up, not throwing in the towel, because I’m sure if some other teams got the punishment we got, you’d probably see a different story. We keep fighting for each other, staying within our circle. I keep going back to it – our leaders have done an amazing job, obviously our coaches as well, for us to have this stuff-it mentality.”
This culture and these bonds invigorate Maitland, the New Zealand-born ex-Crusader who moved to Glasgow eight years ago where he qualified for Scotland through his grandparents. Amid Saracens’ strife, there has been much talk of a return north, perhaps to fill the full-back void left at Warriors by Stuart Hogg. If Glasgow fans were dying to see him back, it has been a forlorn hope. Maitland is staying put for two more years, one of the big hitters happy to stick with the club and tackle the Championship.
“I don’t know why all these rumours have been coming out,” he said. “I re-signed a while back, before the Six Nations. I did have a chat with (incoming Glasgow coach) Danny Wilson and he’s a great coach who I get along with well, but the only place I wanted to be was Saracens. I love it here. My family are really settled in North London, and it’s a great club. I’m lucky to be here.
“I love coming in every day to train with my mates. It’s a family club, they do look after you bloody well. People probably don’t understand that it’s not really to do with the results and the trophies, it’s the memories and enjoyment you have off the field which is a big thing for me. When I found out when we were getting relegated, it didn’t change my mindset at all.”
Everybody in England’s second tier is going to be thirsting for a shot at the stricken giants. There will be some decidedly unglamorous and seriously testing away days, where the prestige and quality of the Premiership falls off a cliff. But for an outside back who turns 32 in September, it will not be the relentlessly competitive weekly grind of the top division. Maitland is still a hugely important and highly experienced member of Gregor Townsend’s Scotland team.
He longs to keep it that way, to surpass the 50-cap benchmark of which he is currently two Tests shy, and hopes that while there will be an obvious drop in standard, a year in the Championship might actually help him stay at the top a while longer. “At first, I didn’t check with Gregor (about playing for Saracens in the Championship),” he said. “I spoke to him towards the end of the Six Nations saying how I wanted to keep playing for Scotland. He had no doubt that it should be fine, obviously form depending.
“I’d just like to keep playing at a high level, keep playing for Scotland. I know there are a few guys that have retired since the World Cup but for me personally, I feel fresh, I feel good, I’d just like to keep playing until someone says no, you’re not good enough. I played in New Zealand and you look at these All Blacks that had sabbatical years, it had a massive positive on their career, probably gave them an extra year or two of playing.
“I’m obviously not treating the Championship as a sabbatical, but at 32, I’m not going to be playing every week, so I can look after my body a bit more as well as spending time with family off the field. Hopefully, it’ll add a couple of years onto my career. At the moment, I’m feeling good and I just keep cracking on.”
In the four Six Nations matches that Scotland managed to fulfil this year, the improvements and tweaks in style were obvious. Townsend’s blueprint for “the fastest rugby in the world” has been shelved for now, or at least significantly altered. There is more pragmatism, a more ravenous, belligerent appetite to defend and blast people backwards.
Steve Tandy, the defence specialist, replaced the long-standing Matt Taylor and his impact has been profound. Scotland leaked tries like rotten guttering in 2019. Against Ireland, England, Italy and France they shipped 15. This year, against the same opposition, they lost only four. Their venomous defence is the best so far in the interrupted championship. For all of their attacking game-breakers, they look like a team that truly loves life without the ball.
“There was a massive improvement from the World Cup,” suggested Maitland. “The biggest improvement was in defence, and that’s no disrespect to Matt Taylor, who is a terrific coach and did great things with the team. But as a defence, we’re just a lot tougher, a lot harder to break down. You can have all the systems in the world but if you don’t want to work hard, you don’t want to get off the ground you don’t want to make tackles, it’s not going to happen.
“Players have to recognise the extenuating circumstances and get on with playing games to make sure the clubs exist and thrive”
– @rwiggy9 on the limbo @Saracens and @premrugby are in due to the coronavirus pandemic. @chrisjonespress takes notes ?https://t.co/KBYoejJpTB— RugbyPass (@RugbyPass) May 1, 2020
“We changed our mindset a bit around how we want to defend. We got rid of all the systems clouding our judgement. I don’t want to talk about Saracens, but we have probably got one of the best defences in the world and it’s not over-complicated. It’s about getting your width, coming off the line hard and trying to tackle someone behind the gain line, make a dominant tackle. That’s what we bought into with Scotland.
“Sometimes on the wing you don’t make too many tackles but you can see guys working hard, getting off the ground. I’ve got a pretty important job of talking to people on my inside and setting width and trying to get them off the line and bang someone. Overall, I just thought we had a bit more balance to our game. At the World Cup, we overplayed at times. Now we have got balance in different parts of the field, whether it’s slow ball or fast ball, kicking on our terms, when to play and when not. The trends of the game are that the team that kicks more wins more matches.”
As the Covid-19 pandemic continues to visit financial chaos upon the game, many of Saracens’ elite have taken wage cuts or huge salary deferrals to keep the club afloat. What kind of team they will put out next season remains to be seen. There is speculation over who among the heavy artillery will stay and who will go. Jamie George, the great England and Lions hooker, has nailed his colours to the Sarries mast. His international colleagues Jack Singleton and Ben Earl are sticking around long-term but will be sent on loan to Gloucester and Bristol Bears.
“From what I hear, we’re still going to have a pretty good team,” Maitland said. “And not only that but this year we have only really played our strongest team in a couple of games. It’s been our young academy boys that have been scrapping – that’s great for the future.
“We want to try and win the Championship, and the ultimate goal would be to come back up and do something special the next year. With what we’ve been through, what everyone said about us, that’d be an amazing thing to try and win a trophy. It’ll be tough, but how cool would that be? That excites me.”
Comments on RugbyPass
This is short sighted from Clayton if you ask me, smacks of too much preseason planning and no adaptability. What if DMac is out for a must win match, are they still only going to bring their best first five and playmaker on late in the game? Trusting the game to someone who wasn’t even part of planning (they would have had Trask pinned in as Jacomb preseason). Perhaps if the Crusaders were better they would not have done this, but either way imo you take this opportunity to play a guy you might need starting in a final rather than having their 12th game getting comfortable coming off the bench.
1 Go to commentsThanks Brett.. At last a positive article on the potential of Wallaby candidates, great to read. Schmidt’s record as an international rugby coach speaks for itself, I’m somewhat confident he will turn the Wallaby’s fortunes around …. on the field. It will be up to others to steady the ship off the paddock. But is there a flaw in my optimism? We have known all along that Australia has the players to be very competitive with their international rivals. We know that because everyone keeps telling us. So why the poor results? A question that requires a definitive answer before the turn around can occur. Joe Schmidt signed on for 2 years, time to encompass the Lions tour of 2025. By all accounts he puts family first and that’s fair enough, but I would wager that his 2 year contract will be extended if the next 18 months or so shows the statement “Australia has the players” proves to be correct. The new coach does not have a lot of time to meld together an outfit that will be competitive in the Rugby Championship - it will be interesting to see what happens. It will be interesting to see what happens with Giteau law, the new Wallaby coach has already verbalised that he would to prefer to select from those who play their rugby in Australia. His first test in charge is in July just over 3 months away .. not a long time. I for one wish him well .. heaven knows Australia needs some positive vibes.
21 Go to commentsWhat a load of bollocks. The author has forgotten to mention the fact that the Crusaders have a huge injury toll with top world class players out. Not to mention the fact that they are obviously in a transition period. No this will not spark a slow death for NZ rugby, but it does mean there will be a new Super Rugby champion. Anyone who knows anything about NZ rugby knows that there is some serious talent here, it just isn’t all at the Crusaders.
2 Go to commentsI wouldn’t spend the time on Nawaqanitawase! No point in having him filling in a jersey when he’s committed to leave Union. Give the jersey to a young prospect who will be here in the future.
4 Go to commentsIt was a pleasure to watch those guys playing with such confidence. That trio can all be infuriating for different reasons and I can see why Jones might have decided against them. No way to justify leaving Ikitau out though. Jorgensen and him were both scheduled to return at the same time. Only one of them plays for Randwick and has a dad who is great mates with the national coach though.
53 Go to commentsBrayden Iose and Peter Lakai are very exciting Super Rugby players but are too short and too light to ever be a Test 8 vs South Africa, France, Ireland, and England, Lakai could potentially be a Test player at 7 if he is allowed to focus on 7 for Hurricanes.
7 Go to commentsPencils “Thomas du Toit” into possible 2027 Bok squad.
1 Go to commentsDon’t see why Harrison makes the bench. Jones can play at 10 if needed, and there is a good case for starting her there to begin with if testing combinations. That would leave room for Sing on the bench
1 Go to commentsWhat a load of old bull!
1 Go to commentsOf the rugby I’ve born witness to in my lifetime - 1990 to date - I recognize great players throughout those years. But I have no doubt the game and the players are on average better today. So I doubt going back further is going to prove me wrong. The technical components of the game, set pieces, scrums, kicks, kicks at goal. And in general tactics employed are far more efficient, accurate and polished. Professional athletes that have invested countless hours on being accurate. There is one nation though that may be fairly competitive in any era - and that for me is the all blacks. And New Zealand players in general. NZ produces startling athletes who have fantastic ball skills. And then the odd phenomenon like Brooke. Lomu. Mcaw. Carter. Better than comparing players and teams across eras - I’ve often had this thought - that it would be very interesting to have a version of the game that is closer to its original form. What would the game look like today if the rules were rolled back. Not rules that promote safety obviously - but rules like: - a try being worth 1 point and conversion 2 points. Hence the term “try”. Earning a try at goals. Would we see more attacking play? - no lifting in the lineouts. - rucks and break down laws in general. They looked like wrestling matches in bygone eras. I wonder what a game applying 1995 rules would look like with modern players. It may be a daft exercise, but it would make for an interesting spectacle celebrating “purer” forms of the game that roll back the rules dramatically by a few versions. Would we come to learn that some of the rules/combinations of the rules we see today have actually made the game less attractive? I’d love to see an exhibition match like that.
29 Go to commentsIrish Rugby CEO be texting Andy Farrell “Andy, i found our next Kiwi Irishman”
5 Go to commentsI certainly don’t miss drinking beers at 8am in the morning watching rugby games being played in NZ.
1 Go to commentsThis looks like a damage limitation exercise for Wales, keeping back some of their more effective players for the last 20/25 minutes to try and counter England’s fresh legs so the Red Roses don’t rack up a big score.
1 Go to commentsVery unlikely the Bulls will beat Leinster in Dublin. It would be different in Pretoria.
1 Go to commentsI think it is a dangerous path to go down to ban a player for the same period that a player they injured takes to recover. Players would be afraid to tackle anyone. I once tackled my best friend at school in a practice match and sprained his ankle. I paid for it by having to play fly-half instead of full-back for the rest of that season’s fixtures.
5 Go to commentsJust such a genuine good bloke…and probably the best all round player in his generation. Good guys do come first sometimes and he handled the W.Cup loss with great attitude.
2 Go to commentsWord in France is that he’s on the radar of a few Top14 clubs.
5 Go to commentsGet blocking Travis, this guy has styles and he’s gonna make a swift impact…!
1 Go to commentsWhat remorse? She claimed that her dangerous tackle wasn’t worthy of a red! She should be compensating the injured player for loss of earnings at the minimum. Her ban should include the recovery time of the injured player as well as the paltry 3 match ban.
5 Go to commentsArdie is a legend. Finished and klaar. Two things: “Yeah, yeah, I have had a few conversations with Razor just around feedback on my game and what I am doing well, what I need to improve on or work-ons. It’s kind of been minimal, mate, but it’s all that I need over here in terms of how to be better, how to get better and what I am doing well.” I hope he’s downplaying it - and that it’s not that “minimal”. The amount of communication and behind the scenes preparation the Bok coaches put into players - Rassie and co would be all over Ardie and being clear on what is expected of him. This stands out for me as something teams should really be looking at in terms of the boks success from a coaching point of view. And was surprised by the comment - “minimal”. In terms of the “debate” around Ireland and South Africa. Nice one Ardie. Indeed. There’s no debate.
2 Go to comments