Every rugby fan will, somewhere in his or her memory bank, have a Serge Blanco moment. Mine is from 1991 at Twickenham. Rob Andrew sent a kick towards the French corner but didn’t get the bounce he wanted, and the ball drifted behind the French try line.
Blanco scurried back and picked up the loose ball, there was a quick glance at the three-quarters lining up outside him, and then he was off, streaking diagonally across his own 22 before releasing Jean-Baptiste Lafond down the right wing.
France scored a wonderful try, finished off with a dazzling infield kick from Didier Camberabero to Philippe Saint-André, who went in under the posts. But the try’s conception was all Blanco’s, for he had the ball in hands at that crucial moment. There was no letting ”I dare not” wait upon ”I would” in such moments.
Blanco retired from rugby in 1991, with 93 caps and 38 international tries to his name. He has continued to serve his beloved Biarritz Olympique club as president ever since, and in 1998, the Ligue National de Rugby (LNR) was formed to govern the professional club game in France. He was quickly appointed president of that as well. It is a title he still holds. In other countries, presidency of the league and one of its leading clubs might represent a conflict of interest.
”Not for him,” said one Toulouse fan at a recent Toulouse-Biarritz league match. ”Everybody loves him. He is good for the French game. He can do what he wants.”
Not satisfied with just those positions, Blanco has launched his own clothing line, the Serge Blanco 15 label, which still causes retired British three-quarters to twitch nervously upon sight of it (and which is soon to have a boutique in Cape Town, if the man himself is to be believed).
He also owns and manages a fantastically picturesque four-star hotel in Anglet — just outside Biarritz — called the Chateau Brindos, and it is there that I went to speak to him.
Talking to Blanco is a lot like playing against him must have been. Simple questions are dealt with efficiently and with little enthusiasm. When asked, for example, if there is a try he scored which sticks out in his memory — if he has his own Blanco moment — he simply leans back, shrugs, and says: ”No. They were all important. They were for France. So they were all at the same level, and always at the right moment.”
Give him a loose question, though, a question where he feels he can impress something new and exhilarating on to the conversation, and we are away. Like, for example, a question about the current state of the international game. Blanco is angry with the International Rugby Board (IRB). Very angry. So angry is he, in fact, that even the interpreter fails to keep up a couple of times — Blanco out-pacing his support again.
”Today, players are asked to play in so many competitions, because the unions use their international teams to get money. So the players are controlled by the national team and not the clubs, which means the clubs suffer.
”We have already asked the IRB to change things. We have asked for tours where a national team stays in one country, where the national teams play clubs during the weeks and the national team at the weekend. We don’t want to see Australia, South Africa, and New Zealand every single year. You play the same team every year and it loses its flavour.”
Blanco’s sentiments echo those of many fans. Irrespective of how exciting the four matches eventually proved to be, there was general consternation from the local rugby public at the news that South Africa would play Australia no fewer than four times this winter.
When the Springboks step out at the Stade de France on November 26, it will be the third time that the two teams have met this year. The Bok players will be at the end of a long month away after an arduous season, just as the French were when they came to Durban in June, and the home team is expected to win.
Even if the away team does win, the fixtures are becoming so commonplace that it will be just another international now, not the rare fixture a Test used to be, something we all looked forward to. There is little meaning to the Test marathons that take place at the end of the respective hemispheres’ seasons. A return to the good old days of Test series would spice it all up a bit.
”The problem is that the people in charge of the IRB are not thinking progressively. The IRB wants only big, professional, international games. They don’t care about the rest, about the amateur game any more,” says Blanco.
”Argentina has a wonderful team, but there are hardly any games there. It is bad for the development of the game there, and for the sport in general. They should insist that teams like France, and England go to somewhere like Argentina. There are so many chances to develop rugby in the world. Rugby is an amazing game. Why destroy it?
”If you want more championships, you could have a world club championship, with 32 teams from all the world, for one month. Three out of four years. Then in the fourth year, you have the World Cup. We could replace the international Test window with it. Why not? It would be interesting, much more interesting than the same old teams playing each other every year.”
The international calendar was not the only issue of the international professional game to irk Blanco.
”I still don’t understand so many things about the ‘new’ rules. How can you make five or seven replacements during a match? The teams do all this conditioning work, and then they replace the players. It is like changing a boxer after seven rounds in a world title fight. It is not sport.
”I would rather have 10 players on the bench, but only make changes if absolutely necessary, and maybe one tactical change. To avoid fakers, you simply ban the ‘injured’ player for a week. They say it can be dangerous without the changes, but bringing on a fresh prop against a tired prop is even more dangerous for the tired prop.”
France will host the 2007 Rugby World Cup, and it will be hosted on a spring tide of rugby optimism in the country. At club level, France currently dominates European competition, and, while the national team flattered to deceive during the last Six Nations tournament, only a fool would write them off completely.
”Yet here too, there are anomalies. The 2003 tournament in Australia was conspicuous for being played wholly within one country, and thereby having a strong national identity. In 2007, four matches will be played in Cardiff — three of them the home pool matches of Wales, and Scotland will have a packed Murrayfield roaring them on when they take on New Zealand. It is not as if France do not have the facilities available to host a Rugby World Cup, so why the foreign games?
”Parce que le rugby est un chose formidable, mais le politique de cette chose est impenetrable [Because rugby is a wonderful game but its politics are incomprehensible]” he replies drily. His involvement in the bidding process was at both a public relations level and in the administration of the French Top 14 league during the World Cup weeks.
”It is all about politics. For the rugby it would have been no problem, but the politics …” he shakes his head and gives a forlorn smile. ”It was about the negotiation with the other countries. England wanted the World Cup so we didn’t negotiate with them, but we did with the other home nations. This, I suppose, was the politics.”
The 2011 World Cup will undoubtedly be a single nation affair, with Japan refusing the offer of New Zealand to co-host, and South Africa too isolated to afford opportunities to co-host anywhere else. The neutral public’s hot favourite is Japan, whose soccer World Cup was a lesson in preparation and national effort. Should they get the award, it would be a clear signal that the game is expanding on a global scale.
”It would be a good idea, a very good idea,” Blanco says, and becomes animated again. ”But I do not think it will happen. Argentina could also organise this tournament, but unfortunately there is the question of money and politics again. Sadly, maybe because of this problem [Japan] will not happen, even though I would prefer it — that is my personal opinion. For the sport it would be superb.”
It is a shame that politics and the rigidity of the IRB appears to be frustrating Blanco, for there is no doubt that with his innovativeness, willingness to experiment, and love of the game and its principles he could make some welcome changes if given the power. He has been the driving force behind the success of rugby in France domestically.
He sees the disparate ways French clubs play as one of their strengths. ”We have identities. Differences. And we work on that. It is important. Maybe we are different from other countries in certain aspects of the game, some are better, some are weaker.
”Since rugby has become professional, it has become more competitive. I also think that it is important to keep these differences, as this is important for the identity. If everybody plays the same rugby, the game is finished.”
He leans forward to make his point: ”In our championship, some teams play with forwards only, some with the backs, some with all 15 players. Everything is there in our championship. In the Super 12, all the teams play the same, and the rugby is flat. It gets boring quickly. All the rugby styles should be different. We have to work on the differences to make sure our national team can play all those styles.”
Ideas and innovations pour forth from Blanco, which is something that sets him apart from so many of rugby’s administrators. Today’s officials are too often concerned with making profit, and as much money as possible. Blanco barely mentions money, beyond demonstrating the growth of the game in France.
He believes that the more interesting and open the game is, the more people will come to see it, and the money will simply flow in. It is a simplistic view, and not always a realistic one, but given the success of rugby in France at the moment and the likely success of the next Rugby World Cup, it is an attitude difficult to find fault with. Just as in his playing days, Blanco is creating exciting innovations rather than playing for percentages. — www.365.com