“What’s the biggest difference between our Rugby Union and Rugby League teams?” asked one self-styled comic after the numbing defeat by Australia. “Answer: there’s more chance of finding an openside flanker in the League side.”
This was a little unfair on Chris Robshaw, the poor sod in the No.7 shirt. Like Tom Wood of Northampton and James Haskell of Wasps, the other full-time flankers in Stuart Lancaster’s party, he was not a pure breakaway of the Richie McCaw/Michael Hooper/Sam Warburton school. He was a “six and a half”, with the emphasis heavily on the “six”.
Robshaw had his moments in the openside role, for sure: his Premiership grand final performance for Harlequins against Leicester in 2012 was something to savour; his Last Man Standing efforts in adversity – most notably against Wales on a gruesome night in Cardiff a decade ago – were object lessons in raw courage and commitment. But if no one could conceivably have tried harder in impersonating a round peg in a round hole, he was simply not one of life’s natural “Dead Ringers”. Which explains why he never toured with the Lions.
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