Left field

Rugby’s hard-but-fair reputation has always been a myth

Colin Meads, regarded by most New Zealanders as the greatest All Black of them all, delivers a diverting after-dinner speech in a self-deprecating “aw shucks” hill farmer’s style with a bottle of beer firmly clutched in a large fist.

It is only after the laughter subsides that the listener realises with a twinge of unease that the majority of the anecdotes involve Meads using one or both of his large fists to thump a member of the opposition. Illegal then and illegal now, it’s worth recalling now amid all the hot air spouted over the Harlequins fake blood scandal.

The saga of a Harlequins winger biting on a fake blood capsule in order to get a goal-kicking replacement on to the field in a Heineken Cup quarter-final has gripped the English media.

It follows revelations that young men who happen to play rugby for a living can be tempted by recreational drugs (see the Justin Harrison story), not unlike their contemporaries in other walks of life.