Hore and Davies: Keeping score on war of words

Jul 4 2008 by Delme Parfitt, Western Mail

Delme Parfitt steps in to referee the verbal blows which have been exchanged between Jonathan Davies and Ospreys chief Andrew Hore over the absence of a head coach with rugby’s galacticos

SECONDS out, round three ... at least that’s what Welsh rugby fans will probably be muttering under their breath the next time Jonathan Davies and Andrew Hore have a pop at each other in public.

On my unofficial scorecard I have Jonathan “The Destroyer” Davies ahead on points at the moment, with Andrew “The Hitman” Hore needing to take some instructions from his corner if he is to get the better of a guy fast turning into his nemesis in the verbal sparring stakes.

Davies landed the first jab back in October last year just as the New Zealander was about to become the WRU’s elite performance director.

There had already been concerned murmurings about a fitness guru landing such an encompassing, powerful role, when the former Wales fly-half put in his gumshield and got off his stool.

“We need someone who knows rugby coaching at all levels,” cried Davies.

“The guys are fitter and stronger than before, but game awareness is lacking.”

Hore got wind of the remarks from 12,000 miles away and the speed of his counter would have done Shane Williams proud.

The Kiwi said nothing publicly, but Davies revealed on TV he had received the hairdryer treatment down the phone from an indignant New Zealander.

Fast forward nine months or so and the bell has sounded once again, with Hore these days EPD at the Ospreys and presiding over a head coaching vacuum that has left many in the game here scratching their heads.

Why, the question has been asked, is it taking so much time to fill such a plum job?

Davies had the answer on Wednesday...

“Most coaches would come into a new job and want to be the main man,” the Welsh fly-half legend insisted, forcing Hore on to the ropes again with a neatly-worked combination.

“But at the Ospreys he will be coming in under Andrew Hore. It’s a difficult position to enter into.”

Ouch! Nose bloodied, Hore’s retort was so tetchy it was akin to a cluster of desperate haymakers.

“That shows a lack of understanding and I’d expect that from Jonathan,” he snapped, “because his experience of professional sport was a fair time ago ... blah, blah, blah.”

You get the picture. It was great, knockabout stuff for the punters, and the media.

But, when he has calmed down a bit, Hore may well regret that he saw the need to respond in a manner that only suggested to outside observers that Davies’ comments had been a bit too near the mark for comfort.

And that’s why the Welshman has curried more favour with this particular judge so far.

Hore insists the delay in finding a new man is only due to a desire to “do our homework very, very thoroughly”.

But whether he or the Ospreys like it or not, there is confusion about where the region is heading with this one.

And Hore’s role, just as Davies had the temerity to highlight, IS at the centre of it.

Consider this from Justin Marshall at the time his fellow countryman was being tipped for the WRU role.

“Andrew Hore is very good at what he does and that is fitness,” said the 81-times capped New Zealand scrum-half.

“He doesn’t need the extra tag of elite performance director and, if the WRU want him, it should be for what he does and that is fitness.”

Apparently Marshall had both barrels down the phone as well.

When Hore left Wales in 2005 following the autumn win against Australia, he did so as the undisputed kingpin of elite rugby conditioning.

Three years earlier when he arrived, he was handed the brief of grabbing hold of a team whose physical fitness had been a major public issue since the dawn of professionalism.

Hore’s triumph was to end that issue for good – and also to leave in place a system that ensured it could never recur.

And his hold over the players throughout the process bordered on the messianic, with then captain Gareth Thomas once saying the squad would have run 100 metres out to sea off Barry Island beach had Hore claimed it was good for them.

But clearly Hore was never satisfied with that brief, and when he chose to take up a role with the 14 academies presided over by the New Zealand Rugby Union back in his homeland, he confirmed as much.

“I wanted to move away from a hands-on conditioning position into more of a high-performance management role,” Hore told us. “That is my passion and that is where I want to go with my career.”

And the Ospreys job affords him the chance to move a few steps further down that path.

But Hore could yet find obstacles on that path.

He seems to have a problem to overcome in Wales and perhaps the wider rugby world in terms of the way he is perceived professionally.

His expertise in the field he wants to leave behind was such that he may struggle to be accepted by those, like Davies, whose bag is just rugby itself.

Rightly or wrongly, there are already those questioning Hore’s qualification to appoint a head coach on behalf of the Ospreys when he has no real track record at the sharp end of the game, or any playing background of note.

One member of the Welsh rugby fraternity put it succinctly last night.

“When Andrew was here before, one of the things he used to say was ‘don’t tell me about fitness and I won’t tell you about rugby’.

“Well now that is exactly what he is seeking to do because any appointment at the Ospreys will, at the end of the day, be his appointment.

“He is the kingpin down there, the man who is calling the shots.”

In other words, there could well be plenty of high-profile rugby people uncomfortable with being placed in a position where they are answerable to a fellow of Hore’s ilk.

And, in the only test case of such a situation in Wales thus far, we saw Graeme Maw, a bloke with a background outside the sport, last just four months as EPD for the national team next to the advanced cerebral rugby strengths of a man of the calibre of Warren Gatland.

Hence Davies’ remarks, which so angered Hore.

In biting back at the former dual-code international, Hore argued his current position at the Ospreys was “quite normal for a southern hemisphere person”.

Oh dear. The last time I checked, Neath, Swansea and the surrounding area was in the northern hemisphere, and some Ospreys fans may have considered that remark rather patronising.

But, as always, their judgement will be reserved for when the season starts and results begin to filter in.

If the trio of Sean Holley, Jonathan Humphreys and Rowland Phillips manage to get the Ospreys out of the blocks quickly, then everything will be all quiet on the western front.

However, if the team drags its heels in the busy Magners League month of September, then supporters will begin to wonder why the region did not act with the swiftness of Leicester, who ensured that head coach Heyneke Meyer was in place as successor to Marcello Loffreda by June 30.

And, were that to happen, you can bet good old Jonathan won’t be backward in coming forward.

We can be certain too that whatever he fires will be returned with interest by the sensitive Hore.

It could be quite entertaining actually.

In fact I can hear it already. Seconds out, round three!