Digby wrote:Almost certainly England missed out there, looked a test player in every way bar actually getting a real chance to show what he could do. Which for a while wasn't his fault, nor England's with all those injuries, but then he was just overlooked for a weirdly long period of time
Yep, people trot out that he was always crocked, but there was a long period where he wasn't and was overlooked. I do remember he was brought into the squad a few times prior to that, and inevitably dropped out. But plenty of other players were given almost infinite injury tolerance.
He was brilliant in the 2002 AI's and would have made the RWC squad, imo, but got glandular fever
Thats my recollection too. He wasnt always injured but simply wasnt picked when he was available.
Cueto was good, but looking at those teams you feel like he would have seen off Varndell, Voyce and a late 2000s Cohen if there were any justice in the world.
Digby wrote:Almost certainly England missed out there, looked a test player in every way bar actually getting a real chance to show what he could do. Which for a while wasn't his fault, nor England's with all those injuries, but then he was just overlooked for a weirdly long period of time
Yep, people trot out that he was always crocked, but there was a long period where he wasn't and was overlooked. I do remember he was brought into the squad a few times prior to that, and inevitably dropped out. But plenty of other players were given almost infinite injury tolerance.
He was brilliant in the 2002 AI's and would have made the RWC squad, imo, but got glandular fever
If he'd hadn't had the glandular fever, then he'd have played the 6N, then the RWC and his place in the team would've been secure. Instead, he came back in 2014, halfway through the 6N, as a player with 2 caps, behind the RWC trio of Lewsey, Robinson, and Cohen. Then when he did get a start, it was on the injury ridden disaster tour of NZ in a misfiring team, where he got blamed for it all, and Robinson could revert to size conquering all. Poor sod.
Does one whip the ball away like lightning only to have it drop around the shins of the receiver? I have to say I've always enjoyed watching Percy in that passage of play, for a defender to sell his inside and outside defenders down the river like that takes some doing, no communication, no responsibility, no tackle, allowances needed both for it being a scratch side and the off chance they'd been out on the piss, but I can see why he was hidden at the back defending like that
