Rugby World Cup 2019: Can a newly diverse England help mend broken Britain?

The country appears more divided than ever so could success for the rugby team in Japan set an example for those back home to follow?

Eddie Jones has challenged his England squad to inspire the next generation of budding rugby players by winning the Rugby World Cup, but could their achievements in Japan be a shining example to broken Britain?

As the British government shut down on Monday night, England were arriving in Tokyo where their five-hour delay at Narita international paled in comparison to the delay in delivering anything close to Brexit, such has been the inadequacy of our current government.

The uncertain times across the United Kingdom has brought with it troubling divisions: remainers and leavers, the left and the right, British and Irish and, unsurprisingly, white and black.

Hate crimes are on the rise, with the most recent figures showing in 2017/18 that there were 94,098 offences recorded by police in England and Wales, an increase of 17 per cent compared with the previous year, which the government apportions to “certain events such as the EU Referendum and the terrorist attacks in 2017” as well as an improvement in data recording by authorities.

There has also been an alarming spike in racism at football matches, both on and off the field, with arrests for racism-related incidents at an all-time high after six years of increasing numbers and the high-profile abuse of Raheem Sterling, Tammy Abraham, Marcus Rashford and Paul Pogba triggering calls for a clampdown on social media and real solutions to be drawn up that can tackle a growing trend in the sport.

So perhaps arguing that what this England team represents can help provide an example for the rest of the country is not that silly at all, especially in the form of a team coached by an Australian of Japanese descent and that features 11 players from black and mixed ethnicity backgrounds that stretch from Tonga to Nigeria. Compare that to the triumphant 2003 squad, where Jason Robinson made up the entire BAME number on his own, and the difference is remarkable yet demonstrative of today’s Britain.

“This is probably the most diverse England squad that there’s ever been, in terms of people coming from different countries and different races,” says Maro Itoje, who has already been touted as an England captain in-waiting, such is his importance to the team. “Obviously we’re all English but we have different roots in different places, different classes too. If you look at the picture of the 1995 World Cup squad and compare it to the picture of the World Cup squad today, you’ll see a lot more diversity and I think it’s great. I think it’s amazing.”

It no doubt has the power to inspire young boys and girls who can relate to an Itoje, or a Kyle Sinckler, or an Anthony Watson, if they share a similar background. The England senior men’s football team can also boast a positive diversity, with Sterling and Rashford joined by the likes of Danny Rose and Jadon Sancho, yet for a sport that is often labelled as the ‘posh white boys’ club, this rugby team represents a titanic change.

Itoje believes that it is not just the difference in a squad picture that is noticeable, either. “If you think of our diversity both in terms of how we think and how we go about our business, as well as in terms of our genetic make-up, that could be our biggest strength.”

It would take a World Cup triumph – and nothing else – for this England team to muster the power to inspire change, but that is perhaps what this country really needs. With racism rising, how unifying would it be to see Itoje lifting the Webb Ellis Cup on an open-top bus in London, or Manchester or Newcastle for that matter, following the Rugby Football Union’s excursion to the north last week that was not before time? Could there be a larger feeling of togetherness than watching Manu Tuilagi and Jack Nowell stumbling out of their celebrations arm-in-arm representing the very best of what Britain has to offer, rather than the very worst that it displays every single day in Parliament – at least when they can be arsed to turn up?

It is for those reasons that this band of 31 players surprisingly offer the perfect contrast to Brexit: something that has proven so divisive, so rotten and so toxic no matter which side of the European Union you fall.

“I think it does set an example,” added Itoje. “No man is an island, whenever you want to make positive strides forward you always have to do it together. Dividing people never works and there’s a slippery slope when you start to do that, you can go down a path of quite negative attitudes. Unity is always the best way forward.”

Itoje is one of a number of BAME players in the squad (Getty Images)

There has been a lot of debate in recent weeks over the nationality of players and whether playing for a country really means exactly that anymore. England are as guilty of broadening their boundaries as anyone, but it is Ireland who have come under the most scrutiny of late, particularly in the wake of Joe Schimdt’s decision to leave the vastly experienced Devin Toner out of his final squad in favour of the three-cap Munster forward Jean Kleyn, born and raised in South Africa much like teammate CJ Stander.

It is no secret that Ireland have utilised the journey of the ‘project player’ to strengthen their squad with overseas players who qualify on residential grounds, with New Zealand-born Bundee Aki also falling into that category. This has left a bitter taste in the mouths of many Irish fans who feel this is a step too far, when the discovery of an Irish grandmother was no longer needed to pledge allegiance to a country of your choosing but simply by moving there for three years.

World Rugby moved to address this, with that timeframe increased to five years from the start of 2020 that should see a reduction in the number of players who are able to treat countries as clubs in the future, chopping and choosing as they see fit. Had the governing body not stepped in and addressed the matter, the international game was seriously heading towards a lottery where the cash-rich club owners of Mourad Boudjellal, Nigel Wray and Bruce Craig could once and for all eradicate the national teams.

For England, there are many examples of this, perhaps none better than the recently jettisoned Ben Te’o, who swapped Samoa for New Zealand, and then New Zealand for Ireland, until England came calling. He will not play for any of these at the World Cup, and will instead fill his time on a three-month stint with Toulon before a large pay-day in Japan.

Tuilagi has spent more of his life in the UK than Samoa (AFP/Getty)

But where should the line be drawn on this matter? Manu Tuilagi has no English blood in his family tree, but the youngest of seven brothers moved here at the age of 12 and has remained in Leicester ever since. He has spent more of his life in the UK than Samoa, took British citizenship as soon as he could and is now raising his family here. According to critics of the residency rule that World Rugby enforces, Tuilagi should not be eligible to play for England, yet something about that doesn’t quite seem fair.

Agustin Pichot, the current World Rugby vice-chairman, is one of those critics. The legendary Argentina international took the surprising step to voice his opposition to Toner’s omission – and Kleyn’s inclusion – on Twitter last week. “If I was Devin Toner, I would be asking World Rugby for answers. I feel sorry for him; nothing against for who was properly selected for the Rugby World Cup 2019 by the way. But I feel that way.”

It’s fair to say that project players are being viewed very differently to the way players like Tuilagi are, although the Pacific Islands continue to be ransacked for players of all ages by the European heavyweights and the Antipodean pair, regardless of economic migration or the far more tactical and shameless player grabbing seen in today’s game.

But then there are players like Willi Heinz, and Thomas Waldrom before him, who travelled to England for the good of their career and to find something new and exciting – and crucially with no intention to play for England. Waldrom, the former Leicester and Exeter No 8, only realised he was eligible when someone informed him that an English grandmother ruled him good to wear the red rose, while Heinz never really expressed a desire to play for England until Jones called him up to the squad two years ago to give him a flavour of what was on offer.

Uproar followed Heinz’s initial call-up, which came for a training camp in Brighton ahead of the tour of Argentina, yet there was not the same reaction this time around when the 32-year-old was named in the World Cup squad ahead of Ben Spencer, Dan Robson and Danny Care. So what had changed? Was it the fact that his English grandmother had come to light, that his four seasons with Gloucester had eased that aggressive opposition to his selection, or the fact that because he wasn’t being selected ahead of an in-form player – as he was with Robson two years ago – but on the merits of his own form this time around?

Perhaps there is one more argument to explain this: the fact that the England rugby fan base now reflects the team that represents it.

Britain is as multicultural and diverse as a country can come. The beauty of this squad is that it can now identify with the country it is pieced together by: there are players from the southern reaches of Cornwall and Devon, and the North in Cumbria and Yorkshire. There is a blend of black players, white players and mixed race players, Polynesians, Kiwis and even one born in the United States.

This doesn’t just stretch to Britain, though. It applies for the bulk of the world, where migration is accepted, embraced and in the most part utilised for the good of the nation. In these dark, confusing times of Brexit, political warfare and sabotage, we’ve already seen how sport can be a beacon of light in the form of the Cricket World Cup success. This autumn, it is the men’s rugby team to attempt to do that, but given what they represent and what they can achieve, it could be the most powerful statement yet of actually providing a shining example for a broken country back home.