England’s players hit the front pages for all the wrong reasons during their tour of New Zealand. But it’s not the first time rugby has seen its good standing marred, as our list of unfortunate incidents shows

Could he handle it? Eighty-nine thousand pairs of eyes following his every move, plus the all-seeing television cameras, desperately seeking a sign of weakness; overhyping the good and accentuating the bad. Handle it? Lawrence Dallaglio has always loved it, and he lived and breathed it here one last time in triumph. It had begun for the old warrior, Wasps-wise at least, on a scruffy second-team pitch on a windswept night 18 seasons ago. It ended in front of the biggest crowd for a club match the world has seen, who rose to acclaim him.

There was a frisson of anxiety here, about the state of the Wasps and England wing Paul Sackey's right knee. He left the field before the end of the first quarter and later left the ground on crutches.

There were seven minutes of stoppage time here, but Wasps had to wait a further two and a half minutes to discover whether they had a home semi-final.

Stuart Lancaster, who has been a fixture at Leeds for 16 years, is to join the Rugby Football Union as head of elite player development. Leeds, who were promoted to the Premiership last year but finished bottom of the table this season, are not at all impressed by the manner of Lancaster's departure.

Wasps have thrown everything at the Premiership after missing out in Europe and the EDF Energy Cup, but yesterday their season – and the finale to Lawrence Dallaglio's outstanding career – threatened to go belly-up.

The notion that Munster are the best team in Europe might amuse a few folk down Toulouse way, and if you listen carefully you'll hear some quiet scoffing in Lawrence Dallaglio land, but the first official ranking table compiled by the people who run the Heineken Cup gives pride of place to the Limerick hordes. Fact or fantasy? On the one hand, any system that puts a side as half-baked as Biarritz in the top half dozen is discredited almost before it starts. On the other, Munster are a whole lot stronger now than when they won the title in 2006.

A lesson in Sevens history by former England international Andy Ripley.

Grassroots rugby at Rosslyn Park is the place where legends are made.

The name of Danny Cipriani had been on everyone's lips for the last four days following his dramatic axing from the England team following an ill-advised midnight excursion to a London nightclub last week.

Ever thought how it would have been for an emergency plumber parachuted on to the Titanic? No, but then why would anyone until the England coach, Brian Ashton, sent on Charlie Hodgson to replace Jonny Wilkinson?

To previous generations of international rugby union players, popping into a London nightclub for 20 minutes, reportedly to drop some tickets off for a mate and without consuming any alcohol, must seem like a laughably innocuous reason for a dynamic rising star for Wasps and England to be dropped two days before the Calcutta Cup match. Take a former star for Wasps and England, who one evening on tour in Paris, in 1992, stripped almost to the buff and, covered in butter and salt, took on and beat a French No 8, a hulk of a bloke called Bernard, in a sumo wrestling match. Linda Uttley could teach Danny Cipriani a thing or two about painting the town red.