As the queue for the airport bus outside Murrayfield grew longer and longer on Sunday evening with no sign of a No100 despite the claim that one would arrive every 10 minutes, dozens of New Zealand supporters who were booked on the 9pm to Paris were getting concerned they would miss their flight. "It would not be so bad if this afternoon had not been such a waste of time and money," said one. "I wish I had stayed in Marseille."
A bus duly arrived but was only able to take less than half of those who were queueing, some of whom had been waiting for an hour. As he shut the doors in the faces of those who protested that their check-in deadlines were looming, the driver said apologetically: "The police ordered the rerouting of buses because of traffic congestion." A reply of "why were we not told?" became lost in the hiss of the closing doors.
The former New Zealand captain Sean Fitzpatrick lamented earlier this month that international rugby sides focused on World Cups to the detriment of the fixture list in the four years in between. Since 2003, France's Bernard Laporte has used the Six Nations as a means to look at players, while South Africa's coach Jake White fielded reserve teams in the Springboks' final two matches of this year's Tri-Nations.
Yet this World Cup has also been devalued by reserve teams being fielded: Japan in their opening match against Australia because they wanted their best players to face Fiji in the following midweek; Fiji themselves left out key players against Australia last Saturday, figuring their most likely route into the quarter-finals lay in beating Wales the following week; Namibia saved some of their leading players against Argentina last weekend for their final game, the one they targeted from the outset as their only hope of victory; and Scotland fielded a virtual second team against the All Blacks.
While the priorities of the sides were different - Japan had their eye on finishing third in the group and automatically qualifying for the 2011 tournament, Namibia have never won a game in the finals, while Scotland believed their surest route to the quarter-finals lay in defeating Italy in their final group game - and the fixture schedule is especially hard on the emerging nations, it makes a mockery of a tournament which has set ticket prices very high. Those who made the maximum investment at Murrayfield on Sunday had very little change out of £170, but coach Frank Hadden was unapologetic.
Scotland, he pointed out, had to play their final three matches in 11 days. Had he fielded his strongest side against New Zealand, the players would have been in no condition to train for the clash against Italy. "As it is, they will be on the park on Monday," he added. Yet after a long period without competitive rugby in the build-up to the tournament, surely his top players needed the benefit of a match against the best side in the world, pitting their wits against top players rather than shadows, and not more training sessions.
The word training has become a curse of northern hemisphere rugby. What do players do in sessions? Take England, Scotland and Ireland in recent weeks against top-ranked opposition, South Africa, New Zealand and France respectively. They scored three points between them, some return for hours and hours spent on the training field. Not one single try and not even a sniff of one.
European rugby is being crippled by fear. Coaches fear being sacked (England, Wales and Scotland have all changed their management teams in the last two years) and players fear taking risks. Compare the stodge served up by Europe's finest to the more imaginative Tonga, Samoa, Fiji, Japan and, to a leaser extent, Argentina sides, who spend nowhere near as much time on the training ground, and you really wonder what goes on in these daily sessions. "If only we played as we trained," has become a dull mantra from the home unions this World Cup.
Refining skills does not seem to be part of the curriculum. The likes of Tonga, Fiji and Argentina in the last eight at the expense of England, Wales and Ireland should be enough to send a signal message to the game in Europe, but what would it do to the tournament commercially?
The Rugby World Cup is about making money. Its logo is a television aerial in the shape of a rugby ball which sums it all up, even if they will have to change it next time to a digibox. The fear for organisers is that England crashing out prematurely would see viewing figures plunge and make it harder to justify the ticket prices, but from an entertainment point of view, it would be just the package.
