Chris Rattue: Tantalising All Blacks v England clash teaches rugby that less is a lot more

Twickenham 2014...expect more fireworks at the famous ground next year when the All Blacks and England meet after a welcome four year break. Photo / Photosport

Super Rugby. Mass market.

The Rugby Championship. A tiresome procession of mind-numbing test matches.

End of season tours. The plane is packed every year and everybody gets a turn.

Provincial rugby. Reserve grade.

In other words, most rugby leaves me stone cold, thanks largely to a host of poorly focused competitions and relentless matches designed by blokes — and they are all blokes — with one lazy hand opening the till, and the other assisting.

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There is a genuine, hot ticket item in 2018 though: the All Blacks v England at Twickenham, November. A one-off bonanza, in every sense. The year will be worth it, for that.

The clamour for a hastily-scheduled game between the two giants because of a surge in England's form was misplaced.

We are quite happily negotiating the biggest gap of games between these two for more than 25 years, no harm done and far from it.

Delayed gratification is good for all of us, on many levels. Rugby, thankfully, could not accommodate the big money All Blacks-England urge this year.

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Patience is a virtue which gives value to life, but we are all being dragged into action-packed, senses-dulling oblivion instead.

Put it this way: car drivers don't hurtle around busy intersections with a phone in their face because the call is so important they will risk life and limb to take or make it. Rather, they can't resist the temptation of instant satisfaction anymore.

Some sport, rugby, needs to re-learn to take a break. The best representative sport was never created through gorging.

There are slight exceptions to the rule. One that springs to mind is the State of Origin league series although I would argue it has become contrived, a tired machine compared to the vibrant glory days of Wally Lewis and co.

Even the once-revered cricket Ashes — held home and away every two years — is played for an urn in danger of becoming a crock of you know what. The Ashes would now be much more satisfying if the five-game series was held every four years.

Yes, rugby's Six Nations is a grand competition with no intervals between the seasons. But it is a bare-essentials series of one-off contests, which is why it works.

Moving on...

November 11, Twickenham — you can almost hear the thunder from here and largely because the All Blacks and England have not met for so long which is the way it should be. The juices are already flowing.

Rugby bosses have a difficult job scheduling a widely-spread sport with global pretensions, but one which is only played to a high level by a few countries. Quick-fix dollar signs and endless matches rule. The answers are not easy.

But as 2017 comes to a close, here's a New Year wish for the national sport.

When the world gathers enthusiastically around Twickenham next year, the people who run the game might take note (not that they will of course). Absence makes the heart tick a lot louder.