Totally obsessed - but relaxed about it

By DAVID LEGGATT at the World Cup

It's the rugby question that seems to be on everyone's minds at the World Cup.

Not can Australia find a way past the All Blacks, or what's up with Wendell, or how come the French are so uncharacteristically together before this weekend's semifinals?

The question that has scholarly and not-so-scholarly minds buzzing is: What makes Jonny tick?

Peering inside Jonny Wilkinson's mind is easy on one level - the England No 10 is an obsessive.

He admits it, and a glance at his record as the game's peerless goalkicker and matchwinner suggests it works for him.

In 50 tests, the 24-year-old has rattled up 778 points, averaging more than 15 a test, and carried England to countless victories.

For one example, take last weekend's quarter-final win over gallant Wales. The score was 28-17. Wilkinson's contribution: 23 points.

Watching him in action at a couple of media conferences this week was instructive. He answered all questions seriously. No flippancy, no glib one-liners.

As he replied to questions his voice tended to lower, and his eyes often focussed on a spot on the floor.

Rather like his kicking, Wilkinson appeared to zero in on a point, give it his undivided attention and not let it go until he had covered all facets of the question.

His weekly columns in an Australian newspaper tend to reveal more about a player who made his test debut in that awful 76-0 loss to the Wallabies in Brisbane on the tour from hell in 1998, which also included a couple of thumpings from the All Blacks.

Wilkinson recounts the time when as a 16-year-old, he pedalled down to the local park at 7am. At lunchtime his mother came looking for him.

"I was going through a phase when I wasn't happy with my practice, and she managed to stop me from returning to the pitch until the evening, when I went back with my brother for another hour-and-a-half," he wrote.

It seems little has changed in the subsequent eight years.

"These days, I don't mind letting the obsessiveness win all the time. Sometimes, on my day off, I'll be out there practising and I'll be annoyed with myself because I'd like to be relaxing. But I know that in terms of priority that rates way down the list."

And this: "Sometimes the kicking sessions don't go so well, and although it may feel terrible at the time, you know that you've been doing these sessions day in, day out for eight years.

"A session eight years ago is still in the bank; a session three weeks ago is still in the bank."

Speaking of banks, Wilkinson is raking in the folding stuff.

The £1.5 million ($4 million) man is rugby's answer to David Beckham in the cult hero stakes - and maybe not so far apart in personality either.

An England player wanting a quiet room-mate could not go wrong with the No 10. For one thing, he's more likely to be down at the park than reclining on his bed with a PlayStation.

He refuses to play table-tennis in the team games room unless it is non-competitive.

Call out "14-12" and he'll drop his bat. He says he needs to save his competitive juices for rugby.

Light-hearted frivolity does not seem to figure in his make-up.

No wonder the French call Frederic Michalak, Wilkinson's opponent tomorrow night, "the anti-Wilkinson."

It's no slur on the Englishman, who the French have been at pains to point out is a terrific footballer and one they wouldn't mind having in the blue.

But

Michalak is the prankster who will throw a bucket of cold water on a beefy front-rower at 3am.

Wilkinson, you suspect, would rather throw a treatise on the point of impact when kicking for goal from the left-hand side 34 metres out and eight metres in from touch with the wind coming from 45deg south-west at 12 knots.

His ability to handle the P word - pressure - has come under closer scrutiny during the tournament than in the rest of his international career put together.

As England wobbled against the Samoans, so Wilkinson's foot got a dose of the shakes as he prepared an unsuccessful close-range shot at goal.

As Wales went for broke in the first half of the quarter-final, Wilkinson appeared less than in command of the situation.

England coach Clive Woodward, perhaps recognising the signs - although never admitting it - brought on Mike Catt at halftime to help with the tactical kicking and take some heat off Wilkinson.

The experienced Catt did an excellent job, England's forwards ploughed ahead, the penalties came and Wilkinson banged over the goals to secure the win.

But it was a telling period, and one that France, and their fast, aggressive flankers Olivier Magne and Serge Betsen, will have noticed.

Woodward is staggered that Wilkinson's form is being questioned.

"I find it absolutely amazing. To me, he has been outstanding."

Wilkinson added: "I don't read that sort of stuff. I know what I believe in my own mind. I analyse my own game and I deal with whatever pressure there may be in my own way."

Now try this from an interview Wilkinson gave this week: "There's always pressure in these environments, and you try to deal with that in your own way."

And later: "You have your own standards and that puts enough pressure on you during the week ...

"You do know there's going to be a lot of pressure ... You know what you want from yourself in training and that's pressure enough."

And again: "There is pressure. I do put pressure on myself. I would put it on myself if I was in another profession."

At least he can laugh, if half-heartedly, at his fascination for his rugby art.

Asked if he was in danger of becoming a basket-case, he replied that, no he wasn't.

"I gather a newspaper followed this up with a story: Wilkinson denies being basket-case."

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