Jonny Wilkinson bows out victorious but Toulon have it all to march on

http://www.theguardian.com/sport/2014/may/25/jonny-wilkinson-toulon-saracens-heineken-cup

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Money cannot buy everything in life but occasionally it helps. Toulon have won the past two Heineken Cups and, wherever the remodelled tournament stages its final next year (Milan is the proposed destination), it is already a fair bet the cosmopolitan French juggernaut will be strong contenders. Saracens, hardly lightweights themselves, were not so much beaten as crushed by an increasingly dominant force of nature who would flatten most Test teams.

To see the genuine delight on the oft-tortured face of Jonny Wilkinson as he was hoisted aloft along with the trophy afterwards was to understand the rarefied level the defending champions have reached. Only Leicester and Leinster have previously managed to retain the Heineken Cup, the preserve of sides with something special about them. For all the understandable lionising of Wilkinson, outstanding on his final appearance on British soil, this is a team with the capacity to improve further without him.

Partly it is the legacy of the Wilko effect: the fly-half’s relentless pursuit of excellence tends to be contagious. The departing kingpin, who celebrated his 35th birthday on Sunday and retires after Saturday’s Top 14 final against Castres in Paris, is also due to stick around in a coaching capacity. With Leigh Halfpenny heading for the Mediterranean the goal-kicking is in safe hands and there is seldom a sense that the wild ambition of Toulon’s owner, Mourad Boudjellal, is remotely sated.

This, though, was an occasion which ultimately provoked more questions than it answered. What price a tournament that becomes exclusively the preserve of multimillionaires with open cheque-books?

There is nothing wrong with seeking to increase the overall financial health of European club rugby but, with the current salary cap in place in England and a period of rebuilding looming in Leinster, how many will be able to compete with the Toulons of this world? Matt Giteau, Juan Martín Fernández Lobbe, Bakkies Botha, Carl Hayman, Bryan Habana, Juan Smith and Wilkinson are among the finest players the professional game has seen. To watch all of them trotting out for the same club at the same time seemed almost obscene.

It was sufficiently uber-physical, too, to make one wince and wonder precisely where the game is heading. The ever more thunderous breakdowns and massive midfield hits are in danger of tilting the balance too far away from creative genius, not to mention normal body shapes.

Habana, aside from an opportunistic dive when impeded by Owen Farrell, was almost as peripheral as David Strettle and Chris Ashton; for old-style willowy wingers and twinkle-toed fly-halves the game is becoming untenable as a long-term career. Thank goodness for Giteau, one of the sport’s enduring artistes, whose quicksilver thinking and execution brought him the crucial first-half try which transcended the surrounding thud and blunder.

Those capable of thriving in this kind of maelstrom are the rarest of gems, worthy of the highest recognition the game can bestow. It is no surprise, then, that when Steffon Armitage sparkles in such distinguished company and collects yet another latest man-of-the-match award, the debate over whether he should be playing for England is instantly revived. On these occasions the issue can no longer be tucked away in the file marked “One of those things”.

Both Boudjellal and Habana openly questioned the sanity of the Rugby Football Union’s stance that England should pick players based overseas only in “exceptional circumstances”. Armitage, by widespread consent, is playing exceptionally and Boudjellal was swift to criticise the “misplaced protectionism” he believes is to blame. “The coach can do what he wants but it’s a stupid rule, really stupid. Just because Jonny Wilkinson or Steffon Armitage plays in France, it doesn’t mean they aren’t English. When a player leaves his own country he feels it more in his heart because he doesn’t see it every day.”

Habana also left England’s head coach, Stuart Lancaster, in little doubt about the view in the Toulon dressing room. “I think Stuart Lancaster and the English selectors are ruing their decision not to pick overseas-based players because he has really been phenomenal for us. The decision is out of our hands but a guy like Steffon probably deserves to be playing international rugby after the season he has had. For the game to go global we might have to look at cutting out the boundaries of where a player plays.”

Habana would say that, being an expat international himself, but the choice is increasingly stark. Is the RFU really so obsessed with stopping its star players moving to French clubs after next year’s World Cup that it is prepared to ignore someone who could help win England the Webb Ellis Cup? Armitage’s availability for every national training camp may be in doubt but any hint of an injury to Chris Robshaw before next year’s World Cup campaign and the phone call to the south of France will probably be instantaneous.

On Saturday’s evidence, too, Wilkinson remains a more reliable presence on the big occasion than his England successor Owen Farrell, who must now find a second wind from somewhere if this weekend’s Premiership final and next month’s New Zealand Tests are to produce happy endings.

There was not much anyone could do about Toulon’s fine 59th-minute second try following a smart exchange of passes – a classic Juan-two – between Smith and Fernández Lobbe but Saracens could never quite summon the maniacal energy which blew Clermont away in the semi-finals.

Maybe it was always preordained that Wilkinson would bow out a winner. What else is there to say about a man who has done so much and yet still feels “a bit of a fraud” in terms of the attention he receives? “If I sat back and thought about it, emotionally it would be too difficult to take in terms of how much other people give and how little they get back.

“At the end of the day I do a job that is my passion, my love and I am paid well to do it. Who could be luckier than me?” Jo-nee, Jo-nee. In his truly exceptional case luck has nothing to do with it.

Toulon D Armitage; Mitchell, Bastareaud, Giteau, Habana; Wilkinson (Mermoz, 77), Tillous-Borde (Claassens, 70); Chiocci (Menini, 46), Burden (Orioli, h-t), Hayman (Castrogiovanni, 56), B Botha (Williams, 51), Rossouw (Suta, 51), Smith (Bruni, 71), Fernández Lobbe, S Armitage.

Tries Giteau, Smith. Cons Wilkinson 2. Pens Wilkinson 2. Drop-goal Wilkinson.

Sin-bin Fernández Lobbe 21.

Saracens Goode; Ashton, Bosch, Barritt, Strettle (Wyles, 70); Farrell (Hodgson, 64), Wigglesworth (De Kock, 51); M Vunipola (Barrington, 64), Brits (George, 69), Stevens (Johnston, 54), Borthwick, Hargreaves (M Botha, 64), Brown, Burger (Wray, 61), B Vunipola.

Pens Farrell 2.

Referee A Rolland (Ireland). Att 67,578.