England fitness guru Aled Walters has revealed why the national team looked ‘terrible’ during their World Cup warm-up campaign – because he pushed them into a hole in pre-season.
The Welshman who guided South Africa’s rise to thundering heights at the last World Cup is now trying to kick-start a repeat process with Steve Borthwick’s national team. But such was the tight time frame he had to work with that Walters had to explain the need for short-term pain – both physically and in terms of last month’s performance and results.
There were three defeats in their four preliminary matches for this tournament and England looked sluggish. Now, in the wake of a promising win over Argentina to launch their campaign here, Walters offered an explanation for the dour, low-energy efforts in August.
“With the crash course we were on, we couldn’t afford to row back early,” he said. “We just hadn’t done enough preparation to be able to do that. So yes, we looked leggy, but I’m glad we looked leggy because if we hadn’t been leggy in the August tests we wouldn’t have done enough. That’s it really.
‘It was actually quite funny, considering… (the reaction). People from outside who are critical, I understand that. Look, people are going to be concerned. They thought, ‘There’s a World Cup coming up and they look terrible. They don’t look fit. They lack energy.” But we knew exactly what was coming and the players knew it too.
Aled Walters (left) revealed why England looked ‘terrible’ during the World Cup warm-up
Walters is glad England looked leggy because if they hadn’t they wouldn’t have done enough
The fitness guru lifted the lid on the England players’ ‘beasts’ making them ‘uncomfortable’
“In Ireland Week, and you might think this is the most ridiculous thing to do, we more or less played a game on Tuesday before playing Ireland on Saturday. Does that give you confidence? Yes. We lost, but we went to one of the hardest places to go.
‘To get someone fitter, you almost have to dig him into a hole first, so that he comes out stronger. What we’ve done is put them in such a hole in preseason that they’ll only reap the rewards of that work. We saw the beginning of it against Argentina. The fresher they get now, the stronger they will be.’
Walters is an energetic and enthusiastic presence in the England camp. His voice echoes on the training field when he makes the team do fitness exercises. There are plenty of jokes among the serious messages. “I’m difficult because I know what we need to build towards,” he said. But I have to laugh and I get energy from people who smile and laugh a lot. They always react well when the general makes fun of someone – a target.”
He claims that ‘no one is safe’ and that even applies to Borthwick, his boss. “He has always given me the freedom to do whatever I see fit,” Walters said. “I think a few times he feels like I’ve sabotaged his meetings by shouting random nonsense.”
So when it comes to beasting players, what are his favorite methods? “It depends on what they’re weakest at,” he said. “It’s anything that puts them in the dark, where they feel really uncomfortable.”
England have certainly been in limbo over the past month. Thanks to the foundations Walters has laid, they could now be brought into the light.