Northampton's down-to-earth set-up should ensure England players don't let fame go to their heads. The Independent's Chris Hewett reports.
"The American jockey Eddie Arcaro knew a thing or two about success: he rode almost 5,000 winners, bagged two Stateside Triple Crowns – one more than anyone else, ever – and rattled off classic victories in the routine way a bingo caller might mumble his numbers into a muffled microphone.
"Once a guy starts wearing silk pyjamas, it's hard to get up early," he said when asked to reflect on the difficulty of keeping things in perspective. Right now, the best rugby team in England have a number of players in silk pyjamas.
"Ben Foden, the full-back; the wing Chris Ashton; Dylan Hartley, the hooker; the lock Courtney Lawes ... suddenly, these young men are the talk of every clubhouse in Christendom. And they all play for Northampton, who have some very important business on their agenda, not least this evening's Heineken Cup meeting with Cardiff Blues at Franklin's Gardens and the return leg in the Welsh capital in eight days' time. Will the red-rose quartet revisit the heights they scaled in helping England to that startling victory over the Wallabies last month, or will they, to pinch Arcaro's metaphor, stay in bed?"
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