England winger Chris Ashton, talking to the Daily Mail's Martin Samuel, admits Saturday's quarter-final will be one of the most physical games of his career.
"Chris Ashton is stirring the froth on his cappuccino. Measured little circles at first, then bigger swirls as he grows more animated. ‘You’ve got to man up when you’re playing France,’ he insists, his cup now its own little whirlpool.
Ashton is considering a prediction by French No 8 and notorious hard case Imanol Harinordoquy. ‘I don’t know if there will be a lot of passing in this match,’ he said this week, ‘but there will be a lot of fighting.’
The calm before the storm: Chris Ashton relaxes before his first World Cup quarter-final
Harinordoquy is no friend of the English. ‘I hate them for their dismissiveness and arrogance,’ he once said. Ashton is considering it all. The hatred, the threats, the challenge of a quarter-final in Auckland."
RSS feed
