Sheridan's Scrummaging Tips

Andy Sheridan’s contribution to England’s emphatic win over Australia on Saturday confirmed his rise to the top tier of world props. England’s dominance in the front 5 proved to be the key that took Australia to their sixth successive defeat.

CoachingRugby rung Andy on Sunday to congratulate him for his all round performance and, together with Phil Vickery, the domination of the Australian scrum.

Whilst Andy celebrated Saturday’s performance with just the one beer, a very large steak sandwich and catching up with his wife, we at CoachingRugby had a few beers on his behalf.

Andy is now relaxing in Penny Hill Farm Hotel and preparing for next week’s game. We asked him if he had his guitar with him, he said he left it in Manchester but he was able to borrow one from the hotel!

Before we let him get off the line we asked him for his top tips on scrumaging.

• Body Position
  “Get the crouch right. Crouch, bend the legs, and most importantly keep your back very flat. Look at your target [your opposite man].” – “Listen to the referee.”

• Engage
  “Get your bind on early. For the loose head, get your head right under the tight head. Make sure your feet are right up, not too far back, back flat, legs bent, ready to explode on the put-in.”

• The Drive
  “Explode on put-in (or a split second before), pump the feet – small steps, the whole scrum together.”

He is looking forward to putting this into practice again next week when he takes on New Zealand’s Carl Hayman in the much anticipated battle. We wish him the best of luck and I think we all agree with Sean Fitz-Patrick when he wrote yesterday in The Times, on the contest between these two, “It should be worth the admission fee by itself”.

This week we are bringing you a new feature on ‘Do-it-yourself’ video analysis.

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