"Ridiculous" - Dean Richards claims England ‘used fake blood’ to win 2003 Rugby World Cup

This claim was initially made by Richards during a private meeting with the Rugby Football Union ten years ago, during the Blood-gate controversy when he was in charge of Harlequins.

“The use of fake blood, cutting players, re-opening wounds, feigning injury in the front row, jabbing players with anesthetic all occur regularly throughout the game,” Richards said in 2019.

Richards was asked for examples and listed seven, including: “RWC 2003. England used faked blood [did not know whether capsule or cut by someone in medical team] to manage replacements.”

When asked how he knew, Richards indicated he was informed by a person in the England squad.

England’s 2003 Rugby World Cup head coach Sir Clive Woodward has responded to the accusation, branding it “absolute nonsense”.

“We won every match in Australia,” he said.

“Why would we want to cheat? This is simply not true. I am not sure why Dean raised this. I have never been involved in anything like this. It is ridiculous.”

Here, we remember the unlucky group of player who only just missed out on England's triumph down under. Some are still bitter to this day.

The versatile back flew out to Australia as injury cover for the victorious 2003 Rugby World Cup, however he was never officially added to the squad after certain players recovered, meaning he was unable to pick up a medal for the success despite flying out to Australia. No wonder he's still bitter.

Where is he now? Working as pundit/co-commentator for BT Sport's excellent rugby coverage

The speedster narrowly missed selection to the final 30 for the 2003 Rugby World Cup because of a back problem, although he had celebrated his first Six Nations Championship start some months earlier with a try in the match against Italy. 

Where is he now? He's now working in foreign exchange

Despite playing in the 2003 pre-World Cup trial match in France, Rowntree was omitted from Clive Woodward's squad, which won the tournament. Clive Woodward admitted that leaving Rowntree behind was one of the hardest decisions he had to make in his time as England head coach.

Where is he now? Following the 2019 Rugby World Cup, where he coached Georgia, he joined Munster as scrum coach

Shaw played in all three 2003 Rugby World Cup warm up matches. He was not named in the original 30-man squad but was flown out to Australia due to an injury to Danny Grewcock, earning him an MBE as part of the World Cup winning team. He keeps this in a drawer as he feels he didn't "win" it as he never played in a test.

Where is he now? In 2011, Simon Shaw became a director of Rugby Hospitality company Set Piece Events

Despite the centre being a firm favourite of Woodward, as his Lions selection in 2005 would prover, Smith was omitted from the squad due to a lack of game time.