If I can say I’m a great full-back as well as a great wing it has to

If I can say I’m a great full-back as well as a great wing, it has to be of benefit to me.” The word “great” is subject to chronic overuse, not least by sportsmen, but you get his drift.Voyce did not look particularly good, let alone great, when he offered an outside track to Tom Varndell during the Powergen Cup semi-final with Leicester a fortnight ago and saw the hottest finisher in European rugby accept it with the deepest gratitude. Did he feel a little daft, eating mouthfuls of Millennium Stadium grass while Varndell was disappearing into the wide blue yonder? “I didn’t feel brilliant,” he replied “Did I beat myself up over it? A little, after the game. I’d have beaten myself a whole lot more if I’d had that kind of chance myself and not scored I was caught flat-footed, and Varndell’s quick. It happens.”Wasps were certainly guilty of a few errors in victory that day, but England made infinitely more in defeat last Sunday. Voyce played only the last quarter, so was spared the heavy flak aimed at the likes of Lewsey, Mike Tindall, Charlie Hodgson and Matt Dawson.

There is a musketeerish air about the squad, however – not even the most implacable of Andy Robinson’s critics would deny that under his stewardship, deep bonds of loyalty have been established- and the new full-back respects the culture of brotherhood as much as anyone.”How do I explain what happened in Paris? I can’t, because it was so bizarre,” he said with a shrug of the shoulders and a splaying of the hands. “I’ve experienced bad moments with Wasps; for the last two seasons, we haven’t managed to get out of our pool in Europe. But I can’t hide from the fact that this was a particularly grim match for all of us – one of those shit-happens days, a day when everything that could possibly go wrong did exactly that. The outsiders have their views and theories, of course: the writers, the radio people, the pundits.. they’ve all had their say.

From an insider’s point of view, it’s about having the debrief and then putting the whole thing away. We made a lot of mistakes against France, but that’s what people do occasionally. Apparently, Steven Gerrard made one on the same day and it cost Liverpool a game of football. We heard about it when we were on the coach, heading for the airport.”So far, so sanguine.