Vox Pop: Why are English rugby sides performing so badly in the European Cup?

PHILIPPE ST ANDRE

GLOUCESTER COACH

English rugby has a lot of excellent individuals, but the teams don't always function as a collective unit. Many French players aren't as good individually but collectively they work harder. You see this particularly in scrums. In England, the scrum too often is individual battles - prop against prop, hooker against hooker. But it's hard for one guy to do well against eight men who are all working together. The English clubs will be better in two or three months' time when all the World Cup players have been reintegrated.

RICHARD COCKERILL

LEICESTER HOOKER

We have not made the best of starts but I don't think people should be jumping on this particular bandwagon too much. These are still early days for the competition and on the whole we are certainly as strong as the French. They are always difficult to beat at home - you have to play exceptionally well to overcome them. The most important thing at the moment is for the English clubs to win their home games and if we do that then we should qualify for the knock-out stages. From then on, it's down to what happens on the day.

TONY UNDERWOOD

FORMER ENGLAND WING

I don't think it's a case of the English sides playing that badly so much as the opposition playing well. The Irish provinces are a lot stronger than in the past. I don't care who you are, it's always tough playing in Ireland. The French are taking things by storm at present and it looks like they're conquering Europe. Last weekend's 46-3 victory by Toulouse over Swansea was pretty awesome, but I don't think the English clubs have been getting panned by anyone. It's too early to come to that conclusion.

FRANCOIS PIENAAR

SARACENS PLAYER-COACH

So far, we haven't taken our chances. We lost one of our opening games to a last-minute drop goal and in the other we gave away an 11-point lead. Well though the opposition played, our mistakes contributed. I can't talk about other clubs but the experience here is that it has taken longer for the World Cup players to settle. We had eight players in the World Cup ... perhaps we should not have played them all at once, but that would not have been fair to them. It is important teams gel as a unit.

ROGER UTTLEY

FORMER ENGLAND COACH

Maybe it's a World Cup hangover or the sides are slow starters and many have had away matches early on, especially in France. Perhaps the Premiership isn't the toughest league in northern hemisphere rugby. Are the players preparing in the right way? They've got to perform at the highest level and it's the clubs' job to stimulate them. I'm sure the English will be competitive in Europe before the season is out. But if they're not then there's a serious problem.

JIM TELFER

FORMER SCOTLAND COACH

The current difficulty for the English teams is that a lot of them have changed personnel and coaches and people just aren't familiar with each other. The Welsh clubs have a similar problem, whereas the Scottish and Irish squads have been together, by and large, for a couple of years. In the case of the English clubs, they've had to do a lot of reorganising since the World Cup. But now the English squads are together, I've no doubt that they will all get stronger as the tournament goes on.