Tom English: Johnson missing vital ingredient as he tries to guide a new generation

THERE ARE NO shortage of stories that tell of Martin Johnson's uncompromising nature but a favourite comes from a spring Sunday in Dublin five years ago. Be aware, there's swearing afoot. Lots of it. Well, its Johnno, isn't it. The big man is no stranger to that kind of thing. If you're offended by the f-word I'd move along quietly now if I were you.

To understand why he did what he did that day you have to be aware of the context, the enormous burden resting on his broad shoulders. It was the final afternoon of the Six Nations championship and if both England and Ireland were going for the Grand Slam it was only the visitors that were under pressure. Having spectacularly blown Grand Slams in each of the previous four seasons, this affair at Lansdowne Road was deemed to be the Dad's Army's last shot, their one remaining attempt at closing the deal before their inevitable break-up through old age. So you might say there was a little tension in the air when Johnson led his team out.

This is where the problem arose. Johnson had been told by Irish rugby officials to bring his team up the steps at Lansdowne Road and line-up to the right hand side of the red carpet to await the arrival of President Mary McAleese. The only complication was that Brian O'Driscoll's team were already standing there when England appeared and there was no more red carpet on that side. A planning error on behalf of the IRFU or a psychological ruse to mess with English heads, Johnno wasn't sure, but he knew what he had to do. He ignored the vast expanse of pristine red to the left (where Ireland should have been) and walked his team to the right as scheduled and stood in the muck of the Lansdowne Road pitch.

That's when an IRFU official with stick-out hair resembling Coco the Clown scurried out to try and avert the embarrassment of the President traipsing through dirt to greet the visitors. "Martin, Martin," he pleaded, "you'll need to move."

"Get f****d," said Johnno.

"But Martin, there's all that red carpet over there."

"Tell your lot to move, then."

"But they were here first, Martin."

"I told you before, f**k off!"

"But the President is coming!"

With that, Johnno walked down the line of his players ordering them to stand their ground. "Nobody f*****g moves," he said, once, twice, three times. And nobody did. Out came the President and up to her ankles went the mud when the red carpet ran out just as she said her hellos to the England captain. There was a bit of a storm about it afterwards but did Johnno care? Did he hell. The only thing that mattered to him was that he refused (like he always refused) to back down and that England won. And how they won. They gave Ireland a terrible beating, so bad in fact that O'Driscoll later talked of his regret at riling Johnno. "In hindsight," he said, "we should have moved ourselves. We went and bloody well upset him, didn't we."

Johnson as captain has few parallels in the history of the game. He is the strangest type of red rose leader in that he had all the cussed Englishness of a Will Carling or a Brian Moore or a Lawrence Dallaglio but was never hated by opposing nations the way they were. It was easy to have respect, even warmth, for Johnson because he was a very down-to-earth character, not arrogant or aloof, not deliberately antagonistic, not looking to wind-up other nations in an effort to get an edge. Johnson just got on with it. He operated above the mind games. He was pretty straightforward, the type of warrior that every country would want and could identify with.

England appear to have a richly talented generation of players coming through right now and it is no surprise that the RFU have chosen their most reliable son to develop them at Test level. The fact that Johnson has done no coaching and has no experience of management at any level of the game doesn't seem to matter to his employers at Twickenham who see him as an infallible sort, a talisman of the ages. They don't see a risk and that's understandable, for Johnson is going to surround himself with specialist coaches and experts in all the areas where he is weak. Above everything else, Johnson is honest. He knows the areas in which he needs help and he'll plug the holes with specialist coaches, just like Clive Woodward did.

Woodward provides the template for Johnson and for the RFU. They want to recreate the structure that brought England a Grand Slam and a World Cup in 2003. Clearly, nothing less will do. Runners-up spots in the 2007 World Cup and Six Nations weren't enough to keep Brian Ashton in his job so Johnson knows the targets he faces. European and world domination should see him safe.

There is one huge flaw in all of this, though. Even if Johnson does turn out to be as good a manager as he was a player, even if he gets all his appointments right and doesn't make a wrong move, he is missing something. In short, he is missing himself. All of the England World Cup heroes of 2003 will tell you that their success had less to do with the globe's great self-publicist, Woodward, and more to do with the great rock, Johnson. Where is the new on-field Johnno? There isn't one. There isn't ever likely to be another one like him.

Woodward would have achieved nothing if it wasn't for men like Johnson, Dallaglio, Neil Back, Richard Hill, Matt Dawson and Jason Robinson. Extraordinary players, all retired. Woodward's team was one of massive experience and big characters, guys who needed little instruction. As manager and all-round big cheese, Johnson has some bright talent coming through but it's fanciful to suggest that Louis Deacon (lock), Danny Care (scrum-half), David Strettle (wing), Tom Croft (blindside), Tom Rees (openside) and James Haskell (No.8) are made of the same stuff as their predecessors in those jerseys.

Johnson as manager will only be as good as the players at his disposal and their quality is far from guaranteed at the highest level. The RFU – and all of English rugby – worship at his altar, as if he has some divine power, but that's the great growling captain they're remembering, the World Cup hero. He's in a different place now. An uncertain place.