According to The Guardian‘s Book Blog, the RFU and Mills & Boon are to team up to raise the profile of rugby by producing rugby-themed romance novels. It didn’t take Alison Flood long to work out that this was a pretty dumb idea for a sport where one of the players is known as the “hooker”. But really, why stop at romance? Who knows what goes on in the England scrum? And as for Stade Francais… Rugby slash, anyone? Butler/Moore?

(Actually, come to think about it, the slash thing might work better with the NFL. I mean, Troy & Buck? It is almost is if they were designed for it.)

On a rather more serious note, Nigel Owens talks to The Guardian about being the only openly gay top flight rugby referee.