KEY POINTS:
The big fella is not up for any game outside tonight's test with the All Blacks. Not up for any outlandish quotes, not up for much discussion about his personal prowess of lifting 480lb in the benchpress. Andrew Sheridan is dynamite but self-contained, the quiet demolition business in
the England front row.
He is in the silent destruction category of props, not as reclusive as Olo Brown was in his day nor as voluble as Matt Dunning, somewhere in between. His answers to journalists' questions are polite and there is an underlying humour through the conversation.
But Sheridan comes from a school which has a foundation tenet not to make this propping business out to be a single-man operation: he is the spearhead but only as good as England's concerted scrum push and reckons he has been made out to be a one-man wrecking ball in New Zealand.
Nice try "Big Ted" - one he acknowledges with a wry smile when it is pointed out that all the exaltation, all the cult status, has been delivered from his part of the world. Left unsaid was that a fair chunk of the prestige was gathered against Wallaby sides who would have struggled to push open a sticky door.
But Sheridan did show against the NZ Maori in 2005 some of that potential before he disappeared into the gloomy inconsequence of a midweek player. He has come on since then.
There is no Hayman tonight at Eden Park. It is the turn of Greg Somerville to face up to Sheridan in one of the most anticipated mini-battles within the major skirmish as England start the first of their two test campaign.
Sheridan, all of 122kg trimmed down with a low body-fat content and 1.93m, up against Somerville, back in favour after two years fighting injury and with Hayman offshore and John Afoa injured, the prime tighthead at 1.86m and 115kg.
Somerville joins Craig Dowd as the most-capped All Black prop tonight with 58 caps and with the bonus of Brad Thorn's muscular shove from the second row. The contest should be intriguing. Somerville on the test comeback route, Sheridan looking for two huge final outings in New Zealand after a month's rest from club rugby duties in England.
Former All Black selector Peter Thorburn helped Sheridan make the switch from lock/looseforward to the front row when the pair teamed up at Bristol in 2001.
"Sheri is immensely strong and had to make the change, he wanted to go into the front row so we sorted that out," Thorburn recalled. "The truth is he is very powerful but he is also long in the back so it will be a good contest seeing him up against Somerville."
Sheridan is the only England survivor in the starting XV tonight from the last World Cup final and in the last two years has played more than half his 24-test cap tally.
The 28-year-old inherited a love of athletics from his grandfather, has always had an interest in strength work, and was a notable shot putter at school. But when he hits the rugby field, propping and its dark arts are his business.
So how does he think he'll go against Somerville, a much shorter target than Hayman had offered?
"Oh I've faced a number of props of varying heights and they all bring their issues. Greg is very experienced, he has a huge number of caps [57], he is an excellent prop and will be a huge challenge," Sheridan said. "But you have to remember this propping is not always an individual thing - the concerted effort of the pack is critical and New Zealand have clearly worked with their entire scrum.
"I have played them in the past and you can feel the whole power of the eight coming through. When you look at footage from rugby years ago there was less impact and it was more about an engagement and then a battle, it was more individual."
Despite the protests, there is the feeling pursued by commentators that if Sheridan goes well then England will produce as well. He is the lightning rod for their performances. So does the big man feel that pressure?
"It's just you guys who try and rev it up," he twinkled. "I'm not too bothered either way, I just get on and do it. There is not pressure because you play as hard as you can and if it's good enough then it's good enough. If it's not, it is one of those days."
OJO SPURRED ON BY TRAILBLAZERS
Topsy Ojo, a Tottenham-born wing of Nigerian descent, took up rugby as a 12-year-old in the late 1990s, by which time three of his countrymen - the Bath trio of Adedayo Adebayo, Victor Ubogu and Steve Ojomoh - had established themselves as players of international quality.
"I remember watching those guys," said the new cap from London Irish. "I'm one of them now, and it feels good."
Ojo has been on the England radar for some years, winning honours at three age-group levels before featuring in the second-string Saxons side, but it is his recent exploits for Irish that have raised eyebrows, not least among the blue-blooded footballers of Toulouse, who found him too hot to handle in the Heineken Cup.
His father, Akin, and his brother, Babs, will be in New Zealand for the game. "My father really enjoys his rugby now," he said, "while my brother, who plays socially, always said if I made it with England he'd be there".
- Chris Hewett
