KEY POINTS:
There's serious trouble at mill when Carlos Spencer, the king of strut, admits that losing has become an expectation rather than an aberration.
Defeat used to eat at his soul. His former Auckland Blues and All Black team-mates all saw the bottom lip drop on days of defeat. They heard the language of frustration and they felt the internal torment that defeat inflicted within New Zealand's most talented player of the last decade.
Spencer, as he admits, just didn't do losing very well. And now, having experienced its bitter taste for much of the last 12 months as part of a Northampton team that was relegated in May, he no longer bristles with indignation as defeat drops down the hatch.
"I hate losing and I have got used to it now," is Spencer's assessment of the collateral damage he has incurred during a turbulent year. "Losing is not something you want to get used to. You go into the changing room when you lose in New Zealand and you are down for a good hour. You drop your head, you drop your lip, you get shitty with guys you call them this and that and I don't do that anymore. We almost accept losing now and we have just got to get out of that feeling."
He uses the term 'we' in the collective rather than the Royal sense to show that he's not going to abandon the sinking ship. Quitting, just like losing, is not in the Spencer manual despite former Saints team-mate Steve Thompson being a little unsure.
Thompson, a fine player and a decent bloke, had to retire from all rugby in April and took a parting shot at the Saints' Kiwi contingent, suggesting they were there for the big pay-cheques and not much else.
Spencer, as the biggest earner and as a very definite piano player rather than piano mover, was the easiest target. But he's been pummelled with cheap shots most of his career and knows the best place to defend himself is on the pitch.
That's why he's going to honour the final year of his contract and duke it out in a division that will see him visit some of the least salubrious venues the rugby world can offer - Bedford, Newbury, Coventry, Rotherham... places that have been beaten heavily with the ugly stick.
If Spencer really was the prima donna Thompson said he was, he would have taken the alternative offers that are still on the table, disappeared for the glamour of the French Top 14 and seen out his days in front of packed stadiums where players need only click their fingers to have their every whim catered for.
Instead he'll get changed in glorified tin shacks with maybe a thousand people on the sidelines mainly entertaining themselves by hurling abuse at Northampton's fallen stars.
With New Zealand team-mates Bruce Reihana and Mark Robinson sticking around, too, Thompson appears guilty of misjudgment.
"At the end of the day he has come out looking like the dickhead to be honest," says Spencer. "We were in dire straits. A couple of weeks away from relegation and he comes out and says something like that... we were all pretty disappointed with what he said. We didn't need stuff like that coming out.
"The intention was always to stay at the club. When I first signed with the club they were one game away from relegation. When I signed they asked if I would pull out of my contract if they were relegated and I said no. It is the same situation now.
"We got in this mess together so I would like to try and get us out of it. I could get out and run and go somewhere else. I have still got offers on the table but the main thing for me is helping this club out. With the right people in the right places this club could be very successful. They've got the money. They've got the best supporters in the Premiership and they deserve more than they're getting."
Having been around from rugby's earliest professional days, Spencer has a clear vision of where the club needs to administer the first aid. It's apparent, without him saying in such terms, that the coaching structure is a mess. Former Blues head Peter Sloane has been elevated to the top post on an interim basis while Saints owner Keith Barwell scours the world for a director of rugby.
The appointment of the latter is a must for Spencer but it throws up confusion about the future of Sloane.
"Obviously a few things have to change within the club. I am not too pleased with the way a few things are going and we are discussing a few things at the moment which I can't go into. The club knows that. The boss knows that. The players are being let down by what is happening.
"They are missing a director of rugby. A good rugby head. Someone who knows the game and knows how to run the club. They just lack someone who knows how to run a rugby club in the professional era.
"They have given Peter the job and in six months they might need to find someone else. I would like to see the coach who starts the season go through the whole season."
Establishing stability around the coaching group is an obvious change. More subtle and harder to achieve is the cultural revolution Spencer feels is imperative.
The Kiwi attitude of play hard, work hard is anathema to the local boys. It's probably also a reason why Thompson felt there was a divide along national lines.
While the English players talk of work colleagues, the Kiwis talk about team-mates with the emphasis on the bit after the hyphen.
"We like to enjoy ourselves," says Spencer on behalf of the New Zealand contingent. "They [English players] look at the way we enjoy ourselves off the field and that is quite new to them. They're not big on off-field culture and there is no togetherness.
"That's half the problem - that is the first thing we have to change."
Spencer is sure that he will end his career overseas. He has a verbal offer to extend his contract with Northampton for another two years and it is an offer he will almost certainly want in writing if the Saints can recover their Premiership status and harness the undoubted talent they have at their disposal.
