Happy hooker has England laughing

You know things are looking up in this World Cup when Ronnie stories are abounding. Like how he was so unimpressed by Paul Sackey ordering a burger and chips in a posh Parisian bistro here that he got the waitress to bring the winger over a kids' colouring book and crayons.

Or how Nick Easter confided to Ronnie that he had given himself a new nickname only for Regan to gleefully rat on him: "Ere lads, can you believe he actually looks in the mirror and in all seriousness calls himself "The Dominator"? What an arse!"

Then, of course, there were his verbal bashings in the scrum of the porky Aussie Matt Dunning, caught on mike in Marseille. "Nah, must have been his own team calling him Teletubby. I said nothing," protested the man who prompted Springboks captain and hooker Jon Smit to remark wearily after the summer tour: "He talked to me more in two matches than my wife has in ten years".

All grand knockabout stuff, which conceals how daft Ronnie has become a serious emblem of England's resurrection shuffle here; a popular, thirty-something journeyman battler who keeps fighting back, even from international retirement, and is being rewarded for his years of unsung, unseen scrapping.

For Regan, you could read Simon Shaw, Andy Gomarsall or Martin Corry.

Even last week, an old hero Neil Back dismissed the Bristol and ex-Leeds veteran as not being good enough to be in the team. Big mistake. Ronnie scrummaged the game of his life before cracking open a can of lager and booming: "It's okay; I'm rehydrating".

We laughed with him because it felt like the triumph of an amateur throwback when, actually, it was a victory for honest professionalism. At 35, our happy hooker is just having the time of his rugby life. "I've been at rugby's coal face 17 years and I've never took a backward step mate," he reckoned. "And now my time's come full circle".

He'd quit the international scene three years ago when discarded but was so buoyed by his rejuvenation at Bristol that he rang Ashton to say: "Look mate, I'm here if you want me." Ashton did, recognising a character with character, someone who, in the side now dubbed by Rob Andrew as "Grandad's Army", could be a feisty on-field general and everyone's favourite off-field squaddy.

"I never lost faith, never lost heart and here I am. Enjoying rugby, enjoying life as well. It's going to be a hell of a battle. Full stop. World Cup semi. In France. In Paris. Christ, it doesn't get any bigger than that," Ronnie rattled on with almost comical enthusiasm at the team hotel. "We shocked the world last week and we can do it again."

He reckoned he had no plans for sledging the French front row because it would be knackering enough just trying to subdue skipper Ibanez without having the energy to simultaneously insult him in choicest Bristolian. "But my motivation is 'Leave no regrets. Go out and perform. Fulfil your dream'."

The dream was only half-realised in Sydney where he got his winner's medal but was frustrated at only being a fringe member. It's different this time. "I'm looked on as a talisman," he said. "I'm older, wiser and I've got to look after the scrum." Not to mention those players who, like him in 2003, can't get in the 22.

"These guys can crack, not being involved, so you have to say 'Look, I was in that position. Head up, enjoy yourself and don't show your disappointment'."

For some of the 30-something stalwarts in Saturday's starting XV, he concedes it will be "last chance, no regrets time".

Including him? "Hmm. Will I still be here in 2011? If they want to thaw me out, possibly."

Before then, how about another World Cup victory tea party at Buckingham Palace? Last time he was there in 2003, an attendant bowed to him and said: "Earl Grey, sir?" "No, mate," came the immortal reply. "Mark Regan, Leeds Tykes." You've got to love a world champ like that.