Rugby and romance

With the Super 14 just around the corner it's time to consider. Do rugby and romance go together like?

Well if you are Mills & Boons and the English Rugby Union they do. It has been called a "bizarre partnership" but romantic fiction publishers Mills and Boon have formed an unlikely agreement with the RFU to produce a set of rugby-themed novels with the first (The Prince's Waitress Wife) due out on today in England, just in time for the Six Nations.

"Our mission statement is to do for rugby what Jilly Cooper did for polo - to give it an air of sexiness and glitz and glamour," Mills and Boon series editor Jenny Hutton told The Daily Telegraph. "You don't have to like rugby to like the books." (source English Scrum)

But is this something that would work in New Zealand. The Christchurch Press investigated by asking a couple of our rugby heroes Todd Blackadder and Richard Loe. Reading the article, romance does not seem to be their strong point, certainly of the Mills and Boons variety. Maybe Kiwis are just built differently. But if you want to see how a Kiwi Mills and Boon rugby romance might look and sound, visit this Stuff.co.nz link.