All publicity is good publicity? England's new alternative kit © RFU

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After two days of fending off brickbats, the RFU has apologised "to those who may have taken offence" over the new England playing kit.

Was it worth it?

• Marketing departments are paid a lot of money to do many things, one of them being to portray whoever they represent in the best light. Trying to 'sell' an eye-wateringly priced replica shirt with a shelf life of months which is only likely to be worn by the national side a few times was never going to be easy.
  
  But the decision by the RFU and Canterbury to cash in on the VC was always likely to backfire, especially coming a month after the commemorations marking the start of World War One.
  
  For all the firefighting yesterday, for all the talk of how the RFU supports other charities - and to its credit it does good work in that field - the message that will stick in the public's minds is one of corporate greed and insensitivity. At some point someone in a marketing or PR department should have been able to take a non-insular view and raise concerns that this might not be such a great idea. But better late than never.
  
  At £90.99 for a genuine shirt - or a bargain £56 for a presumably less-well-made standard product - it seems unlikely they will sell too many anyway. Which raises the question … was it worth all that negative publicity?

England's new Canterbury-manufactured shirts - the traditional white jersey and a crimson alternate shirt - feature Victoria Cross designs that, so it is claimed, comprise numerous small rubber grips to help deaden the impact of the ball. The shirts cost £90.99 with a cheaper version available for £56.

Victoria Cross Trust chairman Gary Stapleton criticised the RFU for having had no contact with the organisation over using the Victoria Cross emblem on shirts that were officially launched earlier this week. Stapleton said the move "touched a raw nerve with a lot of people".

In a statement, the RFU said: "We would like to apologise to those who may have taken offence with our new kit. It was certainly never our intention to cause this. We are huge supporters of our service personnel and respect and value their support for England.

"We have a long-standing relationship with the Royal British Legion, supporting their poppy appeal at the relevant Twickenham international every year, and have helped raise over £2 million for them and for other service charities such as Help for Heroes.

"We will be contacting the Victoria Cross Trust and the Victoria Cross and George Cross Association to see how we can also support their worthwhile work going forwards."

Stapleton said there had been no attempt to contact the Trust before the launch. However, after a number of newspapers carried criticism of the handling of the affair, the RFU has been forced to act to try to limit the damage from what must have seemed a fairly innocuous marketing release.