Sir Clive Woodward once said that rugby players should not sport voluminous beards.

But then, Woodward also said that Alastair Campbell would be just the fellow to look after PR on the Lions's 2005 tour of New Zealand, so his judgment is clearly flawed on a number of fronts.

In any case, rugby players all over the world are gleefully ignoring Woodward's advice. At the 2011 World Cup, the entire Canada squad looked like they had just spent three months in a Saskatchewan logging camp, while more and more players have been happy to sport luxuriant facial topiary.

Until recently, the impressively hirsute Josh Strauss sported Scotland's fuzziest chin, but Geoff Cross has lately emerged as a serious rival to the Glasgow No.8. Looking like an extra from Deliverance, Cross has cultivated one of the greatest beards in rugby, although admirers will be disappointed to know that the qualified doctor will not be keeping it for ever. In fact, clinical considerations will spell the end when the Cross shrubbery has to go.

Cross explained yesterday that it was Strauss, perhaps feeling the pressure of a rival beard on the block, who warned him that patients might be a little perturbed to find an Appalachian mountain man in the consulting room. At which point, he decided that this would be his last chance to grow a beard of real stature.

With his wife expecting their first child, there is another incentive to reach for the shears.

"I suspect it will be gone by the time the baby arrives," the prop explained. "My wife has mentioned that [babies are scared by beards] as an anecdote from her formative years. So it's probably the responsible thing to do.

"I would like to see what a year's growth would look like. Let's say it will go at the end of the Six Nations, roughly. If I'm very lucky it will reach some sort of state of dynamic equilibrium when the hair falling out equals the hair growing and it never gets any bigger. But I think that takes longer than a year.

"I don't think the shave will be ceremonial. It will probably be back at home, and my wife will probably say 'Why did you ever take this long to do what I told you?'"

His future patients can also be reassured that Dr Cross has their best interest at heart.

"I'd imagine there's some sort of infection control risk," he explained. "But there's also things for beards to stop them falling into operating sites, which of course you don't want. The many complications and wonders of facial hair. It's hours of fun."