Rugby union’s men in blazers still do not know how to run the game

It is exactly 20 years this week since Will Carling’s pithy verdict on the Rugby Football Union committee entered the sporting lexicon. The phrase “57 old farts” would nowadays qualify as a wry compliment by modern social media standards; given the behaviour of sections of the English establishment and the City in the intervening years it is tempting to feel a certain nostalgic warmth for the amateur era’s buffers, blimps and blazers.

Because can we honestly say, hand on heavily-sponsored heart, that the game’s current administrators are collectively wiser and smarter than the old-school alickadoos they replaced? Clearly there are exceptions – let’s not embarrass them by singling out their capabilities too loudly because modesty is an underrated thing – but a quick roll-call of the issues stacking up within the game do not reflect terribly well on the supposedly sage guardians of the union code.

It is not merely the rising stench from beneath the carpets at Premiership Rugby, where the serious matter of alleged salary cap breaches have seemingly been swept. Perhaps we should all resign ourselves, as with football’s Premier League, to the air-brushing of anything which conceivably threatens the commercial bottom line, particularly the latest huge broadcasting deal. Is it not too much, alternatively, to ask for those who know the truth to have the guts to step forward, share the details with the public and deal with it accordingly?

The same sense of disquiet applies to the proposed moratorium on promotion and relegation to and from the Premiership from 2016-17. This is not an argument which can be had in isolation. Either the RFU, its leading clubs and English rugby in general want a vibrant, healthy second tier beneath the Premiership or they do not. Simply pulling up the relegation drawbridge, imposing a low ceiling on the funding available to those outside the magic circle and insisting everything will be rosy for the disenfranchised majority is, at best, wishful thinking.

As many have already pointed out, where is the rugby equivalent of Bournemouth – just promoted as champions to soccer’s billionaire playground – going to come from? At the weekend the fancied promotion favourites, Bristol and Worcester, both found themselves trailing in the second half of their play-off fixtures against Rotherham and London Scottish respectively. It suggests the gap in quality between the top half-dozen teams in the Championship is not colossal, yet no one is predicting Worcester or Bristol will struggle next season as severely as London Welsh have this year. There will be some tightly pursed lips in Premiership rugby’s offices – not to mention at Yorkshire Carnegie – should Rotherham somehow get promoted this year and play at Barnsley’s Oakwell stadium for the next five years as part of a 14-team ring-fenced league.

Where is the breadth of vision in all this, at a time when rugby union has a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to spread its gospel? Where, at the very least, is the trustworthy bedside manner? We have not even mentioned the ousting of Debbie Jevans as the figurehead of England Rugby 2015 less than six months before the start of the tournament, nor the subsequent deafening radio silence from Twickenham. The RFU used to be more open in the days when, infamously, its phone number was ex-directory.

The new broom in Europe also has work to do on the perception front. Four of the five main sponsorship slots for the new European Champions’ Cup remain unfilled and a blizzard of free tickets was required to boost the attendance at European rugby’s flagship final. Then there is the Scottish Rugby Union, which is looking at mothballing its sevens team just as the sport prepares for its Olympic rebirth in Rio next year. That ground-breaking event, furthermore, is set to go ahead minus the majority of rugby’s most gifted professionals. Talk about not seeing the bigger picture.

And do you know what? We have still not highlighted the single most glaring failure in worldwide rugby administration since Carling’s off-camera remark in 1995 was broadcast by an unscrupulous television interviewer named Greg Dyke (whatever happened to him?). Forget World Rugby’s ongoing inability to eradicate the cancerous effects of collapsed scrums, crooked feeds, negative kicking and eligibility farce. The biggest issue of all has remained unchanged for the past 20 years and has still not been satisfactorily addressed.

This is player welfare and, specifically, the length of the season. We are now in May at the fag-end of a 10-month northern hemisphere campaign. Those England players who reach the Premiership final will barely have time to unpack their holiday bags before they report to Bagshot for a World Cup training camp in June.

Take the examples of Exeter’s Henry Slade and Dave Ewers, who should both be in England’s enlarged squad of 45. Assuming they play in their club’s final two regular season games, they will have already featured in 31 and 29 domestic games respectively (including pre-season fixtures) before the play-offs commence. Assuming they stay fit and tour Australia with England next year they will have played almost non-stop for two years at a stage in their careers when freshness is everything. Is that fair on anyone?

Something has to give. Asking young up-and-coming players to play upwards of 30 massive games per season and remain in full training for the best part of 49 weeks a year is clearly unsustainable. Leaving the concussion debate aside, there is simply no way the next generation will still be hammering away at the top level into their mid-30s in the way Bakkies Botha, Ali Williams and Carl Hayman have done. Whatever deals are being done behind closed doors must put the battered players first. If not, the integrity and ulterior motives of those running the sport will come under increasing scrutiny.

Un, deux, trois, quatre …

In characteristically understated fashion, the Toulon president, Mourad Boudjellal, has followed up his side’s latest European triumph by announcing he wants to take a Top 14 match to the United States and play one of the club’s European Cup fixtures in Japan. He is not, in other words, about to rest on his laurels. Which begs the question of who can stop them winning a fourth straight European crown next season? Given the proximity of the World Cup and the retirement of several influential players Toulon will not find life easy but, other than Racing Métro and Clermont, is there anyone with the depth of talent to take them down, particularly if the final is staged in France? Supporters from Ireland, England, Wales and Scotland will await this summer’s pool draw with interest.

One to watch

Ospreys v Glasgow. With two rounds of the regular Guinness Pro12 season to go, a little bit of history remains possible. Never before has a Scottish team won a Celtic league title; were they to break their duck this season, with the national side having picked up a Six Nations wooden spoon, it would reflect even more favourably on Gregor Townsend and his table-topping players. If the Warriors’ two fine centres, Alex Dunbar and Mark Bennett, were fit, their prospects would be even better but, with their long-time captain, Al Kellock, retiring at the end of the season, they will not lack for motivation.