One size does not fit all

Wednesday September 17 2003

In his latest column, Stephen Jones of the Sunday Times despairs at the state of the game in Wales now it has gone down the provincial route and argues that the ideal of provincial rugby is not the necessarily the future of the game.

The total lack of knowledge about the realities of rugby in Europe held by many rugby people in the southern hemisphere is always a source of mild amusement and occasionally, anger.

Steve Hansens support of the nonsensical creation of appalling conglomerate non-teams in place of the great club teams in Wales is just one example.

The whole scene in Welsh domestic rugby is a tragedy because Hansen thought that what applies in New Zealand should also apply in Wales. In England, they have long since given up copying New Zealand models, in Wales they blunder blindly on.

People Down Under, and also in Europe, still bleat on about how club teams cannot compete and that provincial teams must be created along the lines of teams in South Africa, Australia and New Zealand.

They forget just a few important matters, of course. They forget that the vaunted Irish provincial system has created, in all of rugby history, a princely total of one Grand Slam team. They forget that Scotlands adoption of a god-forsaken jacked-up provincial system has killed Scottish pro rugby as a box office attraction, probably for all time.

They forget that the countries who enter their top clubs teams in the Heineken European Cup the best, most colourful, most exotic and most-watched rugby competition in the World outside international rugby always dominate. French or English clubs have won every year bar one, when Ulster took the title. Ulster were dreadful they won because the England clubs did not enter because of a dispute.

I was reminded of the bilge about provincial teams last weekend. Down in Wales, rugby was staged twice in two days at Rodney Parade, home of the great Newport club. Two seasons ago, Newport beat both the great English teams, Bath and Newcastle Falcons, plus Toulouse, all in the Heineken European Cup. That was just before the Welsh Rugby Union abandoned the massive club brand games in favour of concepts such as The Ospreys, the Warriors and the Dragons. And killed the future.

At Rodney Parade on Friday, the Gwent Newport Dragons played. This is the new professional outfit (albeit with amateurish marketing structure, administration, concepts) born out of savage battles between its so-called component parts Newport, Ebbw Vale and the rest of Gwent, formerly one of the great rugby areas, now a wasteland.

On Saturday, Newport played Ebbw Vale in a club match. Work that one out. Who do you watch? A more important which is closest to your heart? And when will people in Wales (and elsewhere) realise the difference between parochialism, and true allegiance. Not until it is too late.

Over the Severn Bridge in England, things were a little better in fact, they were better by miles.

The Zurich Premiership began with the first week of action, as the great club names of the world battled it out. In a sense, it was bizarre since all players bound for the World Cup, mostly with England but also with all the other home countries plus France, Italy and no less than FIFTEEN of the World Cup competing nations. That is some indication of the power of English rugby.

On the other hand, surely, it would all be a wash-out. All the top players away, lovely Indian Summer day, live soccer on the box? No. What we had was the biggest first-day aggregate of crowds in the history of English leagues. There were six Zurich Premiership fixtures, average attendance was 9,000 with Leicester drawing 16,000 and Sale Sharks, on their first home match after moving to Stockport from their miniscule Heywood Road, drawing well over 8,000, a club record.

Harlequins was my port of call, for the superb match against Wasps which the mighty Quins, one trailing 19-6, managed to win in thrilling fashion. Who needed the superstars resting on the sidelines, when the devastating Ugo Monye was there to score two searing tries, and with Wasps fielding the 18-year-old young giant, James Haskell, instead of Lawrence Dallaglio and Joe Worsley. It was all fresh and fun and different, new faces to enjoy.

The English Premiership has grown in astonishing fashion. Sometimes, those of us who are close to it on a weekly basis are blasé about that growth, but it is now the exception rather than the rule for the teams to be outside the bracket of those drawing 10,000 people.

Why the appeal? Because they are club teams. They are community teams, they work hard on their community schemes. They evoke feelings of allegiance. They are not soul-less conglomerates with names like Ospreys or Gerbils, they mean something to people.

Even the dear old Quins. It is not to date me too much to recall that I used to report on Quins matches at the old Stoop. There was a vast running track around the ground and then a large strip of grass before the nearside touchline. Watching from the stand, it was as if the match was taking place in the next county.

There was no spectator comfort, just an open meadow on the far side of the tiny stand. No bond to be nurtured, no community to be embraced. Afterwards, all the Oxbridge Blues and old services types went to reminisce. Quins was simply an old club for whom the players wore silly jerseys.

Last Saturday, the whole place was alive from around 10am. There was frantic activity on the training fields as the youngsters of six local rugby clubs (and even those of Maidenhead, 28 miles away) were coached, fed and given seats for the match. There was vast corporate guzzling, a tremendous atmosphere in a re-built stadium. Fair enough, by the time of the 34th chorus of The Mighty Quinn we were tiring of it.

But the excitement was infectious. The silly jerseys? Still the same, except that about 4,000 in the crowd were wearing them too.

England is England, you see. Wales is Wales.

No-one is very interested in copying New Zealand models any more, and those who do, are missing the party In England, the top players are all missing, but the party goes on.