Mark McCafferty is a disgrace

First topic message reminder :

Interview link below.

http://www.espnscrum.com/heineken-cup-2011-12/rugby/story/157976.html?CMP=OTC-RSS

Premiership Rugby chief executive Mark McCafferty has suggested that a flawed qualification system is largely to blame for English rugby's failure to make a significant impression on this season's Heineken Cup.

England's leading clubs have struggled to keep pace with their European rivals in recent seasons with only one side - Premiership champions Saracens - likely to make the quarter-finals this term. The Premiership provided just one quarter-finalist two seasons ago in the shape of Northampton and the Saints, beaten finalists last year, were one of only two teams alongside Leicester to make the knock-out stages in that competition.

McCafferty believes that the Premiership's leading sides and their French Top 14 counterparts are treated unfairly by qualifying arrangements that he claims favour those teams competing in the RaboDirect PRO12. The Celtic-Italian league provides 10 teams for the Heineken Cup with the three highest placed sides from Ireland and Wales and the two sides from Scotland and Italy guaranteed qualification. Additional places are available depending on the destiny of the previous season's Heineken Cup and Amlin Challenge Cup.

McCafferty argues that the battle to claim one of the six automatic spots open to the 12-team Premiership and the Top 14 is a much tougher task - a point that he is set to put to tournament organisers European Rugby Cup Ltd.

"At the moment pretty much everyone in the PRO12 knows they've qualified for next year's Heineken, whereas French and English sides are still fighting tooth and nail and will be doing so in the middle of the Heineken Cup next season to ensure qualification for the season after," he told the Sunday Telegraph. "Make it more meritocratic and everyone will have to take their leagues seriously."

McCafferty went on to explain how he believes the process should work. "Our view is that Heineken Cup qualification should be based on league form," he said. "There are three of those - the Aviva Premiership, the Top 14 Orange in France and the Pro 12 - and you should take the qualifying teams from the best sides in those leagues. Then it's a completely meritocratic system."

This season the 24 teams in the six Heineken Cup pools are made up of 11 from the PRO12, six from the Top 14 and seven from the Premiership. McCafferty believes it should be eight across the board.

"We've put that proposal on the table but we know there will be a huge amount of resistance to it because it means countries in the PRO12, a league which currently has 10 places allocated to it, might go down to eight. There will be concerns that it could lead to one or two countries not being represented in the Heineken Cup. But the price you pay for that inclusivity is not necessarily having the best against the best."

McCafferty also highlighted what he sees as the Irish sides' ability to prioritise the Heineken Cup over domestic matters. "The real change over the past four or five years," McCafferty added, "is that the Irish sides have become more successful in Europe because of the priority they have put on it.

"After round four of this season's tournament I looked at the starting line-ups of Ulster, Leinster and Munster [all through to the quarter-finals] and only four of the 45 starters in the Heineken Cup were retained for their PRO12 league games the next weekend. Take a model where the top eight clubs qualify from each league and they wouldn't be able to take as many risks. That's the issue our clubs have.

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So let me get this straight, you want to handicap the amount of teams in the Rabbo and give 2 additional spaces to English sides to make it fairier? How is it fair that England get to enter 6 teams already? Just because other Unions have streamlined their playing pools into a smaller number of teams to increase their standard and squad strenght.

The biggest issue I have with the guy is that he has completely failed to identify the problem and yet again is looking at it from a English Club increased Revenue standpoint. In truth there are 2 bigger factors at play.

1. Relegation - Its forcing English sides to play cup rugby. Get rid of that and your teams migth stand a better chance.

2. Quality - In truth the quality of squads is no longer available to English sides. French Clubs assemble the squads for the most money so have all the biggest names and the Home Unions to a large degree are keeping their stars at home. As they dont have to split resources by as many clubs as the English do it will make them naturally stronger (with the exception of Scotland). The handicap works against teams too as you have 12 teams bidding for the same player pools. Its understandable why so many buy no name SH imports.

To think this guy is partly responsible in helping English clubs worries me. He clearly has missed the point altogether.

I hope the HC Board laugh him out of the meeting or at the very least counter the argument with "Sure - as long as you will accept 3 places instead of 6".

This bloke is an idiot and his idea of improving English Rugby is to pull other (working systems) down, instead of improving his own.

formerly known as Sam wrote:

At the moment, a number of English coaches look way off the pace to me, in terms of ideas and IQ. Booth and Cockerill spring immediately to mind

As a Tigers fan it's not so much Cockerill that is worrying me it's the backroom staff. Blaze was brought in to monitor the lineouts and attacking forward play which is okay. O'Connor is the backs coach and in charge of the backs in defence and attack but there is no coherent game plan in either. Paul Burke is the kicking coach but that is a thoroughly mixed bag. Cockerill looks over the rest which includes the scrums (excellent) and forwards defence (dire, around the breakdown imparticular). Some of the framework ideas are pretty good but the details to bring them to life are not working.

O'Connor needs to be thanked and then ushered out the door and replaced by an innovative attack coach with an experienced defence coach brought in at the same time.

The squad turnover might help Tigers out as well as there was some required dead wood maintained for the benefit of the RWC period. Twelvetrees leaving is a slap in the face though.

Yes, i think you're right that it goes beyond the head coaches. There seem's to be a fair rotation of average coaches - Hanks? Although Sale are doing some good things at the breakdown it must be said. But Toby Booth?! Alan Tait?! These guys are decent, honest people, but not good enough, and the English game needs to bring fresh ideas to the table.

roddersm wrote:In recent poll Rugby was 2nd most popular sport along with GAA and behind soccer, was it an RTE poll I think?

I think that was a "Whats your favourite sport?" poll. GAA still have the playing numbers by a mile, followed by soccer. But rugby is the sport that is growing faster than any, both in playing numbers and club formation.

It like that guinness add says....this is rugby country......

Toadfish wrote:Why do you keep bring up Ireland? I admitted that the timing of the comments was poor but the logic behind the current system has to be questioned. You are effectively advocating a situation where there is no qualification for some clubs based on their location? Surely for the likes of Italy having their sides in a league where they are facing the likes of Munster and Cardiff on a regular basis is good enough for them now. The next stage in their development has to be aspiring to the next level i.e. the HC?

I just fail to see how making it more difficult for clubs to qualify for the HC (in all leagues) would not benefit them in the long run?

Two questions Toadie.
Do you think Italy would have beaten France last season if their domestic teams were not involved in the HC?
Do you think it's a good thing that Italy have developed into a team which can beat France?

Submachine wrote:

Toadfish wrote:Why do you keep bring up Ireland? I admitted that the timing of the comments was poor but the logic behind the current system has to be questioned. You are effectively advocating a situation where there is no qualification for some clubs based on their location? Surely for the likes of Italy having their sides in a league where they are facing the likes of Munster and Cardiff on a regular basis is good enough for them now. The next stage in their development has to be aspiring to the next level i.e. the HC?

I just fail to see how making it more difficult for clubs to qualify for the HC (in all leagues) would not benefit them in the long run?

Two questions Toadie.
Do you think Italy would have beaten France last season if their domestic teams were not involved in the HC?
Do you think it's a good thing that Italy have developed into a team which can beat France?

I wouldn't say that it had a major impact but maybe it did and I certainly think it's a good thing when any team beats France! I would say however though that they would probably benefit by having more games in the league in which they were competetive rather than throwing themselves straight in the deep end and being punished in the HK. I just feel they are skipping a few steps in their development. Let qualifying for the HK be their first prize before targeting the quarter finals, semis etc.

The point is they are getting better though - Treviso won 1 and drew 1 this year and Aironi beat Biarritz last year.

Treviso are half way up the Pro12 and are the only team to win at Ravenhill this year
Tigers, Clermont, Munster, Scarlets etc haven't achieved that

20 odd years ago Rumania were close to making a break through but were cast adrift and declined - that must not be allowed to happen again.

In fact I would go further Georgia must be brought into the senior domain asap. They have more professional clubs than any Pro12 nation and play a level of rugby equal to Italy when they were added to the 5N. They must be given a chance

I'm just using Italy as an example but even so the results you are talking about above do not warrant keeping a place in Europe's premier rugby competition.

Just to reiterate again that I'm not digging at the Rabo. I don't think London Irish, Bath or Quins had any place being in the competition this year. Quins had a fairly good stab at it but to get entrance by finishing 7th is just embarrassing in my opinion.

Well as you can see above (a post where i suggest 32 not 24 teams) I could not disagree more - for me there should be more teams involved not less and this will only benefit rugby in its wider European arena.

Toadfish
What you are saying is that England and France can automatically have six places but the rest of us have to fight it out.
Your way of thinking is totally unfair towards the other nations involved.
As I said before the top sides from each country are already involved in the competition and if we struggle now then we will continue struggling until we improve our own sides.

Here's a different way to look at it.

No matter how bad any of them are in any given year, no matter how substandard they are, you are always going to see six French and six (or is it seven) English sides in the HC. Always - regardless of standard.

NO - not AP league sides. NO - not Top14 sides. English sides and French sides.

So, if the Pro12 went to 6 HC places based on League position (IF the Unions involved in the Pro12 suddenly didn't have a legal say in affairs, that is!) you could have the prospect that in any given year, no Scottish side might make an appearance, no Italian side might make an appearance, no Welsh side might make an appearance or no Irish side might make an appearance?

"So?" say the alleged purists who want purity and parity of esteem. "Who's leg are you trying to pull in that deal" say we whose parity of esteem is being "toad in the hole"...

Toadfish wrote:I'm just using Italy as an example but even so the results you are talking about above do not warrant keeping a place in Europe's premier rugby competition.

Just to reiterate again that I'm not digging at the Rabo. I don't think London Irish, Bath or Quins had any place being in the competition this year. Quins had a fairly good stab at it but to get entrance by finishing 7th is just embarrassing in my opinion.

Toadfish Quins won the Amlin last season - beating Munster away and Stade Francais. I do think they earned their HC spot. Quins did quite well in the HC this season but threw away quarter final qualification at the final hurdle.

Sorry Cymroglan, think I repeated your point.

Fly you said it better than I did

Cymroglan wrote:Toadfish
What you are saying is that England and France can automatically have six places but the rest of us have to fight it out.
Your way of thinking is totally unfair towards the other nations involved.
As I said before the top sides from each country are already involved in the competition and if we struggle now then we will continue struggling until we improve our own sides.

Can you read? Where did I say that England and France should retain the current situation? Several times I have advocated us having less and even recomended that the Rabo has more than England or France at one point.

Why is it that the HK is the only place that sides can improve? Can they not improve through a better domestic competition?

Toadfish wrote:

formerly known as Sam wrote:

5 each for the Rabo and England and 6 for France

5 for each League (as they are of a similar size) and the 16th place to go to the winner from the previous year. So this year Leinster would auto qualify along with 5 other Rabo teams.

That would work for me, bit of reward for the league that produced the winner each year.

If you want a adult debate then fine I'm all for that but please refrain from questioning my reading ability.

Five or six places is irrelevant you would still have that many teams involved in the competition but you then think that Ireland Wales Scotland plus Italy should fight it out for the remaining five places.

Toadfish wrote:
Why is it that the HK is the only place that sides can improve? Can they not improve through a better domestic competition?

You tell us, Toadfish. It seems it's a question that we're asking of the AP.

Why does AP boss have issues with how other Unions select their HC quota when it shouldn't effect the quality of sides either internally in the AP itself OR the quality of the sides they send to HC?
Do AP sides need to worry about the lowly competition they are going to meet in HC competition or should they just improve through better domestic competition?

How about we take a different view of this. Everyone now is on about qualification to the competition which actually makes no sense. Before we change the qualification method we need establish what our final tournament is going to look like and work backwards from there.
Idea's?

Cymroglan wrote:

Toadfish wrote:

formerly known as Sam wrote:

5 each for the Rabo and England and 6 for France

5 for each League (as they are of a similar size) and the 16th place to go to the winner from the previous year. So this year Leinster would auto qualify along with 5 other Rabo teams.

That would work for me, bit of reward for the league that produced the winner each year.

If you want a adult debate then fine I'm all for that but please refrain from questioning my reading ability.

Five or six places is irrelevant you would still have that many teams involved in the competition but you then think that Ireland Wales Scotland plus Italy should fight it out for the remaining five places.

That's brilliant, you have just posted a bit of a quote that proves you didn't read it properly.

Just another point before I give up. The HK is a club competition, not a national one and there are 3 leagues that make up the qualification pool. If a fourth league joined made up of teams from Romania, Georgia, Russia and Poland would they get 10/11 places in the HK?

Red Right wrote:How about we take a different view of this. Everyone now is on about qualification to the competition which actually makes no sense. Before we change the qualification method we need establish what our final tournament is going to look like and work backwards from there.
Idea's?

Okay - I can't give you an overview but I might give you a condition - and an honest condition - to start us off. Other people can choose to be honest too and describe what their starting out condition would be.

My condition would that there would be yearly Irish representation. I'll repeat, in case some think I'm sounding a little selfish and might want to change tact - I want yearly Irish representation. HC is meaningless if you only get to fire in it once or twice perhaps every six years. Yearly participation in a New HC.

Next condition would be that Nobody who wants yearly participation for their leagues or nations should even hint at the idea that any other of the six nations involved in ERC (for unlike what Toad says, THEY own the HC not the leagues) should be content to forfeit their rights to the same condition.

Now onto others to outline their conditions in relation to their league or nation.

Toadfish

That is a quote that you agreed on you said it would work for you.
Thats basicaly what you have been saying all along

The HC is a competition between countries that take part in the six nations all this is in the rules .

Toadfish wrote:Just another point before I give up. The HK is a club competition, not a national one and there are 3 leagues that make up the qualification pool. If a fourth league joined made up of teams from Romania, Georgia, Russia and Poland would they get 10/11 places in the HK?

That's the thing. It's actually a club competition made up of teams from 6 countries. So if Romania or Russia joined, they could expect to each get a team spot.

Ok I'm getting the picture that people are keen to protect the individual countries so that everyone has representation and I understand that. So lets say we keep it nice and fair and every country gets 2 entrants. How will you be feeling if your team finishes 3/4/5th in the Rabo and don't qualify on this basis, but Italy's 2 teams (sorry Italy) at the bottom of the table qualify?

That would be fine, If Italy produce quality players and only have two sides then they will become serious competition and probably dominate countries who have players scattered around several clubs.

The organization that runs the Heineken Cup is owned by 6 national unions, not the 3 leagues.

The whole point of the Heineken Cup being set up in the first place is to give top flight Europe-wide competition to all 6 Unions. That's why it exists. That is its purpose. That's why it was conceived in the mid 90's. If your going to start excluding teams from some of the owning unions then you might as well axe the whole thing and everyone go back to their leagues and leave it at that. Because the competitions purpose wouldn't exist anymore.

Would their be any point in the Super 15 if it was 13 Kiwi teams, 2 South African and no Aussie's? No, they are all represented irrespective of how good they are. Because the competition exists to benefit all three nations.

McCafferty is in charge of his 12 AP sides. When he speaks at all it is always with the best interest of his sides at heart. That's his job - good man. Nobody is faulting him for that. So when he speaks about another league and queries the conditions of its HC qualification process, both he knows and we know it is done with the intention of furthering the interests of his sides.

Again, that's his job. He probably never watches Pro12 games, he certainly gets no revenue from it. Pro12 is meaningless to him except in the situations when his sides meet Pro12 sides in HC.

Who is the 'McCafferty' of the Pro 12?

He doesn't exist. There are four of him. And each one of those four McCaffertys is in charge of their select bunch of sides within the Pro12 league. They have the same duty to their sides as McCafferty has to his, namely to fight their corner.

So you see, Toad, it is so much more complex than two Leagues having a disagreement. It is one League leader suggesting how four International Unions conduct their HC affairs - all the while knowing he doesn't even control his own HC affairs - the RFU do.

By Alasdair Reid 9:47PM BST 08 Sep 2008Comment
At the moment Scotland's two professional sides, Glasgow and Edinburgh, gain automatic entry into Europe's premier club tournament regardless of how they finish in the Magners League.
The top three sides of both Ireland and Wales also go straight into the Heineken Cup, with another place awarded to the winner of a play-off between an Italian club and the better finisher of the bottom-placed Irish and Welsh clubs.
However, Welsh Rugby Union chief executive Roger Lewis suggested last week that the process of awarding Heineken Cup slots should be blind to the nationalities of the clubs involved, and that European places should simply be given to the top eight sides in the Magners League.
Scottish sides finished bottom of the Celtic event in each of its first four seasons as a straightforward league competition. However, following the axing of the Border Reivers at the end of the 2006-07 campaign, Edinburgh and Glasgow were far more competitive last season, finishing fourth and fifth respectively, progress that suggest the Scots have less to fear now from the Welsh proposal than might previously have been the case.
McKie, though, is likely to drive a hard bargain, the most obvious room for manoeuvre being around the issue of Welsh participation in the EDF Energy Cup, which involves sides from England and Wales. If the Welsh Union reduce their commitment to that competition, the Scots may be persuaded to accept the principle of Heineken qualification on the basis of merit rather than nationality.
"We view it as a package," McKie said.
"Until we understand all the constituent parts of the package it would be inappropriate to make comment on any one bit. You need to understand the full picture. We're due to talk about it in the near future."

So Welsmushroom is Roger Lewis a disgrace as well?
For those who thought the idea was an Anglo-French conspiracy. The same idea has been proposed frequently in the past & also by none other than the WRU president.

BigTrevsbigmac wrote:For those who thought the idea was an Anglo-French conspiracy. The same idea has been proposed frequently in the past & also by none other than the WRU president.

There you go - the complexity of four International Unions running a league together. And McCafferty thinks he has it tough???

Yes and if I remember correctly another part of the package was that England and France would only be allowed eight teams between them.
So it was a non starter from the start as England and France would never have agreed to that.
That was a Roger Lewis making a noise moment knowing full well that nothing would come of it.

A slight correction but the PRL jointly own the English part of the ERC, along with the RFU. Doesn't effect the Pro12 stuff of course.

Cymroglan wrote:Yes and if I remember correctly another part of the package was that England and France would only be allowed eight teams between them.
So it was a non starter from the start as England and France would never have agreed to that.
That was a Roger Lewis making a noise moment knowing full well that nothing would come of it.

Sounds disgraceful

HammerofThunor wrote:A slight correction but the PRL jointly own the English part of the ERC, along with the RFU. Doesn't effect the Pro12 stuff of course.

Thanks for the correction. So that's two Overlords of the English contribution to HC? Well, now it's really getting interesting. Just how many chairs around the negotiating table are we going to need???

3 Leagues,
24 HC places,
6 Unions,
7 or 8 head honchos around a table


..... Sky


....Heineken

You'd wonder how agreement for the HC ever happened in the first place!

One fact that isn't mentioned often in these arguments is that the European rugby season is an absolute mess. It's a jumble of competitions being played concurrently with our showpiece international event plonked right into the middle for good measure. If that isn't bad enough, every four years the World Cup overlaps into it, while it fits perfectly into the southern hemisphere season. Assuming this mess is presenting the English with more difficulties than the Celts. Wouldn't the best solution be to try and sort out the mess? Streamline the season. Play the League first, then the HEC, then the 6 Nations? The English and French could play their league unobstructed, and then enter their top 6 teams when it's all done and dusted. This season structure would also present England with the opportunity to enter regions into the HEC if they so wished, although I don't think they should.

No matter what though, I'll always maintain that every union getting representation in top flight European competition is for the good of the game in general.

HammerofThunor wrote:A slight correction but the PRL jointly own the English part of the ERC, along with the RFU. Doesn't effect the Pro12 stuff of course.

...and I'm pretty sure that's the same with LNR & FFR, and maybe the same with WRU & RRW - RRW certainly have a seat on the board of ERC.

...and Celtic Rugby Ltd does have a single chief executive, not four.


,,,and perhaps this report from the Guardian will shed some light on the bigger picture beyond the "I'm alright, Jack" fraternity

http://www.guardian.co.uk/sport/2011/nov/11/rugby-union-violent-breakaway-premiership

Feckless Rogue wrote:One fact that isn't mentioned often in these arguments is that the European rugby season is an absolute mess. It's a jumble of competitions being played concurrently with our showpiece international event plonked right into the middle for good measure. If that isn't bad enough, every four years the World Cup overlaps into it, while it fits perfectly into the southern hemisphere season. Assuming this mess is presenting the English with more difficulties than the Celts. Wouldn't the best solution be to try and sort out the mess? Streamline the season. Play the League first, then the HEC, then the 6 Nations? The English and French could play their league unobstructed, and then enter their top 6 teams when it's all done and dusted. This season structure would also present England with the opportunity to enter regions into the HEC if they so wished, although I don't think they should.

No matter what though, I'll always maintain that every union getting representation in top flight European competition is for the good of the game in general.

A laudable ambition, but I would suggest that the newcomers be restricted to the Russians, Georgians, Romanians, Spanish, Germans and Portuguese for now.

Cymroglan wrote:Yes and if I remember correctly another part of the package was that England and France would only be allowed eight teams between them.
So it was a non starter from the start as England and France would never have agreed to that.
That was a Roger Lewis making a noise moment knowing full well that nothing would come of it.

I've had a quick look and can't see any mention by Lewis of the English and French sharing 8 places. Or of the cup dropping to 16 (which would amount to the same thing)

Not on that report there was not but that was just a small part of the proposed package.

I did a search on the internet.

Dubbelyew L Overate, there's all sorts of things being said all the time for various reasons. This, from the Pro 12 entry on Wikipedia.

Talks have been held intermittently with both Italy[8][9] and South Africa[10][11] about the possible expansion of the Celtic League. A Rainbow Cup involving South African and Italian teams was announced in 2005,[12] but because of financial issues on the European end of the deal[11] and changes in the leadership of the South African Rugby Union (SARU), the idea was abandoned before a ball was kicked.

In February 2009, rumours spread that South Africa was negotiating entry of its current Super 14 teams into the Celtic League, to take effect when the current media contract between SANZAR and News Corporation expires after the 2010 season,[11] although these rumours were immediately denied by SA Rugby, the commercial arm of SARU.[13]

London Welsh have in the past expressed an interest in joining the Celtic League if promotion and relegation were to be removed from the English Premiership.[14]

So who are the South Africans joining? The French and the English? Or the Celts? I really doubt the French would be interested. You'd have to pull the Bouclier de Brennus from their cold dead hands. Or is it that the South Africans were putting these Celtic rumours out there as a bargaining chip for their negotiations with SANZAR? And is the English talk of a "violent breakaway" for the similar reasons?

p.s. I'd LOVE IT if the South Africans got involved in European rugby. If that doesn't force the Irish to improve their scrummaging nothing will.

Absolutely, there's all kind of posturing going on.

The salient point is that the current ERC accord ends in June this year. The last accord was in 2007, when the French nearly pulled out of HC and PRL were at loggerheads with RFU.

The doomsday scenario is that English and French clubs pull out of ERC, which they'll probably only do if they have an alternative, more lucrative (or potentially more lucrative) income stream. It also, in my opinion, relies on the English and French acting in accord, the unlikelihood of which gives some hope.

Whatever happens in the end, expect more posturing in the coming months, and either evolution or revolution of European club rugby in June.

HammerofThunor wrote:I did a search on the internet.

And the full proposal did not show up I'm not really surprised due to so little interest being shown towards it at the time.
As I said if my memory serves me right he said this that and the other I cant even remember if I read it or heard him say it on ScrumV for instance.
All I know is that he did propose changes that would never ever been implemented.

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/sport/rugbyunion/club/9033790/Benetton-Treviso-bring-more-to-the-Heineken-Cup-than-great-scenery.html

Some good reasons to counter McCafferty's self-serving diatribe. Its a bigger picture and rugby is a small game still. To contract or to restrict that, at HC level - will damage the game's growth.

Think of the Game as whole. Not just your own mess McCafferty.

HammerofThunor wrote:A slight correction but the PRL jointly own the English part of the ERC, along with the RFU. Doesn't effect the Pro12 stuff of course.

Quick question, do you know at what point did PRL become a separate entity from the RFU? Has it always been the case or is it something that came about at the dawn of professionalism?

All the PRL is is the group that represents the clubs. The clubs realised that they could negotiate stronger as a collective. So the PRL (made up off representatives of the clubs) speak to the RFU and deal with Sky etc and all the clubs have agreed to go along with the decisions. It does cause problems (smoothing payments to compensate for EPS payments, 'unfair' salary cap, etc). This is why Sale could say it wasn't up to them that Peel couldn't play outside the window (they have given up the right to act independently). Any of the clubs could break away but they would have to negotiate their own TV deals, sponsorship, etc.

It's similar to the Regional Rugby Wales thing that was set up a while back.

http://www.skysports.com/opinion/story/0,,12062_7451779,00.html

Barnes is right but he will say something completely different in the rugby club.

HammerofThunor wrote:All the PRL is is the group that represents the clubs. The clubs realised that they could negotiate stronger as a collective. So the PRL (made up off representatives of the clubs) speak to the RFU and deal with Sky etc and all the clubs have agreed to go along with the decisions. It does cause problems (smoothing payments to compensate for EPS payments, 'unfair' salary cap, etc). This is why Sale could say it wasn't up to them that Peel couldn't play outside the window (they have given up the right to act independently). Any of the clubs could break away but they would have to negotiate their own TV deals, sponsorship, etc.

It's similar to the Regional Rugby Wales thing that was set up a while back.

Cheers for that, I was actually interested to find out if it was a spin-off from the RFU (in which case it would be the masters puppet) or if it was, as you stated, an independent body acting for its own members interests. The latter does give it far more leverage.

Surely its Mark McCafferty's job to represent the English sides in the best way possible?? Which by putting this forward is what he is attempting to do, so to call him a disgrace for doing his job seems a bit much. On to your points.

English rugby needs some type of promotion/relegation. But maybe the way to go would be to follow the idea of rugby league (not sure of the details) but something like giving each club 3 year licences, and after each 3 year cycle gurantee at least one movement from the championship to the premiership. With each club needing to meet a minimum set of requirements. It encourages more long termism, and ensures clubs buy players only when they have the infrastructure.

The only problem is that it could mean a club could win the Heineken Cup or League in year, but be playing the championship the year after.

This system would certainly mean the end of London Irish in the premiership but would help the national team due to relegation not being based on on field performance, leading to more playing to win rather than playing not to lose. As an Ireland fan this means very little to me, but if English rugby as a whole want to succeed, changes are needed.

Its not just the structure, the coaching is also not as good, and also needs to be looked at.

My biggest bugbear from the PRL is the smoothing payments for the EPS players. Not sure if you already know all this but...

The RFU directly pay the relevant club for any players in the EPS. This is to compensate for the additional time lost to the club, allowing them to bring in cover (something like an additional 7 games missed on top of international window).

However the PRL were concerned that this would encourage some clubs to buy up all the English players and get money back for them. So they agreed (unanimously apparently) to smooth out these payments by uneven distributed TV and sponsorship money (the RFU has no control over these).

This makes sense if it only needs a majority and by definition more than half will almost always make more money this way (they can't all have above average number of players missing). What effect this has had is that clubs like Leicester or Northampton (or now Saracens) who contribute above average (3 or more players) lose money. Effectively it discourages having EPS squad members in the squad. To compound this issue they don't get any salary cap compensation so that they have players missing for more of the season and therefore need more cover but with the say budget.

It's going to be really interesting to see what happens in the next round of negotiations (deal runs out after 2015 world cup I think)


On a side note, the issue with relegation isn't actually relegation. It's promotion. That's what needs to be kept from our point of view. There's nothing special about the current top clubs other than they happen to be top at the moment. All the championship clubs are aiming to develop their club so that they can gain promotion to the premiership and stay there (just look at Exeter). Relegation is a necessary byproduct of that. IMO

The Telegraph and Sky sports articles posted by Gibson and rodders are very interesting. Looks like the British media isn't buying McCafferys excuses or solutions any more than we are.

Cleary in the Telegraph is completely correct in saying that Treviso add more to the tournament than the likes of Worcester or Exeter would. He's also right that if only the top 8 Celtic teams qualified for the HEC, Italian participation would likely be extinguished within 5 years and the growth of rugby in that country stunted, in order to let the weaker French and English teams in.

Barnes is also right about the the former masters, England, needing to stop the excuses and become the pupils. Particularly in attack and at the breakdown. Some English posters have recognized and acknowledged this already. Some still have their eyes closed and simply demand less Pro 12 teams in the tournament.

When will the penny drop?

By the way I don't think relegation is a problem at all, with regard to English performances in Europe. Just adds a bit of excitement to the bottom.