Wasps dive into the Anglo-Welsh debate
HAVING reflected on his club’s below-par efforts in the Anglo-Welsh Cup and A League this season, Wasps’ boss Dai Young believes a longer-term rethink is required.
Most Premiership clubs, Wasps included, view both competitions as an opportunity for back-up players and academy prospects to get some experience.
Nonetheless it is telling that the clubs who reach the semi-finals tend to also be those with domestic and European pedigree, and few would bet against this season’s AngloWelsh Cup final being a replay of last year’s Premiership Twickenham showdown between Saracens and Exeter.
Wasps have only managed two wins from seven starts across the two competitions this season, and while Young both understands the root causes of this and wants to improve the situation, he says it will take years not months.
“We have to look at the scenarios around the Anglo-Welsh Cup and our A League team,” Wasps’ boss says. “We are falling short in those games and it’s something we need to address, as that’s where our fringe players and academy boys get some game-time.
“It is something we’ll need to look at moving forward, as currently we haven’t got the depth or academy numbers to give these competitions a real crack.
“Where our squad is at the moment we’re fighting on two fronts, and three would have been a bit too much for us. A squad of around 40 is about right for Europe and the Pre- miership, but probably not enough to also be competitive in the AngloWelsh and the A League.”
The move from Wycombe and Acton to Coventry has probably presented a bigger challenge to Wasps’ academy than to the club’s senior side.
The rearrangement of academy territories, which was finalised last summer, has entailed a fair amount of shifting sand. It is therefore under- standable that building relationships with a number of new clubs and schools takes time, and that in turn this change will take longer again to manifest itself in the young professionals in the senior academy who appear in these second-tier competitions.
“For the last few seasons, I’ve found myself watching the A League games a bit through my fingers, and we’ve also only won two or three games in the Anglo-Welsh Cup in three years,” Young says.
“Moving areas obviously hasn’t helped, and we now need to get more numbers through the academy since we’ve pretty much had to start again in Coventry.
“You want the bulk of the A League and Anglo-Welsh Cup games to be development and academy players, not the first team. Having a big group of younger players coming through really helps, and we need to put a bit of work into that.
“We rested 15 players over the two games because of the amount of rugby they’ve played, and with the four Premiership games coming up we needed to be sure they are all fine.
“But unfortunately this has proved we are not good enough in either competition, so we have to find a way to improve that.”