Bristol dilemma tells me it’s time to end relegation
Andy Robinson’s departure from Bristol ought to rekindle the debate about Premiership promotion and relegation. If an obscenely wealthy club, with a former international coach, a ridiculously large first-team squad, and lofty ambition, is in as much trouble as they are, then what hope is there for any promoted side?
In the past I was a staunch believer in the need for promotion and relegation but it’s surely time to have a serious rethink? The gulf between the Premiership and the Championship is vast, and getting wider with every year. You’ll come across Championship fans who will deny that, but they’re deluded.
The Championship sides are in general comprised of players who are good, but not good enough for the highest level, and if one appears who is of Premiership standard, he’ll be poached in a flash. Every so often Sky shows a Championship game, and entertaining though they are, it’s abundantly clear you’re watching a lesser standard of rugby.
Consider what Bristol went through, and it’s clear just how much the cards were stacked against them. They earned their promotion in the final week in May, winning the twolegged final against Doncaster, despite losing at home in the second leg – without any disrespect to Donny that should have flagged that there could be trouble ahead. Bristol then had just over three months to ready themselves for a Premiership campaign – that’s just insane.
Supporters of promotion will point to Exeter Chiefs as the example of how a team can make the step up, but that is the exception rather than the rule, and was the result of many years of gradual growth. Against that if you look at the history of other promoted sides – Rotherham, Leeds, London Welsh – it really isn’t a good story. To succeed, a club need to recruit better players, but anyone who’s hanging around in May looking for a contract probably isn’t the answer!
If Bristol had been promoted for a two or three-year period they might well have made it – their recruitment would have been much easier and they would have got their hands on better talent. Instead, in the wake of Robinson’s departure, we’re hearing about an international who will join in January, with another one promised after that – that smacks of desperation, but what else can they do?
They’re looking for a replacement for Robinson, and that too is problematic – out-of-work coaches who can fly in at a moment’s notice probably come with a health warning!
It’s time for a proper dose of realism about the structure of the Premiership, and it would be good if it happened sooner rather than later. Bristol deserve to be a Premiership club, and given a proper chance I have no doubt they would be a huge asset to the league. That would take us to13 clubs, but 14 would be better – that way there would be 26 rounds, and the wretched Anglo-Welsh Cup could be put out of its misery, or turned into the ‘A’ team competition it should be.
Which club should be the 14th? There are, realistically, only two candidates, London Irish and Yorkshire Carnegie.
Irish have the Premiership pedigree, and are currently heading the Championship table, but I have no doubt that the RFU would love the Leeds-based outfit to make the step up – three top-level sides in the North has long been their ambition.
There will no doubt be squeals of anguish from the other Championship clubs, but that’s just tough. Except for Irish and Leeds, they should become feeder clubs for the Premiership.
What about the stray billionaire who wakes up one morning and fancies owning a Premiership club?
Instead of throwing himself into a lower-league club and trying to build it up, maybe buying a Premiership outfit is the way forward. Let’s be frank, the clubs are now effectively franchises, to be bought and sold to the highest bidder – in recent times two-thirds of them have had either a change of ownership, or a major investor coming in.
The Premiership is the best and most competitive league around, and it continues to develop, to the extent that it can no longer carry passengers.
It’s time to make sure the league is comprised of the right clubs – the ones that will invest and grow and make English club rugby an even better spectacle for the fans.