Scots interest in Falcons is doomed to disappoint
The Scottish Rugby Union chief executive, Mark Dodson, spoke openly last week about his desire for the Scots to have a presence in the Premiership. A while ago rumours were rife that Worcester were the target club, but the logic of the SRU taking an interest in the West Midlands club always looked questionable. Now it seems Newcastle might be next on their list.
At one time the Borders were a hotbed of great rugby, with little towns such as Galashiels, Hawick and Melrose producing Scottish internationals and British Lions, but, just as in England and Wales, the growth of the professional game wreaked havoc on those old clubs.
With only Glasgow and Edinburgh having pro setups, the Borders is starved of top-flight rugby, but Edinburgh and Newcastle are almost equidistant from Hawick, and all of the Borders rugby towns are closer to England than they are to Glasgow. Unlike the Worcester adventure, at least an SRU involvement in Newcastle Falcons would have some geographical sense, but would the Scots be welcomed?
That the Premiership is considered to be attractive is a compliment, with Dodson commenting that they ‘believe in its financial strength’, and it’s hard to avoid making comparisons with the struggling Pro14.
Newcastle, of course, are one of the Premiership clubs that haven’t yet reached break-even, so it might be that Scottish pounds would be welcomed there, but what would it do for the Premiership?
Scotland has two franchises, and it’s hard to imagine anything other than that they’ll always have the pick of the talent. What’s left is likely to be those that can’t quite make it, are past their best, or are Academy kids coming through – would they really benefit an ambitious Premiership club that’s on the way up?
What is likely to be the biggest hurdle, is the fact that the SRU already ‘own’ two clubs that compete at European level. What would happen if an SRU-backed Newcastle were drawn in the same pool as Edinburgh or Glasgow? When Mohed Altrad fancied buying a controlling interest in Gloucester, the other owners sent him away with a flea in his ear – he would only have been allowed to become a minority shareholder, and conflict of interest with his ownership of Montpellier was cited as the reason. That presumably means the SRU would have to be a minority investor, but it would already own two competing clubs, which complicates matters.
As a minority partner, what influence would the SRU have over a club’s affairs, and wouldn’t it be more likely they’d be a nuisance rather than an asset? To put this is in the bluntest terms, does the Premiership want or need a bunch of players that are an embarrassment to the SRU because they can’t find them a home?
The Scots have thrown their lot in with the PRO14, a league that has its own problems – far better for Mark Dodson and his fellow-countrymen to devote their energies towards making that work.
The question of ringfencing is back in the hands of the RFU and it will be fascinating to see what price they try to exact for their approval.
There’s an element of the perfect storm about all this: England messed up in the Six Nations with fatigue cited as the cause, so want an answer to player welfare, and the clubs have had enough of the yo-yo-ing involving promotion and relegation. It looks like we’re in for a spell of horse trading.
My hunch is we’ll see tougher limits on the number of minutes played by England’s elite squad, and a bit more access to them for Eddie Jones. In return the clubs will get a moratorium on relegation for a few years.
Will there be 12, 13 or even 14 clubs in the brave new Premiership, and what will give to make the season manageable – the Anglo-Welsh Cup? Whatever the size of the league, with the top players on the sidelines for longer, current squad sizes won’t be sustainable. There will have to be a few more players employed by each club, and that means hard talking about money.
This all makes sense of the appointment of ex- RFU chief executive Ian Ritchie as chairman of PRL – is it poacher turned gamekeeper, or the other way round?