Excuse me Colin, but Pirates are certainly ambitious

I READ with much interest two articles in last week’s Rugby Paper. The first was brilliantly written by your Nick Cain, who highlighted the plight facing the Championship clubs with the reduction in RFU funding and their token offer to adjust the proposed slashing of said cuts.

Cain highlighted how the French are making a mockery of the RFU by the efficient, profitable and highly effective running of their ProD2, the equivalent of the Championship. The French also run a third tier which is fully professional and totally worthwhile. Take note Mr. Sweeney!

The second article was written by Colin Borg who, to be quite frank, didn’t appear to have any proven reasons to substantiate his facts. He emphasises the point that he sees no sensible alternative than to ring fence the Premiership.

“There isn’t a Championship side that has a hope in the foreseeable future,” he says. Well my club, the Cornish Pirates are fully professional and have every intention of reaching the pinnacle of English rugby.

It does not help matters when a club relegated into the Championship get a parachute payment from the RFU to ease their way for a quick return.

Boag says he does not see another club with the ambitions of Exeter in the second tier. He clearly has not done his homework because Coventry, Ealing, Jersey, Nottingham, along with the Pirates (who incidentally are having a new stadium built to satisfy the RFU seating criteria) have every intention of reaching the top flight.

This season alone my club have spent vast sums on ground improvements including pitch drainage, higher goalposts, an electronic scoreboard, new changing rooms, upgrading the floodlights, standing enclosure and general spectator safety.

Championship club owners do not have endless pockets. If standards in this league are to be upheld, staying fully professional, running academies, working with the community, employing the necessary staff for administration, ground improvements and advancing the careers of the Jack Nowells and the Luke Cowan-Dickies (both former Pirates), then the RFU’s proposed reduction in funding is nothing short of a total disaster for English rugby second tier.

IVAN ROWE