Probyn: Prem acadamies only help ‘parasitic’ clubs
With the last season and the Six Nations finally over and the preparation for the start of the new autumn competition just a couple of weeks away, the international game is starting to heat up.
After last week’s Premiership final you would have thought everyone would be happy as finally all seems to be balancing out as best it can (given the current circumstances) but they’re not.
Despite Exeter claiming an excellent European-Premiership double, the chief executive and chairman Tony Rowe took time out to castigate the RFU for not helping the Premiership clubs enough financially, particularly in terms of paying for young player development.
Rowe argues that the RFU do not provide enough academy funding in a process that starts for the Premiership clubs at around the 15-16 age group, when talented young players have already been identified.
Most children start their rugby journey at a grassroots club in mini and juniors or through the schools rugby system, where, if proven good enough or if being sent to the ‘right school’, they graduate to schools county and youth representative rugby.
It is at this point where the Premiership clubs ‘hoover-up’ virtually all and sign them (through their parents) to their club’s academy system on the promise of a professional rugby future in the game.
Effectively, the clubs are taking the players who have been developed by their grassroots club and /or school to a level where they have shown themselves as potential ‘stars’ for the future of the game and closing them off from virtually any other opportunity to develop their rugby skills anywhere else in the game.
The reality of the current academy system is that it serves to protect the current Premiership clubs in their position at the top of the game with little or no thought as to the damage it creates among those younger players it rejects.
Player development is a long-term strategy that is not a ‘one cap fits all’ system with young players growing and developing at different rates.
The current academy system has no long-term strategy to review players’ progress and offers contracts only to a minority after a couple of years, while abandoning the majority to their own fate in or out of the game.
Many will leave the game with their dreams destroyed but some will persevere and may eventually be ‘discovered’ but it is unlikely with no alternative pathway for the ‘late developers’ to showcase their talents.
What should be a symbiotic relationship between the Union and the clubs for all young players as they move along their journey, is seen by many in the game as the parasitic Premiership draining the sport of talented young players it can ill afford.
Unfortunately, the academy system is like the ‘virtually’ ring
“I feel sad that Tony Rowe does not seem to understand the needs of the whole game”
fenced Premiership with no way in if you’ve missed out in those early years of school county rugby, unless you are lucky enough to be at a school or college that has a ‘relationship’ with a Premiership club.
The RFU do provide funding for academies which, even though considering each Premiership club only runs its academy for its own benefit as part of that particular business, but not for the benefit of the game as a whole, isn’t a surprise.
The RFU help fund player development at every stage of the game from the youngest mini and juniors to full internationals and even veterans as part of their commitment as the sport’s governing body.
As an admirer of what Rowe has achieved at Exeter, I feel sad that he does not seem to understand the
needs of the whole game, even those at the top.
Rowe said, “Being forced to release them (England players) for so many international games is not good. We don’t get compensated enough. We bred these players for ourselves, we didn’t breed them for England.”
“We (the Premiership clubs) should be able to turn to the RFU for financial support, because they turn to us when they want our players.”
Although I agree there should not be an endless stream of international games, his comments are to say
the least, surprising.
It is the Premiership who insist that players for the England team are picked only from the Premiership shareholders.
By creating that caveat, it forced the decimation of virtually all other previous representative stages in the game, including senior County and Divisional rugby.
There is also no doubt that playing international rugby vastly improves you as a player which in turn aids the club you play for in their league performance.
It’s international rugby that finances the whole game and is the driving force of the professional game, which in all probability would cease to exist if international rugby were to collapse financially.
Rowe took Exeter from the lower leagues to the top of the club game and along the way has benefited from the support of the RFU.
He should remember what it was like looking up and struggling to reach the top, rather than complain while reaping the benefits that success has given the club.