Why the WRU simply must rethink theWebb situation

THE late, great Johan Cruyff once declared: “Before I make a mistake, I don’t make that mistake.”

Oh, to have had the peerless former Dutch football master on the panel of Welsh rugby bigwigs who drew up the selection rule that will see Rhys Webb exiled from international rugby from next season. Their overall objective of trying to bolster Welsh rugby was laudable in so many ways.

The regions were losing too many leading players and something needed to be done to prevent the trickle from turning into a flood that would further weaken the domestic game.

Not picking exiled players who haven’t reached the 60-cap threshold stacks up in a lot of ways, then. But not in every way. Not when it leaves Wales heading towards a World Cup minus their best scrum-half by some distance.

The autumn Tests reminded us of that.

“I don’t know about you, but, for me, none of the other lot inspires much confidence,” a work colleague said recently of Webb’s scrum-half rivals.

He probably wasn’t alone in singing from that particular hymn sheet.

Gareth Davies and Aled Davies are both good players, but the jury remains out on the former as a game-manager and the latter as a proven Test operator. Tomos Williams, of Cardiff Blues, is flashy, skilful and dangerous, but can he boss a match at the top level? We don’t know. Lloyd Williams? He has experience and is a fine player, but the selectors don’t seem to fancy him.

There are a few other likely lads bubbling under, but they are young and, again, untested against the very best. No one could say that about Webb. He is a Test Lion who has been around with Wales for half a decade and in 2016 he gave a good account of himself over three Tests against a player widely touted as the best scrum-half in the world, Aaron Smith.

In the recent batch of internationals, even though his contribution was punctuated by injuries, Webb still largely looked the part.

He was Wales’s best attacking player against Georgia and when he came off the bench against South Africa he used all his experience to help guide the team home.

Warren Gatland will know all this — of course he will.

Yet he seems powerless to prevent Webb from being tweezered up from his squad and placed off limits for Japan in 2019.

The bare facts will be familiar to most. Webb agreed a deal with Toulon but doesn’t have anywhere near 60 caps so, as an exiled player from next term, he faces banishment from the Test scene for the duration of his contract on the Cote d’Azur.

He protests that he didn’t know his move would stop him playing for Wales and his agent issued a timeline that indicated the scrum-half had committed to the French club before the new selection policy was introduced.

Some find it hard to believe the player didn’t know what was coming in terms of the change.

Ultimately, you either take him at his word or you don’t.

Should he have demanded more information given that his future risked being so hugely affected? Undoubtedly.

Should be pay for not doing so with his Test career? Not from here, he shouldn’t. Those who framed the new rules could have simply exempted Webb on the basis that he had already agreed a deal with Toulon.

They could have further said those who had reached either 60 caps OR made 150 regional appearances should continue to be eligible even if based in Timbuktu rather than Tonyrefail.

Let’s be clear here: 150 regional appearances amounts to a significant commitment to the game in Wales. Ryan Jones only reached the mark in his final game for the Ospreys, when he came off the bench against Zebre.

Ashley Beck, who has been with the Liberty Stadium region for 11 years, is still 25 games shy of the figure.

Injuries can have a ruinous impact and Webb has suffered his fair share, including the foot problem he sustained on Wales duty before the 2015 World Cup. That cost him eight caps on its own.

He also underwent shoulder surgery earlier in his career and sustained an anterior cruciate ligament problem that saw him fail to start a match over seven months in 2013.

The Bridgend product has made 148 regional appearances over a decade and more than paid his dues to the regional game. He didn’t join the rush to head outside Wales during Welsh rugby’s years of strife between the WRU and the regions. Instead, he stuck with the Ospreys and was part of the early contingent who signed dual contracts.

And he re-signed after just nine months.

There is also the point that Webb had a world-class player operating in his position in his early years at Test level.

Mike Phillips went on to add 32 caps to his tally after Webb made his international debut. Others in the national set-up would not have had their way to the team so blocked, but Webb was on the squad scene for much of the time.

But will anyone be persuaded to fine-tune a policy Warren Gatland says was drawn up by the Welsh Rugby Union and the regions?

The odds do not look favourable, notwithstanding that national team face being denied the services of their best scrum-half heading towards a World Cup.

It is borderline remarkable that Welsh rugby’s power brokers devised a situation that is so obviously damaging to Wales’s cause.

Was it the case that someone felt it wouldn’t be a bad idea for a sacrificial lamb, to hold up as an example of the seriousness of the policy? Hopefully not. Whatever, it is set to hurt Wales. And, for that reason but also out of fairness to Webb, the WRU and the regions need to look at it again.

They then need to have the boldness to modify a rule that has snared a player who has given a huge amount to the Welsh game over the past decade.