WHAT NEXT FOR CARNEGIE?
Yorkshire set to revert to Leeds name as relegated club rebuild for long-term
YOU would imagine the combination of relegation from the Championship and the effects of the far less expected coronavirus may have dampened enthusiasm within Yorkshire Carnegie to continue revival plans.
Nothing could be further from the truth, though, according to director of rugby Phil Davies who insists the rebuild project under their erstwhile name of Leeds is very much still on.
After a winless season of 20 successive defeats, Carnegie – shattered by financial strife for the last 18 months – were certainly not complaining when the Rugby Football Union ended the campaign early on March 20 due to the pandemic.
The Headingley-based side still had eight fixtures remaining but, realistically, had no chance of survival; their fate was, then, officially confirmed in April.
Davies, who had overseen their greatest era as Leeds Tykes from 1996 to 2006 when they sailed high in the Premiership, graced Europe and won at Twickenham, had returned in January.
Back then, there was already talk of returning the Leeds name plus renewing links with various partners in the city and – despite now facing life in National One and with RFU funding gone – the gregarious Welshman maintains plans are coming together.
“To be honest, myself and Gary Hetherington, and some of the key investors, have not really stopped working since the cancellation of the Ealing match,” he said, their last fixture which was called off on March 14.
“We’ve worked on a plan to encompass looking at changing the name, where we’re going to play and train, plus recruitment and retention of players, the coaching side of things and partnerships.
“There’s been a fair amount of work gone on and I hope in the next four to five weeks we can make announcements around a lot of those areas.
“We’re in the process of finalising the name and I’m pretty certain it will be Leeds something.
“I don’t want to speculate on where we’ll be playing but we need a base where people can come and really enjoy watching the team play and have a good experience pre-match, during the match and post-match.
“We’re looking at resetting the club and wanting to drive it forward again and make a real positive contribution to rugby in Leeds and the rest of the county.
“Ultimately, we want to try to get back to being a sustainable Championship club. It will be challenging but hopefully we can get back on the right track.”
With their budget slashed last season following a CVA, the hastily-assembled, youthful, inexperienced Carnegie squad never had any real chance of survival.
Understandably, a malaise had enveloped the club that, just a few months earlier had still talked about returning to the Premiership for the first time since 2011.
But Davies remains “confident” there is enough backing and stability to keep them fighting on.
He added: “The investors have been fabulous. Steve Kershaw at Weetwood Hall has been very supportive, Gary Hetherington has been supportive of the commercial aspect and Chris Gibson.
“There’s a lot of good people that are involved who want to continue to be involved in the club and I admire that immensely. Yes there will be financial restraints – that will happen to everyone in sport – but it’s just how we can use the benefit of everyone’s experience. The last few years have been difficult but a lot of learning has come out of that.”
National One life will not be easy as Rotherham – the former Premiership club – discovered, suffering relegation this season just two years after falling out of the Championship themselves.
Carnegie fans will worry the same slide could happen to them but former Wales international Davies is encouraged.
The former Namibia coach said: “There are some players that will move on as they feel they need to play at Championship level or maybe even Premiership.
“We respect that of course.
“But also we have a lot who are keen and are from Leeds; we want to build the squad predominantly from people based within three quarter of an hour from the training ground and ideally who have roots in Leeds or in Yorkshire.
“We’re trying to go back to something we worked on years ago; trying to build a real local identity so people can recognise the faces in the jerseys and the names in the programme.”
Granted, there is no word yet when clubs will be able to start training after Covid-19 or when the 2020-21 campaign will begin.
Davies, meanwhile, will commute from his home in south Wales and added: “I’m going to have a pretty big involvement in it but I do have things to do potentially with World Rugby again,
“The Covid situation has curtailed a lot of that but I will retain that interest as I think that global reach is good for the club as well.
“With coaching, myself and Wayne Proctor have a lot of experience and hopefully Colin Stephens and a number of other coaches can help, too. But there’s the players as well; some of the Leeds lads like Joe Green, Jack Metcalf and Daniel Lancaster are really bright, young players.
“Jake Brady is a great clubman and real asset. There’s a good core of youth and experience that will hopefully form the side’s spine.”