SUDDENLY, THERE IS GOODWILL AGAIN AND A SHARED DESIRE FOR PROGRESS
2 For this new competition, Munster could be split into North Munster (Limerick, Clare Tipperary) and South Munster (Kerry, Cork and Waterford) with games staged in each county. Leinster would be split between Dublin (home games in Donnybrook) and the rest (moving between Naas, Carlow, Tullamore etc) while the league would be filled out by the existing Connacht Eagles and Ulster Ravens.
3 The AIL would be limited to Division 1A and 1B and cut back to eight teams in each (with a minimum of one club from both Connacht and Ulster) – the reduction in fixtures freeing up weekends to play Foley Cup games.
4 The rest of the clubs would revert to provincial ‘community’ leagues, with play-offs to ensure a route into Division 1B. Narrowing the focus is the pragmatic play and there is encouraging precedent here. Last year’s community series was a hugely popular move by the IRFU, with clubs benefiting from a significant reduction in travel costs, as well as the reigniting of local rivalries that had lain dormant for years.
5 Selection for Foley Cup sides would be a mixture of academy and AIL players but could extend down to the provincial leagues – ensuring every promising player has a route to auditioning for the professional game.
6 Do away with ancillary competitions such as charity cups to free up more weekends.
7 Organise TG4 to cover live Foley Cup and AIL games, wherever possible, as they have done successfuly with club Gaelic games, with continued streaming of AIL similar to last year.
8 Aggressive marketing campaign featuring the likes of Peter O’Mahony, Johnny Sexton and Paul O’Connell talking about their club roots.
‘RUGBY FOR ALL’
RUGBY regularly gets lazily tagged as being a sport exclusively for ‘posh boys’ and, while there is undeniably an element of truth to that, it is far removed from the AIL experience at clubs across the country.
While provincial and international games attract their share of occasion-junkies, full of overt jingoism, adopted lingo and spoofery, the club experience is far earthier – most similar to its GAA equivalent – and deserves appreciation as such.
Like the GAA, everyone attending a club game in rugby tends to be invested (former player, underage coach, family member etc) and thus has hands-on knowledge of the game. There is little room for the pretension so often associated with rugby and, just as with our national sports, that grassroots core is essential to the bigger picture.
It is strange that it would require a global pandemic to provide clarity but it now seems obvious that there has to be a middle tier between clubs and provinces, linking both.
The Foley Cup-type solution seems the most workable and, with players leaving the sport for a variety of reasons, IRFU backing for grassroots is essential to offer solid foundations from the ground up.
The ideal scenario is ‘rugby for all’ at every club – ie vibrant senior, junior, Under 20 and Women’s teams, along with a thriving underage structure. Ideally, there would also be a profitable clubhouse serving as a social hub and creating a strong sense of identity with the community.
That may all sound almost naively aspirational but clubs such as Highfield tick all those boxes and show what is achievable.
The Cork club may have won ‘f*** all for years’ but they will be back trying hard as ever, as will the rest of the clubs, and hopefully with a clearer path to follow.