Time to put a full tackle on blazerati banal blethering

catastrophic for clubs – and nowhere has this been more apparent than in Scotland.

At the outset of the brave new pay-forplay era, there was an opportunity for grassroots organisations to seize the initiative and one or two responded to the challenge. Melrose were a driving force in the Borders and Glasgow Hawks orchestrated bold proposals for a club structure across their homeland, which would be based around the cities.

At the outset, Hawks even recruited a string of high-profile players and were sufficiently powerful to beat Toulouse in one friendly and draw with Newcastle Falcons in another. At the time, I contrasted their refreshing vision and when normal service resumes?

How will the likes of Highland and Aberdeen Grammar prepare for the resumption of competitive league action when, as the latter’s director of rugby Gordon Thompson told me last week: “We are in a state of suspended animation”?

And, despite the financial support being offered by the SRU, when will we see the creation of a championship structure which is actively promoted by the powersthat-be, rather than sidelined by the latest pieces of PR fluff from Glasgow and Edinburgh?

In these current and unprecedented circumstances, everything should be up for discussion. As somebody who used to

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