The world leaders in prevarication!
There’s an old adage, ‘When you’ve nothing to say, say nothing’, and it’s one that World Rugby would do well to take to heart. When you see a Press release entitled ‘Rugby united in approach to optimising the men’s international calendar’ it’s reasonable to think it might be followed by something of substance, but what we got was waffle and management-speak of the most ridiculous kind.
The so-called global calendar is a running sore that has plagued the game for some years now, and the reasons behind it are a mystery to me. Here in England we have the Premiership, the Six Nations, the Autumn Internationals, and the European Cups, and in a normal year the summer tour to the southern hemisphere, plus the RWC every four years.
It all hangs together pretty well, and the RFU and PRL have been able to reach an accommodation on player release that seems to suit both parties. The French, too, seem to be managing it well, while in the PRO14 it’s different because of the nonsense of central contracts, but they still seem to get by.
The problems with the calendar are predominantly southern hemisphere ones, with World Rugby using those to try to find a way of consolidating its power in the game, and that’s what led to last week’s ridiculous Press release.
Apparently there’s been ‘an extensive and collaborative process’, with lots of ‘facilitating’ of discussions, and exploring of options, seeking solutions and financial outcomes! This has all been endorsed by various committees, no doubt comprised of old players whose experience of the game goes back to the amateur days. In the end, however, all they’ve managed to agree is a set of principles for future discussion. Early on in their statement they managed to get ‘player welfare’ mentioned three times, so no doubt that earned a tick in the mandatory box!
The principles can best be described as motherhood and apple pie: improve player welfare (!), increase competitiveness, and achieve ‘optimal outcomes’. The only bit of substance is that any proposed new competition can’t happen until 2024 at the earliest – what I think politicians refer to as kicking the can down the road!
Apparently everyone is going to keep on talking around these principles, with player welfare at the heart of their decisionmaking, or as is more likely, not making any decisions. They will, however, have more subcommittees chuntering on interminably: one for the calendar, one for player welfare (of course), another for financial assessment, and one for competition.
This is deeply depressing stuff from what is supposed to be the game’s governing body, and we all deserve better from them. I’ve commented before that their staff list runs to over 100 people, supplemented by former players and administrators from around the globe, and for an organisation of that size and scope they seem to accomplish very little.
At the heart of all of this nonsense there are a couple of fundamental power struggles going on: World Rugby is desperately scrabbling around trying to retain its position in the game, and those who believe that Test match rugby should be pre-eminent are fighting against the success and power of the northern hemisphere leagues.
The global calendar is rugby’s equivalent of the Holy Grail, or more accurately the Monty Python version of it, albeit not as funny.
It looked for a while as though the ongoing saga of Premiership relegation might finally be drawing to a conclusion, and then it dragged on for a bit longer. It was due to go to the RFU Council for approval, but seemingly PRL asked for a last-minute delay as they hadn’t cleared it with all of their partners! Why did that surprise no one?
The bigger question is why a decision on the professional game needs ratification from the amateurs on the RFU Council? They were famously described by Will Carling as ’57 old farts’ – that was back in 1995, and 26 years later it seems they’re still exercising power!
“World Rugby is scrabbling to retain its position in the game”