the times | Tuesday April 5 2022 59
Rugby unionSport
How Ealing’s ground comparesWasps..............................Capacity: 32,609
Bristol Bears......................................27,000
Leicester Tigers...............................25,849
London Irish ....................................... 17,250
Gloucester ............................................. 16,115
Northampton Saints ..................... 15,200
Harlequins..........................................14,800
Bath ........................................................ 14,509
Exeter Chiefs ...................................... 13,593
Sale Sharks ........................................ 12,000
Worcester Warriors.........................11,499
Newcastle Falcons.........................10,200
Saracens................................................8,500
Ealing Trailfinders............................4,000Ealing fury at glass ceiling
Ealing Trailfinders, who have won the
RFU Championship, have decried the
barriers stopping them entering the
Gallagher Premiership as they await
their appeal hearing.
Ealing beat Richmond 60-10 on
Saturday to clinch the second-tier title
for the first time in their history, but still
do not know if they will join an expand-
ed 14-team Premiership next season.
Their application to go up was
rejected last month, with the RFU,
Premiership Rugby, and Professional
Game Board deciding they did not meet
the minimum standards required —
particularly as their Vallis Way ground
holds only 4,000 fans.
Ealing have appealed and an inde-
pendent panel will hear the case later
this month.
“If the panel is going to look at black
and white, whether we meet the
10,000-capacity criteria, then we don’t
and we know that,” Ealing’s director of
rugby, Ben Ward, told The Times’ Ruck
podcast. “There is part of me that thinks
it’s more hope than expectation, based
on our experiences of the past
12 months. We just wish it were a bit
more open and [that] we’re all pulling in
the same direction. A lot of people talk
of growing the game, but you don’t see
that at the top as much.”
Ealing applied — alongside Doncas-
ter Knights, whose own appeal will fall
away because they finished second —
in October for an audit of their facilitiesand heard little until their proposal was
rejected last month.
“We engaged in conversations with
the various bodies fairly early and made
clear our approach — to go to 7,500
capacity, 9,000, then 10,000 over a
three-year period,” Ward added.
“It’s very difficult for Championship
clubs to put a 10,000-seater stadium in
place without knowing you’re in the
Premiership. Realistically, with attend-
ances in the Championship, it would be
a waste of money and difficult to afford.
“We felt our approach was met with
optimism, but we’ve been disappointed
as we had very little to no contact with
the relevant bodies.”
Ward, who has been at the club for
18 years, is now in limbo — unable to
sort out player recruitment and reten-
tion or work out funding streams until
it is confirmed which league Ealing will
be in next season.
“That uncertainty makes it a lot more
difficult,” Ward said; he believes some
in the Premiership do not fancy Ealing’s
bid with London already having three
clubs — Saracens, Harlequins and
London Irish — in the league. “It neverseemed to be an issue when Wasps were
in London,” Ward said.
Rob Baxter, the director of rugby at
Exeter Chiefs, saw his side jump
through these hoops in the mid-2000s
before their promotion in 2010 and
agrees the system is flawed.
“The bit that does irk me about the
minimum criteria is that there are ele-
ments of it that if you are in the
Premiership you don’t have to have in
place,” he said. “We were spending
money on putting things like wider
doors on our medical room. When we
built Sandy Park we had to put certain-
sized toilets in the changing rooms.
“Then you go to Bath and sit in
changing rooms that have not been fit
for purpose since day one of the
Premiership. They don’t have to
readjust them, they just have to pay the
fine every year. Ealing would not be al-
lowed to be promoted with that size
changing room. We go to games regu-
larly where crowds are not meeting the
minimum Ealing would have to put in
place. I agree with the argument about
why those things seem unfair, but they
have always been unfair.”Will Kelleher
Ealing’s players
celebrate after
winning the
Championship
last weekendDAVID HORN/PRIME MEDIA IMAGESAll Blacks
great joins
women’s setup
Will KelleherWayne Smith, the former New Zealand
coach and player, has taken a role with
the nation’s women’s team to help them
win the World Cup this autumn.
The 64-year-old coach, who was
instrumental in the men’s World Cup
victories of 2011 and 2015 under
coaches Sir Graham Henry and Steve
Hansen, will be a technical coach for
the Black Ferns at their home
tournament, which starts in October.
The Black Ferns were usurped as the
world’s best women’s team by England’s
Red Roses last autumn, when Simon
Middleton’s side beat them 56-15 and
43-12.
New Zealand endured a harrowing
tour to Europe at the end of 2021, where
they also twice lost to France, so need to
transform their fortunes quickly to lift
the World Cup again — as they did in
2017.
Smith was inspired to take the role by
New Zealand women’s rugby legend
Laurie O’Reilly, the first coach of the
women’s team.
“I indicated to him before he passed
away that I would help the women’s
rugby [team] in whatever way I
could and now I will get the chance,”
Smith said.
“The coaching group is all on the
same page around the type of game we
need to play to win the World Cup.There is a lot of work to be done to get
there but it is going to be exhilarating.”
Smith helped the New Zealand
women’s team in the 1990s, too, and he
was involved in more than 200 Tests
over nearly two decades with the All
Blacks. He will be tasked with helping
Black Ferns coach Glenn Moore —
who is under pressure after a poor
northern tour and facing a review into
the culture of his side following allega-
tions of bullying that came up last year.
England are the favourites for this
year’s World Cup, having won their past
20 Tests.Smith also worked
with the Black
Ferns in the 1990s