Rugby World UK – July 2019

BIG BLOW
Ireland back-row Sean
O’Brien has been
ruled out of the World
Cup with a hip injury.

AUTUMN DATE
The Barbarians will
play Fiji at Twickenham

on 16 November. See

ticketmaster.co.uk/

barbarians for tickets.

TOP HONOUR

Black Ferns sevens

captain Sarah Hirini

(née Goss) is now a

Member of the New

Zealand Order of Merit.

BOOK WINNER

Ben Ryan’s Sevens

Heaven, about Fiji’s

journey to Olympic

gold in Rio, was named

the Rugby Book of the

Year at the Telegraph

Sports Book Awards.

FANTASTIC FIJI

Fiji (left) were crowned

World Sevens Series

champions after

winning the London

and Paris legs. They

qualifi ed for the 2020

Olympics alongside

USA, New Zealand

and South Africa.

MOVING ON

Ex-Wales wing Mark

Jones has stepped

down as coach of RGC

1404 after three years.

NEW JOB

Petrus du Plessis will

take on a player-coach

role with Glasgow

Warriors next season.

PICS

Getty Images

years of fi nding funds to help fi nance

community club facilities and to employ

suffi cient quality staff to support

volunteers with advice and infrastructure.

It may well be that, as Stephen Jones’s

article suggested last month, the RFU

is not currently fi t for purpose, but let’s

be clear what this purpose is. It must

have at its core the protection of the

long-term future of the game as a whole,

and the fostering of healthy community

clubs at the base is fundamental to this.

HE PREMIERSHIP clubs
exist only to further their
own interests. To do this
they make maximum use
of England internationals,
as players and as bargaining counters
to squeeze maximum ransoms from the
RFU for releasing them for training.
Of course, the clubs invest time, eff ort
and money in developing the country’s
best youngsters into top players, not for
England’s benefi t but their own. They
get massive fi nancial contributions from
the RFU towards these investments,
which is more than can be said for the
community clubs who produce all the
youngsters in the fi rst place. 
The eight-year commitment to pay
huge amounts to Premiership clubs
under the Professional Game Agreement
is directly starving community rugby of
even the very
basic level of
support from
Twickenham.
The payment
of reasonable
compensation to
the top clubs for releasing England
players is hard to argue with, yet the
RFU hasn’t had the gumption to demand
equal treatment for community clubs,
which year after year lose their best
junior players to Premiership academies.
The hard-nosed businessmen running
the top clubs are not going to volunteer
such payments. And if the RFU can’t
negotiate anything on behalf of the
grass roots, then the ruling body must
do a far better job than it has in recent

The RFU’s

principal sources

of revenue will

always be the

England team

and Twickenham

stadium. To maximise these, it might

be that changes need to be made to

the relationship with the Premiership.

However, the latter must not be

allowed to dominate the relationship

any more than it already does through

its control of the players. n

Premiership Rugby has an undue sway over English rugby, argues RW reader John Allanson

“The agreement is starving

community rugby of even the

very basic level of support”

HAVE YOUR SAY

What gets your goat? Let us know on

Facebook or tweet @rugbyworldmag

T

Stretching budgets

Clubs are compensated for

England training access

THE RUGBY RANT

Front Row

SHORT

PASS