The Rugby Union Society

Really enjoyed the last couple of weekends of Heineken Cup rugby, shame that it might be the last year of it happening, for a while anyway. These rumours of an English/South African club competition are interesting although I don't have a grasp of the exact logistics.

Rumours have it that the Welsh regions have been offered a substantial sum of money to move over to the Anglo-Welsh Premiership.

Personally livid about this, mainly because it'll likely spell the end of Worcester as a top-flight outfit. If Wales could take their money problems and second string journeymen sides back to the Rabo that would be fab.

I'm a Munster fan too, so seeing sides ditch the Rabo isn't good news.

Money is ruining the game

If they're second string journeymen sides why are you worried about them beating Worcester? It's all stemming from the lack of control they have over their own future. All of the revenue the regions make goes through the WRU before being spoon fed back to the regions through a forced players agreement. The regions don't see it as fair that 1: The WRU negotiate all of their deals for them to a standard they see as poor, the rabo tv contracts are pitiful compared to the French and English leagues, and 2: the WRU force their terms onto them, they have no say in their own future in terms of leagues and money. Welsh players are leaving in droves and I think the regions don't like the fact that they can't change that without this action. With the extra money on the table more Welsh sides will keep good players, and you could have a better standard league and possibly the blueprints for a British league.

I'm not worried about them beating Worcester. I'm worried about the obvious bloated Premiership if we include an extra 4 teams, meaning 3-4 sides will have to be relegated to ensure this isn't a disaster of a season for the players. Which means Worcester will go down.
Particularly because they won't bring the 4 Welsh sides over and then let them get relegated to the Championship straight away. They'd let 3-4 English sides out to pasture for a load of Welsh teams with no Welsh internationals playing for them, teams which realistically a fair chunk of the Premiership could and would beat. Worcester, in fact, have their only win of this season away at Cardiff. Regardless, promotion and relegation would have to go for fear of losing a Welsh side to the Championship, as if it's an Anglo-Welsh league there has to be a decent number of Welsh sides in it. Then the bottom half of the Premiership would become as pointless as a large chunk of the Rabo, making the league crappier and not worth the investment.

I feel sorry for the Welsh regions and the money situation. It sucks hard, and it's a shame to see a load of Welsh players going elsewhere (as an aside however: if the rumours that Halfpenny was asking too much from Clermont to the extent they had to refuse his proposal, some of the players could do with someone questioning their loyalty).

But I am a Worcester fan. And an Anglo-Welsh league, or even a British league (although surely this would be British and Irish if it happened?) would cause Worcester's demise. So I am against any course of action that would lead to Worcester's relegation from the top leagues.

That's fair enough. Ultimately I think a European multi tier league or British league will have to happen in order to facilitate the re-structuring of the game that needs to happen in the Northern hemisphere. Currently the calendar of our pro game is in the hangover of the amateur days, and as much as I wish that players still showed loyalty to their home regions (and that it was demanded by fans of big clubs too, who aren't so easily swayed when a millionaire decides to buy a whole team only loyal to money) we need to move on in some ways to maximise the ability of the game to make the most of what it has. English and Welsh top players might well in one year play in their respective leagues, the LV cup, Heineken cup, six nations and autumn interntionals. A properly structured season is needed to keep local players and boost crouds and interest across Europe, as well as putting us in a better position to beat the Southern hemisphere (although really England should definitely still be able to do that despite any inconveniences, due to their player base). A British and Irish league is probably the only way that will ever happen.

Lancaster doesn't know what he's doing! Twelvetrees out of his depth and it was too early for Nowell IMO