Rugby Union 2013-14

[tomd2103]

it's a tough one because getting more money is clearly part of it but the undeniable issues are:

The RaboDirect gets 11 places for 12 teams, with the 1 missing place shared between Ireland and Wales, England and France get 6 guaranteed places between 12 and 14 teams respectively.  The key argument here is that, from a qualification point of view, league placing is irrelevant, add on that there is no relegation in the rabodirect and league placing becomes even less of an issue.  That means those teams can hold players back for european games whereas the english and french sides can't afford to do the same.  Ireland having the strongest sides in the rabodirect coincided well with it's formation to give them a disproportionate amount of wins in recent years.

Financially the commercial revenue is split by union rather than by league so again, club by club, the french and english clubs get less of a share in the revenue than the rabodirect sides.

Finally the structure of the Heineken and Amlin cups is doing nothing to help the developing nations in europe as the amlin in particular is totally dominated by english and french clubs.

The best proposal I've seen was 3tiers of 20 teams with the heineken cup giving 6 places per league, with an additional place for the winners of both the Heineken and Amlin cups.  Then the Amlin has 5 teams per major league and 5 spots for 3rd tier leagues, with the finalists both guaranteed a spot.  The 3rd tier would then be made up of the top teams from the developing leagues, such as romania, russia, georgia, etc.  The 1 issue is that if both of the top tiers are won by clubs from the rabo direct or the english league then they'd be given 13 places for 12 teams but it'd be pretty easy to have some kind of pre-season playoff between the other league and french league for that spot.

True, but the English teams look to share their amount out equally amongst all teams in the league instead of giving teams that are in the HEC a higher amount. 

[paul_e]

Leinster vs Saints has been one hell of a first half from Saints, North, Wood and Manoa in particular have all been superb, great game to watch so far.  To their credit Leinster have defended as well as anyone I've ever seen.

[paul_e]

Leinster vs Saints has been one hell of a first half from Saints, North, Wood and Manoa in particular have all been superb, great game to watch so far.  To their credit Leinster have defended as well as anyone I've ever seen.

Bad to quote myself but that was one of the best games I've ever seen, both sides threw everything at each other and both defended fantastically.  Truly brilliant rugby, massive win for saints and the breakaway try denying Leinster was nice as well.  It's still a massive task for Saints to qualify from their group but it's good to see that much heart from them.

[lovejoy]

Particularly after the home defeat drubbing last week.

[cheltenhamlion]

How did Glaws do? 5 points today, which was needed?

[lovejoy]

Ha, f'cking lost, having beaten them away.
If we lose to Worcester next week I suspect Davies will come under big pressure.

[cheltenhamlion]

Lost at home? Again? To Edinburgh? He should be under pressure now.

[paul_e]

To be fair Edinburgh defended very well, they were really aggressive on gain line and were hitting runners back in the tackle, what glaws needed to do was start manufacturing rolling mauls, the try came from one and they were getting nowhere otherwise.

Also of note, Edinburgh were incredibly lucky not to go down to 13 men at one point, with a man already sin-binned their 10 swatted at a pass when there was a decent chance of an overlap, you normally see yellow when they're that blatant.

The Edinburgh 15 was on kicking duty and he made the single worst penalty attempt you'll ever see, the ball fell off the tee as he was stepping up so he effectively hit a grubber straight to a glaws player, who was so surprised by it that he knocked on to give them a scrum 10yards out right under the posts, which largely sums the game up.

[cheltenhamlion]

I suppose one positive to consider is that we are starting to make signings in the front five for next season.

Afoa from Ulster and Hibbard from the Ospreys confirmed so far.

[paul_e]

I agree, Credit to Davies for being pretty pro-active about it and getting his men in early, Afoa is a particularly good signing as he's a good pick and go carrier around the fringes which none of the existing front 5 are really, that's another reason why the backs aren'y able to rip teams open, when glaws pick and go they go backwards far too often which means the backs end up too flat and aren't coming on to passes at full pace.  Noyle at 9 is a big problem as well as he will not pass off the floor, which you really need as an option when your game is built around your running game in the backs, it's only 1 step but it slows things enough that they never have quite as much space as they'd like.

[lovejoy]

A 5 year deal for a 30 year old prop seems quite generous to me though, they normally retire before then (Leonard excepted).

[paul_e]

not really, props are normally at their best at 28-29 so playing until 34-35 is not that unusual, it might be a year too long but no more than that.

[cheltenhamlion]

If they can just find a pair of second rows then that should make for an interesting season next time. Woody will be fine alongside the two new boys.

[lovejoy]

Rumours have Jim Hamilton coming back but I honestly can't see how we can afford it, unless we are adopting a Sacraecian approach to the salary cap.

[paul_e]

I fully intended to watch the game today but ended up wrapping christmas presents instead so I'm very upset that I missed the game being delayed by half an hour because the crossbar got broken by the pre-match entertainment, Ben Kay and Austin Healy on the commentary would've been great fun to listen to after that.

Aside from that it was a very important home win for Glaws, they really need to get some home form after a pretty shocking run and a nervy one in a local derby is a great starting point.