Review of uncompleted 6N campaign.

[Cameo]

Geech, especially in harness with Telfer was a fantastic innovative coach. In his day. His latter appointments were not so successful as he became to my mind more and more detached from the reality of the modern game.

I'll admit, it made me reconsider my opinion upon hearing that Geech agreed with some of my points! He has got significantly odder as time goes on.

Puja

Haha, I think that is fair. "Ahead of your time" can quickly become "detached from reality" when not exposed to actual decisions. I think some of his ideas are interesting though.

Septic - Pro10 would be good format wise but it would be a shame to drop Italy. I'd also like to continue dreaming that we can add a team or two one day.

Maybe a two ten team conference league (with no crossover until playoffs) might work but has the issues re unbalanced conferences.

On the derbies, I agree and get the financials but, ultimately, we want the league to get to a point where we are not artificially relying on inflated numbers of derby matches. Add 1k to each attendance plus more for some new rivalries (e.g. Glasgow Munster) add you could mitigate some losses. A massive help would be if Wales could come up with a way of getting 4 competitive reasonably supported teams.

[septic 9]

Septic - Pro10 would be good format wise but it would be a shame to drop Italy. I'd also like to continue dreaming that we can add a team or two one day.

Maybe a two ten team conference league (with no crossover until playoffs) might work but has the issues re unbalanced conferences.

On the derbies, I agree and get the financials but, ultimately, we want the league to get to a point where we are not artificially relying on inflated numbers of derby matches. Add 1k to each attendance plus more for some new rivalries (e.g. Glasgow Munster) add you could mitigate some losses. A massive help would be if Wales could come up with a way of getting 4 competitive reasonably supported teams.

I certainly am not going to make a case to drop the Italians, just pointing out the sort of decisions that might need to be made. And to repeat I really do not like having 3 Edin-Glas derbies, but in the current set up there is not an option TBH. It enables the 4 Irish and 4 welsh to play each other twice.
I don't like conferences either, but a 14 team league means either more games (not on I feel) or a really random selection of fixtures which influence the outcome and devalues the competition.

Upping attendances isn't so easy. It depends on several factors. The obvious one is performance. Edinburgh have had excess capacity for ever, but disappointing attendances (bar the odd cup run and 1872). Glasgow have been selling out every home game for 2/3 seasons, never mind Munster. (BTW Ulster used to bring the biggest support, many based over here anyway)
And that is in the best of times, ie before covid. When rugby returns, its entirely possible that some social distancing will still be in place and Glasgow's capacity halfed. Tough times

[Puja]

Septic - Pro10 would be good format wise but it would be a shame to drop Italy. I'd also like to continue dreaming that we can add a team or two one day.

Maybe a two ten team conference league (with no crossover until playoffs) might work but has the issues re unbalanced conferences.

On the derbies, I agree and get the financials but, ultimately, we want the league to get to a point where we are not artificially relying on inflated numbers of derby matches. Add 1k to each attendance plus more for some new rivalries (e.g. Glasgow Munster) add you could mitigate some losses. A massive help would be if Wales could come up with a way of getting 4 competitive reasonably supported teams.

I certainly am not going to make a case to drop the Italians, just pointing out the sort of decisions that might need to be made. And to repeat I really do not like having 3 Edin-Glas derbies, but in the current set up there is not an option TBH. It enables the 4 Irish and 4 welsh to play each other twice.
I don't like conferences either, but a 14 team league means either more games (not on I feel) or a really random selection of fixtures which influence the outcome and devalues the competition.

Upping attendances isn't so easy. It depends on several factors. The obvious one is performance. Edinburgh have had excess capacity for ever, but disappointing attendances (bar the odd cup run and 1872). Glasgow have been selling out every home game for 2/3 seasons, never mind Munster. (BTW Ulster used to bring the biggest support, many based over here anyway)
And that is in the best of times, ie before covid. When rugby returns, its entirely possible that some social distancing will still be in place and Glasgow's capacity halfed. Tough times

Would Glasgow not benefit from doing the occasional Big Game at a larger stadium a la the English clubs? Hire Ibrox for the Ulster game, try and get 20k paying punters with free tickets to schools to bring a crowd of 25k. Might not make any more money than an ordinary home game, but could help establish the next generation of fans as well as building the overall fanbase.

Puja

[septic 9]

Would Glasgow not benefit from doing the occasional Big Game at a larger stadium a la the English clubs? Hire Ibrox for the Ulster game, try and get 20k paying punters with free tickets to schools to bring a crowd of 25k. Might not make any more money than an ordinary home game, but could help establish the next generation of fans as well as building the overall fanbase.

Puja

Ibrox pitch is too small for rugby - got a one of dispensation to do the Commonwealth 7s.
Hampden has 50kish capacity but has very shallow raking and shit views.
Parkhead was used for last season's pro14 final, and was in consideration a previous season for a home HC play off had it happened.

Parkhead was liked by some and detested by others; not in a sectarian way but people who detest both sides of that divide, myself included. That apart I thought it was shit venue, weather and result didn't help of course.

the cost of hire is prohibitive especially if you discount tickets and give away free ones. Warriors have been looking at how to expand Scotstoun, for now the best option - and can and do extend another 3k for end of season play-offs. Its enough for now. Win the league or get a HC semi or better, different thing.

[Puja]

Would Glasgow not benefit from doing the occasional Big Game at a larger stadium a la the English clubs? Hire Ibrox for the Ulster game, try and get 20k paying punters with free tickets to schools to bring a crowd of 25k. Might not make any more money than an ordinary home game, but could help establish the next generation of fans as well as building the overall fanbase.

Puja

Ibrox pitch is too small for rugby - got a one of dispensation to do the Commonwealth 7s.
Hampden has 50kish capacity but has very shallow raking and shit views.
Parkhead was used for last season's pro14 final, and was in consideration a previous season for a home HC play off had it happened.

Parkhead was liked by some and detested by others; not in a sectarian way but people who detest both sides of that divide, myself included. That apart I thought it was shit venue, weather and result didn't help of course.

the cost of hire is prohibitive especially if you discount tickets and give away free ones. Warriors have been looking at how to expand Scotstoun, for now the best option - and can and do extend another 3k for end of season play-offs. Its enough for now. Win the league or get a HC semi or better, different thing.

Good knowledge; thanks.

Puja

[Cameo]

Would Glasgow not benefit from doing the occasional Big Game at a larger stadium a la the English clubs? Hire Ibrox for the Ulster game, try and get 20k paying punters with free tickets to schools to bring a crowd of 25k. Might not make any more money than an ordinary home game, but could help establish the next generation of fans as well as building the overall fanbase.

Puja

Ibrox pitch is too small for rugby - got a one of dispensation to do the Commonwealth 7s.
Hampden has 50kish capacity but has very shallow raking and shit views.
Parkhead was used for last season's pro14 final, and was in consideration a previous season for a home HC play off had it happened.

Parkhead was liked by some and detested by others; not in a sectarian way but people who detest both sides of that divide, myself included. That apart I thought it was shit venue, weather and result didn't help of course.

the cost of hire is prohibitive especially if you discount tickets and give away free ones. Warriors have been looking at how to expand Scotstoun, for now the best option - and can and do extend another 3k for end of season play-offs. Its enough for now. Win the league or get a HC semi or better, different thing.

Interesting view on Parkhead. Personally I thought the only real downside was the weather (and transport but that wouldn't be as much of an issue for a normal game).

Agree though that regular hire is not really the best option.

[septic 9]

Parkhead was liked by some and detested by others; not in a sectarian way but people who detest both sides of that divide, myself included. That apart I thought it was shit venue, weather and result didn't help of course.

the cost of hire is prohibitive especially if you discount tickets and give away free ones. Warriors have been looking at how to expand Scotstoun, for now the best option - and can and do extend another 3k for end of season play-offs. Its enough for now. Win the league or get a HC semi or better, different thing.

Interesting view on Parkhead. Personally I thought the only real downside was the weather (and transport but that wouldn't be as much of an issue for a normal game).

Agree though that regular hire is not really the best option.[/quote]

Having grown up watching football and being abused by both sides it sticks. And it hasn't gone away, the teams depend too much on it as their raison d'etre to tackle it full on. The PA having to ask people to avoid an obvious walk back into the city to avoid the battle zone says it all

[septic 9]

I'm still a sceptic (!) on season re-structure. I would love to see a better sequence to it, but the devil as discussed is always in the detail.
A couple of other suggestions worth a gander for those interested

Alan Solomons
What would your ideal global season structure look like?
I’d have a six-month block – March to August – where we play our elite domestic and cross-border club competitions, followed by a three-month window in September, October and November where you play international rugby and have domestic development competitions running concurrently.
You would then have that six-month window for elite club rugby with no crossover with internationals, while from September it would be clear for worldwide, money-spinning Test rugby with no overlap. At the moment in the northern hemisphere everything is mixed up, but by having that three-month Test block with development competitions acting as a player proving ground for the following year, you would inject some really clarity and flow into the fixture schedule.

What other advantages are there?
If you do this, it gives ALL players a proper break during December and early January, after which you can filter people back into pre-season ahead of a March 1 restart. I know there will be some challenges but between March 1 and November 30 all players would be available, playing in appropriate levels of competition. If we’re going to have a true reset, it needs to be on a global basis.


This sounds lovely, but it also requires a reduction in league and/or HC weekends. It has no space for Lions Tours (although that for me is an acceptable loss), and no room for a world league national or club competition which many seem to want. And no room for RWC unless we assume that every 4th season that the sept/oct/nov is given over to RWC and warm ups (a reasonable assumption) bt that effectively means no 6N revenue; or it takes place in Dec/Jan which would be fun in the NH for those wanting summer rugby

[septic 9]

and then there is this being floated

https://www.therugbypaper.co.uk/latest- ... -into-may/

except even Beaumont has said the 6N isn't moving.

Also like other suggestions 9 wks of test rugby is a huge demand on teams, those with smaller squads being hit with an even bigger challenge than now; and to go from that into HC effectively cripples teams like ours (between injuries and need to rest) because the national players are concentrated in just 2 teams.

As I say the devil is always in the detail. If we are serious about player welfare (everyone says we are) then there has to be fewer matches. Everyone then seems to look to cut club matches to make way for test matches because they make the big money. For my money we have this the wrong way round. There is too much test rugby. The balance is wrong, we have players eg in Wales and Ireland who play as much for Ireland as their club. Change this balance further and we're getting more towards only test matches counting for much, we will leave pro rugby below test matches like county cricket.

And that's before we get to the carbon footprint of teams flying all over in sep/oct/nov (and load on players) - not a tour to one country (they have gone under these proposals), but for us all over the SH. These are reasons the HS rugby championship and super rugby struggle commercially as well, we need to learn from that.

Oh and Beaumont still wants his world league, with relegation. And NZ still want a big share of NH cash. These are the real drivers, nothing to do with developing tier 2 etc unions - they would again be frozen out except for 1 team, the rest would get no fixtures against tier 1s

[Puja]

I don't get the concept of the World League. I mean, I'm not necessarily opposed to it, but I genuinely don't get how adding a league table and a trophy to existing games will result in a massive influx of money.

Puja

[Cameo]

I don't get the concept of the World League. I mean, I'm not necessarily opposed to it, but I genuinely don't get how adding a league table and a trophy to existing games will result in a massive influx of money.

Puja

I'm with you on that. There is also a danger that it gradually makes every year the same. I would be moving the other way towards fewer but longer tours (i.e. 2 or 3 match series rather than one off matches against each team in the area)

[Cameo]

Journalists are also very ready to ascribe any opposition to it as conservative sticking head in sand reactions by traditional unions (which it may be) rather than looking at any weaknesses in the idea. For instance, they seem to take for granted that it will help tier 3 nations but, as far as I can see it will only, at most, help a couple of chosen ones.

[Puja]

Journalists are also very ready to ascribe any opposition to it as conservative sticking head in sand reactions by traditional unions (which it may be) rather than looking at any weaknesses in the idea. For instance, they seem to take for granted that it will help tier 3 nations but, as far as I can see it will only, at most, help a couple of chosen ones.

Yeah, there's been a lot of falling in line in the press. Opposition to it by the 6N has been positioned as them opposing guaranteed millions of funding for impoverished unions, while never questioning whether the promise of money converts to actual cash in hand. They'd be great landlords.

I'm with you - scarcity breeds demand. The Rugby Championship is going down the pan because NZ vs SA three times a year every year is monotonous. The most hyped test match of the past RWC cycle was England vs NZ 2018. Why? We hadn't played them since 2015 and everyone wanted to know how we stacked up. Could have sold Twickenham 4 times over for that.

Besides, bring back three test series and you've got a competition with a trophy right there, especially with mid-week games. It'd be like a mini Lions tour.

Puja