RugbyRebels

With the prospect of no internationals, Duhan and Kebble may have to wait another 2 years.

Big D wrote:With the prospect of no internationals, Duhan and Kebble may have to wait another 2 years.

none until April 2022? You're more miserable than me!

Haven't seen a lot of Kebble - would he get ahead of Sutherland at the moment?

I'm keeping within shouting distance of sanity with bike rides and the live replays from SRU/Ed/Glasgow. Watching Edinburgh v Dragons - sounds an unlikely classic, and by far the best part of the game is the scrums: Dickinson, Ford and Nel all over their opposite numbers. Not a great back line though.

no sleep wrote:Haven't seen a lot of Kebble - would he get ahead of Sutherland at the moment?

I'm keeping within shouting distance of sanity with bike rides and the live replays from SRU/Ed/Glasgow. Watching Edinburgh v Dragons - sounds an unlikely classic, and by far the best part of the game is the scrums: Dickinson, Ford and Nel all over their opposite numbers. Not a great back line though.

He would be an option in the position we have few options in.

no sleep wrote:Haven't seen a lot of Kebble - would he get ahead of Sutherland at the moment?

I think not. Kebble on top form is a damned good player, carries like the beat he is, hit rucks hard and destroys tight heads - and takes shit from no-one. That's the upside of his CV. The downside is some refs really don't like his scrummaging and penalise him a lot; and he is injury prone; misses lots of games and seems to be subbed off early too often with injury as opposed to the usual musical chairs.

On the 6N performances Sutherland has the jersey for now. Kebble could easily displace Dell from the bench - I think he is struggling since his move to LI, especially in the scrum

Yep, I don’t think anyone would have questioned Kebble being ahead a few months back, but he’s had a dip and Sutherland has had an enormous surge. Being able to use him off the bench for 20-30 would be fantastic though.

septic 9 wrote:

Big D wrote:With the prospect of no internationals, Duhan and Kebble may have to wait another 2 years.

none until April 2022? You're more miserable than me!

He's referring to 2020 being the last year of the 3 year residency rule. Just because there is no rugby to be played doesn't mean they aren't qualified - I think we should be fine.

It may well remain incomplete, with a new 2020 6N in October, and 2021 taking place at the usual time.

https://m.sport24.co.za/Rugby/Britishan ... 0-20200420

Doesn’t sound ideal, but what is at the moment? If it goes ahead, it’s about taking the chance again! Let other people complain about the scheduling and view it as an opportunity to continue to work on our new way of playing.

FWIW, I think we have a great chance to align the global calendar and would like to see us move to summer rugby. If that means moving the 6N to a different time, so be it.

Yep. This has to be seen as an opportunity to adjust some things.

Concussions will probably kill the sport dead within 10 years anyway but whatever.

Rory Best now on the summer rugby bus. Always knew he was a good guy.

https://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/rugby-union/52362279

Mikey Brown wrote:
Concussions will probably kill the sport dead within 10 years anyway but whatever.

Aye. Will probably end up with touch/ mini rugby up to 16 years old I reckon.

General Zod wrote:Rory Best now on the summer rugby bus. Always knew he was a good guy.

https://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/rugby-union/52362279

so can you or mr good guy explain how that would work for tours, Lions, RWCs etc? Tks

septic 9 wrote:

General Zod wrote:Rory Best now on the summer rugby bus. Always knew he was a good guy.

https://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/rugby-union/52362279

so can you or mr good guy explain how that would work for tours, Lions, RWCs etc? Tks

Sure.

Just make it mirror roughly the current SH season, and every second year jigger about a bit with the fixtures.

Job’s a good ‘un.

General Zod wrote:

septic 9 wrote:

General Zod wrote:Rory Best now on the summer rugby bus. Always knew he was a good guy.

https://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/rugby-union/52362279

so can you or mr good guy explain how that would work for tours, Lions, RWCs etc? Tks

Sure.

Just make it mirror roughly the current SH season, and every second year jigger about a bit with the fixtures.

Job’s a good ‘un.

so our international tours happen in season, losing pro team players to the national side, Lions tour in season maybe we don't lose too many players but TV audiences deflected, RWC takes place in season, we lose loads of players to national team and TV audiences deflected. Who the fuck would buy a pro team season ticket (not just in Scotland) when you never have any players? Or who pays for the need for bigger squads in our cases?

What does jiggling mean? Extending it? We already have a 9 months season. Fuck the players, make it 10 or eleven

septic 9 wrote:

General Zod wrote:

septic 9 wrote:
so can you or mr good guy explain how that would work for tours, Lions, RWCs etc? Tks

Sure.

Just make it mirror roughly the current SH season, and every second year jigger about a bit with the fixtures.

Job’s a good ‘un.

What does jiggling mean? Extending it? We already have a 9 months season. Fuck the players, make it 10 or eleven

Jigging, not jiggling, is an expert scheduler’s word for playing about with it a bit.

The point is if Southern Hemisphere teams can run a season on a Jan - Dec calendar, so can we. And as I suspect you’re something of a pedant, my use of Jan - Dec is merely to reflect the start - finish order, not to advocate 12 months of continuous rugby. Could be Feb - Nov, for instance.

Anyway, I’d bash out the first half of the season before a window for the 6N. Back into it and the end of the year is space for RWC/ Lions/ “Tours”. Players are playing too much, so yes, that likely means fewer internationals while it beds in. The tours could be home and away series to share the dollar out a wee bit.

For instance, November for us could see something like:

Argentina home (“warm up”, appearance fee for Argentina)
Australia home
Australia away
South Africa home
South Africa away

May even do 3 @ home followed by 2 away to cut down on travel. If we win one and SA win the other, the teams play extra time to put something on it.

Just a suggestion, and if it doesn’t work, you change it again. Do you have any proposals?

Not quite sure about the home and away autumn internationals but no reason why summer rugby would have to mean more club games played during international windows as Septic suggests.

Can have a 6N break, a NH to SH break and a SH to NH break

septic 9 wrote:

General Zod wrote:

septic 9 wrote:
so can you or mr good guy explain how that would work for tours, Lions, RWCs etc? Tks

Sure.

Just make it mirror roughly the current SH season, and every second year jigger about a bit with the fixtures.

Job’s a good ‘un.

so our international tours happen in season, losing pro team players to the national side, Lions tour in season maybe we don't lose too many players but TV audiences deflected, RWC takes place in season, we lose loads of players to national team and TV audiences deflected. Who the fuck would buy a pro team season ticket (not just in Scotland) when you never have any players? Or who pays for the need for bigger squads in our cases?

What does jiggling mean? Extending it? We already have a 9 months season. Fuck the players, make it 10 or eleven

We've actually had this discussion on the EMB and it's perfectly possible to do without having tours/Lions/RWC mid-season. Have 6N where it is (in one block without gap weeks), followed by domestic rugby (Pro14 for your lot) until July when the tours go on, then European tournaments August to October with AIs in November. Off-season for the majority of December and January. Every 4 years, clubs get to do their Club World Cup idea in July instead of the ERC, leaving August-November open for the RWC warmups and RWC itself. And in a Lions year, Europe is pushed back by 2 weeks and the AIs go into December by a couple of weeks.

Puja

Puja wrote:http://rugbyrebels.co/board/viewtopic.p ... 04#p206803

so, we have a cup/ championship from 9 jan to mar. If front line players are to play in that, then either they have no pre season, or no real off season downtime. It takes according to most fitness guys at least 4 wks to get up to par for pro rugby. And in that time there would need to be full contact games. Players need longer time off if anything than now

If front line players do not play in the above, then they go into the 6N with little to no rugby. Seems sensible. Not

You have reduced premiership to 16 games, from current 22 plus 3 (play offs) with no clue how to achieve that in Eng never mind elsewhere. Pro14 conferences of 2*7 still amount to 21 games plus play-offs. They are already lop sided in terms of balanced fixtures, stuff like one round robin means a huge adv/disadvantage in terms of who you get home and who away. Oh and you might have noticed from ours that some teams get 11 homes games in regular season, others only 10. Afraid that might do for a non partisan TV viewer to watch on TV, but not for me.

Also at a stroke you have reduced income for Premiership clubs by 35% - gate receipts, and sponsorships and TV deals worth less. Good luck with that.
And 6 N with no breaks - you know the breaks are there to aid player welfare? This worsens it. 6 wks in a row of test level rugby would be a murderous toll on players' bodies.

Ditto the idea of going into summer tests (with serious travel involved) then back to the HC. I would be worrying that as in soccer we would start to see a lot more players unavailable through injury for away internationals
And after 13 weeks of high intensity HC straight into 3 wks (or more) of AIs

What you have done is shifted the balance more to International games and away from clubs. Made all more dependent on Test match money. Players appearing less for their clubs than now, a lot less

Its a pretty sequence but afraid it doesn't work for player welfare, has no real off season and takes loads of money out of the system

That's before you get to other unions

septic 9 wrote:

Puja wrote:http://rugbyrebels.co/board/viewtopic.p ... 04#p206803

so, we have a cup/ championship from 9 jan to mar. If front line players are to play in that, then either they have no pre season, or no real off season downtime. It takes according to most fitness guys at least 4 wks to get up to par for pro rugby. And in that time there would need to be full contact games. Players need longer time off if anything than now

If front line players do not play in the above, then they go into the 6N with little to no rugby. Seems sensible. Not

You have reduced premiership to 16 games, from current 22 plus 3 (play offs) with no clue how to achieve that in Eng never mind elsewhere. Pro14 conferences of 2*7 still amount to 21 games plus play-offs. They are already lop sided in terms of balanced fixtures, stuff like one round robin means a huge adv/disadvantage in terms of who you get home and who away. Oh and you might have noticed from ours that some teams get 11 homes games in regular season, others only 10. Afraid that might do for a non partisan TV viewer to watch on TV, but not for me.

Also at a stroke you have reduced income for Premiership clubs by 35% - gate receipts, and sponsorships and TV deals worth less. Good luck with that.
And 6 N with no breaks - you know the breaks are there to aid player welfare? This worsens it. 6 wks in a row of test level rugby would be a murderous toll on players' bodies.

Ditto the idea of going into summer tests (with serious travel involved) then back to the HC. I would be worrying that as in soccer we would start to see a lot more players unavailable through injury for away internationals
And after 13 weeks of high intensity HC straight into 3 wks (or more) of AIs

What you have done is shifted the balance more to International games and away from clubs. Made all more dependent on Test match money. Players appearing less for their clubs than now, a lot less

Its a pretty sequence but afraid it doesn't work for player welfare, has no real off season and takes loads of money out of the system

That's before you get to other unions

Okay, so first of all, I completely acknowledge that it's not perfect. I am not going to defend it as the epitome of season plans and it has holes enough that even James Haskell could probably avoid contact (okay, so maybe it's not that bad). However...

The cup competition is a secondary event, much like the English cup currently is. It would not *need* to involve many appearances of the players who had played in the AIs and the rate at which it was taken seriously by clubs would vary. In Scotland, I would imagine it probably wouldn't exist - you'd have a pre-season camp for the Scottish squad to build up to the 6N (which is 5 weeks international rugby, not 6 - considering 4 consecutive weeks is often done for Autumn Internationals and some players in the 6N play tough games in the rest weeks anyway, I'm not sure it's that big of an additional burden, especially considering one of the games is Italy. Also player welfare would be hugely improved by players coming into the competition off the back of a break, rather than midway through a gruelling season).

Also, I'd like to note that non-international players would have an off-season from November-January, while internationals would basically have December to mid/end Jan, which is better than they're currently getting and a damned sight better than the internationals will be getting next year once the summer internationals move to July to accomodate the SH.

The reduction of the league window to 16 weeks and how the hell that would be accomplished - I've got no answer to that criticism; it is clearly a gaping flaw. However, I'm not 100% convinced that fewer games means proportionately less income - for a start, this idea would move every Prem game away from clashes with internationals. It would also allow the season to start with the maximum number of eyes on it, following immediately on from the biggest public event in the rugby calendar with 8-9m viewers tuning in on free-to-air. Launch the Prem/Pro14 immediately after the 6N with big games at Twickenham, Tottenham, St James Park, Millenium Stadium, Aviva, Murrayfield, etc, especially if they're the ones that BT share on FTA television on Channel 4 and you've got a huge number of potential cross-over viewers and spectators. That's the whole idea of this CVC nonsense - that rugby is not getting its full value out of its assets and that larger crowds and larger sponsorship numbers are possible if the game is marketed better and uses its assets better, so even with selling a quarter to CVC, 75% of a larger pot is bigger than 100% of a smaller pot.

In addition, taking the international windows out of the middle of club seasons means room for potential money-spinning games as mid-week/warm-up games against touring sides, as well as whatever stupid challenge games clubs want to dream up - North champs vs South champs, Sale vs St Helens, etc.

I don't see why moving the competitions into solid blocs is more of a problem than what we have currently. 13 solid weeks of ERC is hard work, but no more hard work than 13 solid weeks of mixed Prem/ERC/AIs is. And the latter is certainly far less cohesive for a casual fan - you and I might understand 2 weeks of ERC, then a gap, then 2 weeks, then a gap, then 2 weeks, then a gap, then knockouts scattered at intervals through the calendar, but in terms of building an event that draws people in and keeps them interested, a tournament that builds solidly to a climax is far better than one with 5 gaps to lose eyeballs and interest. I'd imagine it sells better to tv companies as well - "Here's 13 weeks of solid content", rather than "Here's 2 weeks, then 2 weeks, then 2 weeks, then 1 week, then 1 week, then 1 week, that you have to commit to for 8 months, no, come back please!"

To my mind, it has the potential to raise player welfare - fewer games, fewer club-vs-country issues, a set off-season that avoids the worst weather conditions - has the defined off-season of 5 weeks that the RPA has said is essential, and has the chance of drawing in more money than the current system. You say that my plan is dependant on Test money, but the club game is already not working and very heavily dependant on national unions. English clubs are losing money hand over fist, the likes of Ospreys and Dragons are playing in front of sub 5k crowds, the new and improved European competition is already being talked about as being scrapped because it's not making money as expected - the current system is not making money and is already dependant on the big Twickenham/Murrayfield/Millennium/Aviva crowds to keep all the boats afloat.

Like I said, my idea is far from perfect (and I still have no answer to how you fit a domestic league into 16 weeks), but I think overall there are positives and a change has to be considered because the club game right now is going very very slowly bankrupt.

Puja

Puja, where I certainly agree is that competitions being played in complete blocks would be very desirable.

Where I differ is putting more eggs in the test match basket. FWIW I am of the view that we all play too much test match rugby, England and Wales especially. And double especially Wales who devalue their teams and the Pro14 by having a 4th AI.

Clubs going bankrupt has been forecast for a decade. It hasn't happened (bar a few early professional mess ups and cons). The current pandemic is a huge challenge for them, and some adjustment is necessary but I cannot see how taking away so many money generating opportunities helps. There may be fewer TV clashes with tests (actually not so many for us these days) but sponsors and broadcaster factor in how many exposure opportunities as well as viewers on each occasion. I don't think I've missed a Glasgow or Edin match because of a TV clash

septic 9 wrote:Puja, where I certainly agree is that competitions being played in complete blocks would be very desirable.

Where I differ is putting more eggs in the test match basket. FWIW I am of the view that we all play too much test match rugby, England and Wales especially. And double especially Wales who devalue their teams and the Pro14 by having a 4th AI.

Clubs going bankrupt has been forecast for a decade. It hasn't happened (bar a few early professional mess ups and cons). The current pandemic is a huge challenge for them, and some adjustment is necessary but I cannot see how taking away so many money generating opportunities helps. There may be fewer TV clashes with tests (actually not so many for us these days) but sponsors and broadcaster factor in how many exposure opportunities as well as viewers on each occasion. I don't think I've missed a Glasgow or Edin match because of a TV clash

Not unfair, and I agree that reducing the number of revenue generating opportunities is a big gamble. However, the ambition would be to get a larger amount of funds from the games rather than spamming the more games = more money option, cause the players just can't take it. A properly structured season would have a flow to it and would drag casual supporters from one tournament to the next - in my example starting with the biggest eyeball gatherer in the NH game and trying to pull as many of those across as possible. Get 7,500 average to Ospreys for 7 home games and that's better than they did with 5k for 10 home games.

However, it's a gamble - not done well and you could end up with the same crowd/television and sponsor interest for the fewer number of games.

Appreciate your point of view on the test matches, but the fact remains that those are the part of NH rugby that makes money right now. A fourth AI might be a crass money-making exercise, but it's a very effective crass money-making exercise and I would want it in the schedule as back-stop just in case.

Puja

There's an Iain McGeechan article including similar ideas.

https://www.nzherald.co.nz/rugby/news/a ... d=12327778

It's tricky to fit all the games in but the truth is that we fail to do that now. A bottom line for me for any changes would be that you don't increase the number and aim to decrease it.

One idea for that would be fiddle the format of the Champions Cup (either increase the teams but make it only winners that get through or, even, straight knockout or decrease the teams to 16 and have group winners go straight to semis).

In terms of the pro12 I would also get rid of the additional derby games (I know) and the quarter final playoff. A longer term neater system would be to get up to 16 teams and have two proper pools without crossover games with semi and final for 16 games (I know that creates more issues with derbies but frees space if countries want to organise separately - Scotland could bill it as a pre 6 Nations trial).

Internationally, I think we probs should be aiming for between 10-12 games a year with no more than 10 (preferably 9) being against teams in the same tier. To reduce travel, I would prefer more series and fewer attempts to play everyone in one year.

So, for example, over a year Scotland could play five 6 Nations games, have a two game tour to Australia with a stop in Fiji (who would also play Australia) and two games at home against Argentina with a visit from Georgia (where Argentina would have stopped off).

Any other international matches played during Lions tours should be exclusively cross tier matchups (though not really fair on teams never involved with Lions like Italy etc.)

Cameo wrote:There's an Iain McGeechan article including similar ideas.

https://www.nzherald.co.nz/rugby/news/a ... d=12327778

It's tricky to fit all the games in but the truth is that we fail to do that now. A bottom line for me for any changes would be that you don't increase the number and aim to decrease it.

One idea for that would be fiddle the format of the Champions Cup (either increase the teams but make it only winners that get through or, even, straight knockout or decrease the teams to 16 and have group winners go straight to semis).

In terms of the pro12 I would also get rid of the additional derby games (I know) and the quarter final playoff. A longer term neater system would be to get up to 16 teams and have two proper pools without crossover games with semi and final for 16 games (I know that creates more issues with derbies but frees space if countries want to organise separately - Scotland could bill it as a pre 6 Nations trial).

Internationally, I think we probs should be aiming for between 10-12 games a year with no more than 10 (preferably 9) being against teams in the same tier. To reduce travel, I would prefer more series and fewer attempts to play everyone in one year.

So, for example, over a year Scotland could play five 6 Nations games, have a two game tour to Australia with a stop in Fiji (who would also play Australia) and two games at home against Argentina with a visit from Georgia (where Argentina would have stopped off).

Any other international matches played during Lions tours should be exclusively cross tier matchups (though not really fair on teams never involved with Lions like Italy etc.)

Geech idea of having no off season but 3 * 1 month break which the players would train through anyway is supposed to be putting players first? Its as if he has no idea of the level of i for professional rugby, the need for a prolonged rest as opposed tp permanently carrying injuries with the help of little painkilling pills and injections. And players playing up to 35 games in that season -way above current best practice IIRC.

Apparently with no club games in the second international window more tier 1 v tier 2 is possible. More tier 1 v tier 2 is possible now. Some unions actually play at least 1 tier 1 every season, some don't. The problem isn't club games, its the will and certain unions reluctance to play games against them, especially away from home.

Then not content with keeping the conference pro 14 is plagued with, he want everyone to suffer thee same dependency of luck of home draws, and want to reduce the number of HC games but I can't see how he proposes to do that. what I do know is it reduces the income to the competition and clubs. Is he proposing fewer teams qualify? Fine, and that means more meaningless end of season league games. Is he proposing one round robin in pool stages? So much would depend on who got who at home.

And " it would be good to see World Rugby create a position whose sole responsibility is to oversee the disbursement of funds to tier two and tier three nations and then help to manage the spending of said monies". So lets create another well paid job which will only be able to disburse what the WR council agrees to, and then sit like some colonial governor telling underlings what to spend it on. He's be better starting off by WR telling Rugby Australia what to spend money on . More seriously, unions have to be self accountable. WR can suspend or stop payments if not happy with how used, or they could decide only to grant cash against a specific project application etc, then only make staged payments against progress. And they could make grants dependent on reform, and transparency, and could do that now - I'd argue they should be doing more and it isn't the lack of a new financial controller, its will and politics - see Beaumont/LaPorte/Keane and the continued involvement of the President of Fiji in the FRU

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.

Cameo wrote:
In terms of the pro12 I would also get rid of the additional derby games (I know)

Pro14 mate, more on that in a second . Specifically on the 3rd derby, I would get rid of it tomorrow, except we have it only to balance up the number of games we play, due to the Welsh and Irish having 4 teams. These derbies generate money better than other regular league games, for us and them. We can't just ignore the financials, but the other option is to play a pro12 again (which would be an extra game if we went back to a home and away formula (for me the best format for any league, anything else is too dependent on luck). Or to a pro10, which would reduce games, reduce TV and maybe sponsor money but in all honesty otherwise do not make cash and may well be an overall drain for the rest of the league.

League quarter final play off, could go I think.

septic 9 wrote: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