It seems obvious to me...

[Sandydragon]

Good news with the EGM vote. Now they just need to make some good hires.

At last a step in the right direction.

https://www.walesonline.co.uk/sport/rug ... e-26560365

Very positive. Hopefully we don’t fuck it up anyway

[Sandydragon]

Meanwhile, Llanelli is withdrawing from next season's Welsh Premiership. Apparently, they are going to focus on player development, but are willing to look at participation in any future elite 8 club competition. I would assume that any club that withdraws from a competition would have to re-enter the league system at the bottom but I'm sure the Scarlets have given them the nod over which club they will be sponsoring into the Elite 8.

[Wallpaperman]

Bit of a player exodus at the moment, Moriarty being the latest today.

He and Rowlands are big players to lose, although they have strength in depth for the back row at least. And they have had to cope without Rowlands since the autumn. I hope the Dragons spend the wage savings on a couple of tight heads. The scrum has been a real Achilles heel this season.

[Sandydragon]

Bit of a player exodus at the moment, Moriarty being the latest today.

He and Rowlands are big players to lose, although they have strength in depth for the back row at least. And they have had to cope without Rowlands since the autumn. I hope the Dragons spend the wage savings on a couple of tight heads. The scrum has been a real Achilles heel this season.

Our front five needs reinforcement. We have still a strong back row but front five is where we tend to lose games.

[Eugene Wrayburn]

As an outsider...

You don't have regions now, at least to the naked eye. They're clubs. They may have theoretical catchment areas but that doesn't really mean anything. Losing one or two doesn't mean that there's suddenly a bit of the country not covered, unlike Ireland where we nearly had a gaping hole where Connacht should be. Losing clubs would be devastating for the supporters of those clubs but shouldn't otherwise affect provision. The number of teams you keep will be dictated by the number of Welsh players that can sustain them - assuming no more than 5 or 6 "foreign" players - and the amount of money they have. Dropping down to 2 clubs is massively problematic in generating depth if you keep to a home-play international rule. If you lose that rule how do you keep people at home without the prospect of trophies. My gut says you can probably fund no more than 2 but I don't really know. Which 2? the ones that are most financially viable which means (generally) the best supported. It's obvious to me that your elite pro clubs should be owned and run by the WRU. Sure there can be a certain amount of autonomy so that clubs run themselves within boundaries set but the WRU must be in control. It's mad to me that there are clubs competing for Welsh players on wages. That's banned in Ireland for the simple reason that the IRFU refuses to negotiate against itself.

[Sandydragon]

The issue is they are supposed to be regions but don’t really act that way. Newport, Cardiff, Llanelli etc all have clubs in the Welsh premiership. If you consider the four regions to be actual regions then their coverage is across the South Wales rugby corridor, plus I seem to recall Llanelli also were technically covering a fair bit of the north as well.

If we are to have actual clubs then get rid of the premiership equivalents as they just make no sense and call the big four by their actual club names.

Or demand that they actually behave as regions.

We are stuck in this neither one or the other camp at the moment. But the issue we do have is that if say Dragons folded, that would leave the Gwent region without any pro team. That’s a big kick in the nuts to a lot of amateur clubs to suddenly feel unrepresentative. They aren’t suddenly going to follow Cardiff.

I agree that we can’t afford four pro teams. Two would seem the obvious number right now. And that would hamper player development. But equally four crap teams won’t help anyone either. Getting hammered week in week out isn’t anyone’s idea of fun. And we can’t simply just remove two teams from competitions without taking a financial hit. It feels like we have to focus funding on one or two regions and look to have the others on reduced budget until funding becomes more secure over time (hopefully).

Eugenes point about Irish regions not fighting each other for players is where we need to be. Have a WRU led development and recruitment plan; if players in certain positions aren’t getting enough game time at the Scarlets, move them to the Blues.

[Numbers]

The issue is they are supposed to be regions but don’t really act that way. Newport, Cardiff, Llanelli etc all have clubs in the Welsh premiership. If you consider the four regions to be actual regions then their coverage is across the South Wales rugby corridor, plus I seem to recall Llanelli also were technically covering a fair bit of the north as well.

If we are to have actual clubs then get rid of the premiership equivalents as they just make no sense and call the big four by their actual club names.

Or demand that they actually behave as regions.

We are stuck in this neither one or the other camp at the moment. But the issue we do have is that if say Dragons folded, that would leave the Gwent region without any pro team. That’s a big kick in the nuts to a lot of amateur clubs to suddenly feel unrepresentative. They aren’t suddenly going to follow Cardiff.

I agree that we can’t afford four pro teams. Two would seem the obvious number right now. And that would hamper player development. But equally four crap teams won’t help anyone either. Getting hammered week in week out isn’t anyone’s idea of fun. And we can’t simply just remove two teams from competitions without taking a financial hit. It feels like we have to focus funding on one or two regions and look to have the others on reduced budget until funding becomes more secure over time (hopefully).

Eugenes point about Irish regions not fighting each other for players is where we need to be. Have a WRU led development and recruitment plan; if players in certain positions aren’t getting enough game time at the Scarlets, move them to the Blues.

The clubs aren't fighting each other for players, the out of requirement players are being picked up by other clubs cheaply as they can't afford any foreign or marquee players, for instance it's rumoured Dane Blacker is to go to the Dragons, this isn't a fight between the Scarlets and the Dragons, the Scarlets already have two international scrum halves and the U20s scrum half on their books, he's unfortunately surplus to requirements now budgets have been reduced.

[Sandydragon]

The issue is they are supposed to be regions but don’t really act that way. Newport, Cardiff, Llanelli etc all have clubs in the Welsh premiership. If you consider the four regions to be actual regions then their coverage is across the South Wales rugby corridor, plus I seem to recall Llanelli also were technically covering a fair bit of the north as well.

If we are to have actual clubs then get rid of the premiership equivalents as they just make no sense and call the big four by their actual club names.

Or demand that they actually behave as regions.

We are stuck in this neither one or the other camp at the moment. But the issue we do have is that if say Dragons folded, that would leave the Gwent region without any pro team. That’s a big kick in the nuts to a lot of amateur clubs to suddenly feel unrepresentative. They aren’t suddenly going to follow Cardiff.

I agree that we can’t afford four pro teams. Two would seem the obvious number right now. And that would hamper player development. But equally four crap teams won’t help anyone either. Getting hammered week in week out isn’t anyone’s idea of fun. And we can’t simply just remove two teams from competitions without taking a financial hit. It feels like we have to focus funding on one or two regions and look to have the others on reduced budget until funding becomes more secure over time (hopefully).

Eugenes point about Irish regions not fighting each other for players is where we need to be. Have a WRU led development and recruitment plan; if players in certain positions aren’t getting enough game time at the Scarlets, move them to the Blues.

The clubs aren't fighting each other for players, the out of requirement players are being picked up by other clubs cheaply as they can't afford any foreign or marquee players, for instance it's rumoured Dane Blacker is to go to the Dragons, this isn't a fight between the Scarlets and the Dragons, the Scarlets already have two international scrum halves and the U20s scrum half on their books, he's unfortunately surplus to requirements now budgets have been reduced.

In a centrally managed world, those scrum half resources would be spread out to allow game time, rather than just wait for market forces.

[newgalesurf]

Since the WRU actually own the ground and region in Newport, one of your 2 teams should be based here, just sayin

Why go to all the expense of founding a new 'Cardiff' region

[newgalesurf]

Whichever way you try to break it out, we will end up with another Dragons debacle of trying to crowbar rival population areas together

[Sandydragon]

Some rumours flying about that Andy Marinos might be heading to Wales with an eye on the CEO role.

[pompey-zebra]

The Fail is reporting today that initial discussions about a merger between Cardiff and the Ospreys have taken place.

[Sandydragon]

Looking at the comments under that article, it’s fair to suggest that outcome wouldn’t be universally popular! It also seems to be more of a takeover by Cardiff rather than a real merger.

[ALunpg]

Sadly the investment company owners don't really concern themselves about the Ospreys. Whilst it is just guess work on my behalf, I would say they are looking to offload the Ospreys as there seems little future in regional rugby moving forward financially for quite a while. If they can by this move compress 2 teams, that should get the remaining teams more budget..in theory ..and reduce their exposure. However a huge area of rugby from the Loughor bridge to Bridgend will be impacted and a swathe of developmental players pathways lost whilst we get sorted out ..again.

[Sandydragon]

Sadly the investment company owners don't really concern themselves about the Ospreys. Whilst it is just guess work on my behalf, I would say they are looking to offload the Ospreys as there seems little future in regional rugby moving forward financially for quite a while. If they can by this move compress 2 teams, that should get the remaining teams more budget..in theory ..and reduce their exposure. However a huge area of rugby from the Loughor bridge to Bridgend will be impacted and a swathe of developmental players pathways lost whilst we get sorted out ..again.

And the Ospreys don’t own their own facilities, which is a huge negative when looking at the financial spreadsheet.

[pompey-zebra]

Reports that the Dragons take over by a consortium led by David Buttress has been completed, so Drags now out of WRU control. Consortium have also bought Rodney Parade too.

[Sandydragon]

Part of me is of course happy that we are no longer the odd region out and have some owners who might invest some money. On the other hand, I still think that the regions should be WRU owned.

[Zhivago]

Part of me is of course happy that we are no longer the odd region out and have some owners who might invest some money. On the other hand, I still think that the regions should be WRU owned.

And the WRU should be nationalised. There we go all problems solved.

[Son of Mathonwy]

And according to the Fail, there are high level talks surrounding the possibility of a GB league. With three English clubs gone, suddenly the English are keen to explore this.

If it comes off I think it would be ideal for us. Good competition maintained with regular clashes against English clubs which so many want.

I agree that a GB league would be great news for us - a league of clubs on the same island, historic rivalries and good (well, good-ish) transport links.

This, however worries the hell out of me:
https://www.walesonline.co.uk/sport/rug ... e-27935633

High-level talks have been held about establishing a British and Irish 'super league' that would transform domestic rugby in Wales.

Proposals, which are yet to be drawn up in any significant detail, would see South African and Italian teams also involved, with the URC and Premiership amalgamating, potentially into two divisions with relegation and promotion.

This would be an absolute disaster for us. All 4 regional teams would be relegated to the lower division instantly. The Irish and South Africans (with maybe 1 or 2 English clubs?) would dominate. It would cement our decline.

It's been a disaster for us to let the SA teams into the URC where we were already in serious decline. This would be worse.

[Son of Mathonwy]

I have to say I'm pretty underwhelmed by this from Nigel Walker:

https://www.walesonline.co.uk/sport/rug ... s-27936914

There doesn't seem to be much of a plan, other than going in the opposite way to the Irish and making sure all regions are independently owned, and writing off (probably . . . although he was unwilling to disclose details) millions in the process of selling the WRU share in the Dragons. Because the model of independent regions run by investors has been so successful . . .

[Sourdust]

This would be an absolute disaster for us. All 4 regional teams would be relegated to the lower division instantly. The Irish and South Africans (with maybe 1 or 2 English clubs?) would dominate. It would cement our decline.

It's been a disaster for us to let the SA teams into the URC where we were already in serious decline. This would be worse.

There would have to be some protection involved, fudging things like in European qualification, so that there is always (let's say) one Welsh, one Scottish, one Italian and two English clubs in Division One.

Good luck writing the algorithm for that one...

[Sandydragon]

And according to the Fail, there are high level talks surrounding the possibility of a GB league. With three English clubs gone, suddenly the English are keen to explore this.

If it comes off I think it would be ideal for us. Good competition maintained with regular clashes against English clubs which so many want.

I agree that a GB league would be great news for us - a league of clubs on the same island, historic rivalries and good (well, good-ish) transport links.

This, however worries the hell out of me:
https://www.walesonline.co.uk/sport/rug ... e-27935633

High-level talks have been held about establishing a British and Irish 'super league' that would transform domestic rugby in Wales.

Proposals, which are yet to be drawn up in any significant detail, would see South African and Italian teams also involved, with the URC and Premiership amalgamating, potentially into two divisions with relegation and promotion.

This would be an absolute disaster for us. All 4 regional teams would be relegated to the lower division instantly. The Irish and South Africans (with maybe 1 or 2 English clubs?) would dominate. It would cement our decline.

It's been a disaster for us to let the SA teams into the URC where we were already in serious decline. This would be worse.

I think that even a GB only league would have 2 tiers and none of our regions deserve to be at the top. But that can only get better over time. As it stands, the chances of us getting a team into the Euro Cup are very slim.

[UKHamlet]

Quite honesty, if a GB league means giving the English owners a say in how things are run, I'd suggest we pass on it.

[Son of Mathonwy]

Hopes for better cooperation across Welsh rugby going forward are looking shaky:

https://www.walesonline.co.uk/sport/rug ... c-27979107