If Something Needs Sorting - Hire A Hooker

EDINBURGH coach Richard Cockerill came out of the Leicester system. His entire career – until approximately a year ago - was spent in a system whereby, if you didn't perform as a team, you got relegated, with a knock-on effect in terms of salaries and even jobs. Now he is with Edinburgh, he is in a system where failure means the Challenge Cup rather than the Champions Cup; if we are being honest here, the consequences of failure for Edinburgh players are not as dramatic as they might be for Leicester players.

Those lovely chaps, the English rugby media have long suggested this fear of failure means the English game is harder, the players more focussed and driven than those in the PRO14, where, of course, there is no relegation. This, of course, is pure English bullshit and arrogance – generations of hard English forwards have admitted, there were no more-difficult places to go as the likes of The Gnoll, or Stradey Park, Mansfield Park or Ravenhill. And though the venues and in some cases stadium names may have changed, with the advent of the PRO14, that has not lessened the challenge of winning.

Cockerill knows, he is now in a league which will be every bit as hard to win as the Aviva Premiership; he is a winner, and he will be determined to show, he can win with Edinburgh. He may hang around for the long haul, but, you can bet, if he can turn-around the serially under-performing Edinburgh and make them at least competitive – then some English club will offer hi big money to return home.

He might well return, but, just maybe, the opportunity to live in Scotland, particularly an independent Scotland doing rather better than England, will see him perhaps build a legacy at Edinburgh which is great for Scottish rugby.

He is certainly talking a good game. Even some of the more-cynical members of the Scottish rugby-writing fraternity are being won over by the philosophy of a hard wee bugger of a former hooker – all of which bodes well for Edinburgh.

AT t'other end of the M8, the same attitude is being instilled by Dave Rennie and his coaching team. Aye, two bonus-point wins from two starts is great, but, Rennie and Jason O'Halleran, who was on media duties on Monday, don't just want to win – they want to win with style, an attitude which didn't do Jock Stein any harm half a century ago. Glaswegians want their sporting heroes to have a bit of gallus swagger about them. If Finn Russell, Hoggie & Co can deliver, hell, they might have to expand Scotstoun again. These are exciting times in Scottish rugby.

Speaking of extending Scotstoun. I was not impressed by the attendance at Myreside on Friday night. The good burghers of Edinburgh have endured some poor performances from their professional rugby team since it was formed, so, it will take more than two straight victories to persuade them to turn out in greater numbers. However, if the results keep improving, along with the marketing effort, who knows what might happen.

However, I remain uncertain as to the virtues of Myreside as a home venue. I feel the SRU missed a trick when they did not, as was suggested years ago, built a sort of Edinburgh Arms Park behind the remodelled Murrayfield, the room is certainly there.

THAT HARDY ANNUAL, expansion of the PRO14 into North America has re-surfaced this week, with news of a potential Washington franchise joining, along with one perhaps in Germany. There is also the fact that the Aviva Premiership clash between Newcastle Falcons and Saracens will be played in Philadelphia as proof the money men in rugby are increasingly looking Stateside.

There is NO WAY the Aviva Premiership will ever, as the PRO14 is contemplating, bring-in an American franchise. England must rule the waves and, if Americans got involved, they would soon be taking over – cannot have that old boy, must keep those colonials in their place and all that. They may like the idea of selling their league for TV, but, as with so-much of professional sport in England, it's all about making money for the few and the greater good of the game comes a long way second.

The Celtic Unions might not make the money the RFU does, but, at least, with them, the overall care of the game is still uppermost, it is not, as it increasingly seems in England, a case of the clubs asking: “What's in it for me, and how can I get more of it?”

I remember, years ago, the RFU toyed with setting-up Divisions, the equivalent of the Welsh Regions and the Irish Provinces, but, the power of the clubs put the kibosh on that plan. Had the Old Farts kept the head and carried it through, who knows, maybe today we would have a two division British Isles League operating, something which to me is the logical set-up for rugby in these islands.