Is The SRU High Performance Department Fit For Purpose?

ONE of the things I have learned, since I first encountered Super 6 and Agenda 3 last year is, when a club official from one of the “lesser” clubs warned me – the row around Agenda 3 will eclipse in its ferocity, that around Super 6 - he was maybe under-estimating the possible extent of the problem.

I think most of us outside the Murrayfield bubble now accept: Super 6 is a flawed concept, the figures, as far as they have thus far been in the public domain, do not add-up. Unless the SRU Ayatollahs come to their senses and think again – this time consulting more-widely and in greater depth – pain and anguish lies somewhere in the future.

But, that pain and anguish will only affect a few clubs, who should be able to recover, given time.

The SRU has been guilty over at least the last decade, maybe longer (I have not been back covering rugby for a decade so feel somewhat under-qualified to comment further). But, from what I have seen since switching from football to rugby press boxes, the SRU has concentrated on the top end of the game, to the detriment of the lower tiers.

As I have said before, I want the Union's High Performance Department to succeed. I want Scotland challenging for the 6Nations crown and competing in the knock-out rounds of the World Cup. I want Edinburgh and Glasgow doing likewise in the PRO14 and in Europe.

But, that's Murrayfield's job. The job of the clubs is to provide rugby for those who wish to play it, to as high a level as they are able. There has, obviously, got to be a cross-over point, at which potential professionals are taken out of the play for fun stream into the this is your job stream. But, potential does not follow a strict pattern, not every player develops at the same rate.

The SRU has the player development pathway. At Under-15 level, they start to sift through the emerging talent, and, if a boy is lucky – he will move seamlessly through the system; Under-16 to Under-18, to Under-19, then Under-20; into the Academy, then onto professional contracts with the two PRO14 clubs, and, hopefully, onto the Scotland team. But, even with this system, progress is not uniform.

The 28-man Scotland squad which performed so well in the Under-20 World Cup in May and June last year was:

Forwards: Hamish Bain (Currie)*, Fergus Bradbury (Stirling County)*, Alex Craig (Gloucester)***, Luke Crosbie (Currie)**, Tom Dodd (Worcester)***, Ross Dunbar (Boroughmuir)*, Archie Erskine (Newcastle Falcons)***, Matt Fagerson (Glasgow Hawks)**,
Bruce Flockhart (Glasgow Hawks)**, Thomas Gordon (Currie)**, Callum Hunter-Hill (Stirling County)**, Adam Nicol (Stirling County), Fraser Renwick (Hawick)*, Robbie Smith (Ayr)*, George Thornton (Bishop Burton College)***, Daniel Winning (Boroughmuir)**.

Backs: Patrick Anderson (Melrose), Ruaridh Dawson (Newcastle Falcons)***, Connor Eastgate (Wasps)***, Darcy Graham (Hawick)**, Josh Henderson (Glasgow Hawks)*, Robert Kay (Heriot’s), Blair Kinghorn (Edinburgh Rugby), Stafford McDowall (Ayr), Ross McCann (Melrose)**, Robbie Nairn (Harlequins)***, Charlie Shiel (Currie)**, Andrew Simmers (Heriot’s).

*BT Sport Scottish Rugby Academy Stage 2 Player, **BT Sport Scottish Rugby Academy Stage 3 Player, *** Scottish Exile.

Of those 28 players: 1, Blair Kinghorn, was already a full-time professional with Edinburgh. A further 9 – Luke Crosbie, Matt Fargerson, Bruce Flockhart, Thomas Gordon, Callum Hunter-Hill, Daniel Winning, Darcy Graham, Ross McCann and Charlie Shiel were Stage 3 Academy players. A further 6 players – Hamish Bain, Fergus Bradbury, Ross Dunbar, Fraser Renwick, Robbie Smith and Josh Henderson were Stage 2 Academy players. There were 7 players from the Scottish Exiles (as it was then) programme – Alex Craig, Tom Dodd, Archie Erskine, George Thornton, Ruaridh Dawson, Connor Eastgate and Robbie Nairn.

The final 5 players – Adam Nicol, Patrick Anderson, Robert Kay, Stafford McDowall and Andrew Simmers got in on performances for their clubs, all 5 players strutting their stuff in the BT Premiership, you know, that competition which isn't fit for purpose.

Let's look at how these players have fared this season. Kinghorn was the most-advanced of the team, and he continues to set the pace, having made his full Scotland debut off the bench in last Saturday's Calcutta Cup victory.

Another player, Darcy Graham, an Academy Stage 3 player at the U-20 World Cup, is also in the full Scotland squad, and is currently playing for the Scotland Sevens squad.

Of the other Stage 3 Academy players in the squad, Crosbie, Fagerson and Hunter-Hill are now full-time with one or other of the two PRO14 teams, while Sheil, after an outstanding season with Currie and a Scotland Club XV cap, has also signed a full-time Edinburgh contract, while the SRU has sent Flockhart, along with Josh Henderson – back then a Stage 2 Academy player, to France through their controversial tie-in with Nice.

Of the 6 Stage 2 Academy players, Bain, Dunbar, Renwick and Smith have moved-up to Stage 3, full-time player status, while Henderson has gone to Nice, leaving just prop Fergus Bradbury not having moved-on.

Of the quintet of then unsupported players – i.e. not in the Academy system, Adam Nicol and Stafford McDowall went straight to Stage 3 status, and both have since played for Glasgow Warriors.

Exiles players Erskine and Nairn have returned to Scotland as Stage 3 players – playing respectively for Boroughmuir and Ayr in the Premiership; while the other five are still with their English clubs.

Craig is only just returning from injury, playing in the Gloucester Academy side, and for Hartpury in the English Championship. Dodd is still with the Worcester Academy, playing club rugby for Luctonians, while Thornton has left Bishop Burton College to link-up with Eastgate at Wasps. He plays club rugby for Coventry, but, like Eastgate, has featured for Wasps in the Anglo-Welsh Cup, in which Dawson has played for Newcastle Falcons.

So, of the 28 players in the squad, McDowall and Smith are the only ones still in the 2017-18 Under-20 squad, while at best only 10 of the other 26 have progressed their careers significantly – the jury is out on the move to France of Flockhart and Henderson.

With just 10 of 26 players progressing their careers in one season – I ask again, is the SRU High Performance Department fit for purpose.

In an ideal world, the SRU would have found a means to keep them playing together, perhaps in an English-style Academy team, or teams; or perhaps with a third PRO14 team which is definitely identified as a “Development Team”. But, since they are unwilling or unable to do this, player development will, it seems, be an ongoing aspect of the top-level of the club game.

And, if that has to happen – well six clubs is a case of too-few.