Can We Continue To Fund Full-Time Rugby If It Harms Our Clubs?

IN THE COURSE of my many years in sports journalism, I have covered some 55 different sports, but, mainly I have covered football and rugby.

Having covered both the round and oval ball games in Scotland, and being one of the few journalists with this twin-track experience, I feel I am qualified to write today's blog, the text for which is taken, yet again, from pegj's btl post of the other week. In the course of that post he quoted from an official SRU document, which said:

'Increasing costs in professional rugby, if not matched by improved revenue streams from professional rugby to pay for them, will ultimately place pressures on other income streams which might otherwise be devoted to the Union’s core activities in domestic and international rugby. This in turn could lead to difficult choices having to be made in future over the prioritisation of funding between the professional, international and domestic aspects of the Union’s activities'

The whole thrust of that paragraph clearly demonstrates – as far as the Murrayfield “suits” are concerned: it is professional rugby, first, last and always. Their “difficult choices” will see the professional, and now, through Stupid-6 the semi-professional game, being given preference over the clubs, which are the backbone of Scottish Rugby.

Of course the “suits” will look after the professional game – that is the source of their power; that's the bit they have sole charge of, it's their wee Empire and, when the stability of the Empire is concerned, they will cut off the periphery to maintain the integrity of their centre.

Leaving aside the competence of their governance; and at the moment one of them is I would argue being managed even less adequately than the SRU: the two principal professional sports organisations in Scotland are Celtic and Rangers.

Celtic pulled-in over one million fans to their home games last season, under-performing Rangers only slightly fewer. Celtic, with their huge European income is a very rich club indeed, Rangers, again if the overall management was adequate and the playing pool was “Rangers Class”, and if they were offering a realistic challenge to the club across the city, should also be doing well.

Celtic can pull-in 60,000 fans for a full house, Rangers 50,000. Yet, they do not between them employ a single “world-class” player.

If we accept it would be unrealistic to expect either club to fill Murrayfield to its 67,000-plus capacity for a club game, the best Glasgow or Edinburgh could, at the present time, expect to attract would be somewhere in the region of 25,000 fans. More-realistically, however, we have to accept, the best Glasgow could do would be to fill Scotstoun to its 10,000 capacity, and Edinburgh attract just under 8000 to their still to be built Mini-Murrayfield for every game.

Hoggie - a world-class player in a poorly-funded club

Yet, they each have “world-class” players, i.e. players who, if a “World XV” was being selected, would be mentioned as possible selections. These guys command high wages, and, while I do not know for sure, I suspect the likes of Stuart Hogg and Johnny Gray at Glasgow and John Barclay and WP Nel at Edinburgh will be on salaries which compare favourably with those being picked-up by say Celtic's Leigh Griffiths or Lee Wallace, assuming he has a Rangers' future.

These rugby players, however, have to be paid from far-lower spectator income – the base-line for professional sport. To put it bluntly, the SRU is – as far as we know since the finances of the professional game is seemingly a state secret - trying to fund Champions League-level clubs on mid-table SPFL income streams.

So, it is maybe time to ask the question:

Can Scottish Rugby afford full-time professional rugby?

Indeed, when you consider the reports of the level of debt in the top-flight in England, the reports of ongoing financial issues in Wales and now reports of Irish provinces seeking to make budget cuts, the question could be:

Is professional rugby viable in the British Isles?

Back in the amateur days, a comparative lack of financial muscle was not a handicap to Scotland. Our club sides just got on with playing; the better players then moved-up to the Districts, and from there onto the international arena.

We didn't often win, but, Scotland was always competitive, and, if say the Glasgow XV of the amateur era contained a non-Scottish-qualified player, like England scrum-half Lionel Weston, it was because he was working in Glasgow, not because he was a paid mercenary.

Today, for some reason – the two Scottish professional sides apparently MUST have their quota of overseas players, some of whom are “Development Players”, who might hang around long enough to be Scotland qualified, but, to my mind, some of whom are picking-up a good wedge for doing very little.

Celtic won the European Cup in 1967 with a squad of players all born within an hour of Celtic Park. Rangers won the Cup-Winners' Cup in 1972 with a squad of 11 Scots who played, while the subs' bench was an all-Scottish affair other than German back-up goalkeeper Gerry Neef.

Aberdeen's 1983 team of Gothenburg Greats was another all-Scottish squad. Then, along came Graeme Souness, followed by David Murray and suddenly, hame-grawn, haund-knitted Scottish teams would not do – and the virus has spread to rugby.

Scottish football has regressed since the clubs decided: “If Rangers are importing non-Scots, we need to too.” OK, in rugby we gained from having Leone Nakarawa among us, iko Matawalu is still exciting us, but, some of our imports were and still are, I would venture, filling a spot on the roster which could be equally well-filled by a young Scottish player.

Leone Nakarawa - a stand-out for Glasgow, can that be said of a lot of other imports?

Maybe, just maybe, if the Murrayfield “suits” spent less time recruiting non-Scots, and encouraged more home-grown talent, their budgets might balance better. And, if the professional budgets were better-balanced, of even better-managed, there would be less-need, and hopefully no need to rob Peter – the club game, to pay Paul – the professional side of Scottish Rugby.

A final thought: the football World Cup is going-on right now. Our near-neighbours, Denmark, Iceland and Sweden are all participating. In these countries, their top-flight domestic football is mainly played by part-time, semi-professional teams. These three countries, plus Wales, Northern Ireland and the Republic of Ireland are all nations currently ranked above Scotland, whose domestic football is played by part-time, semi-professional teams. That's in football, Scotland's leading winter team sport.

Might there then be a case then, in rugby, our number two winter team sport, for ditching our two full-time professional rugby teams and establishing a system which we could afford, which would safe-guard the wider club game and which would keep us competitive. There has to be some other way, than having the empire-building full-time professional administrators squandering our fiscal assets for very little return?