Rare Outbreak Of Harmony And Mutual Help In Dundee

ONE OF, perhaps THE defining feature of the Celtic people – the Irish, Scots and Welsh, is – we relish a good battle. Maybe that's the reason God allowed the Angles, Saxons and Jutes to take-over the major portion of the British Isles archipelago – to give the the Celts a common enemy to fight and thus stop them fighting among themselves.

I understand an ancient order in the UK military, for instance, has never been changed; this states – all the Scottish regiments can never be stationed within Scotland at the same time. Some believe this is to prevent the Scottish Army getting together and deciding to march on England, and, this time, not turn around at Derby. Others reckon it is to prevent mass-scale civil disobedience as the Jocks, with nobody else to fight with – do battle among themselves.

This ability to fight among ourselves, or start one in an empty house, is particularly prevalent in Scottish sport – any Scottish sport. It is one of my fears in the current battle for the soul of Scottish Rugby, that, the Ayatollah will, with typical Saxon cunning, ensure we become embroiled in our various little local difficulties, allowing him to continue to fuck-up the game at his personal pleasure.

 

But, there are signs we may, at long last, be learning. In this I particularly refer to events in Dundee, where the natives in the City of Discovery may, perhaps be finally learning to live together in rugby harmony, following the announcement of the co-operative deal between Dundee High School FP, Abertay University and Morgan FP.

Initially this will see Dundee High's second team – Dundee Titans, join the Caledonia Regional Leagues and form a “bridge” between Morgan, who have plummeted down the leagues in recent seasons and the city's top side – Dundee HSFP's first team. Other clubs will hopefully come on-board, while the long-term aim is to have a true “Dundee RFC” ready to successfully bid for a place, should Stupid-6 somehow work and expand to eight or more teams, once the initial five-year franchise term ends.

Of course, had the Dundee clubs acted together sooner and got their act together in time, perhaps they could have got one of the original six franchises. That, however, is water under the bridge.

David Leslie - not even he could unite the warring Dundonians

A combined Dundee side – capable of competing at the highest level in Scottish club rugby has long been a dream for some. David Leslie, arguably the city's greatest rugby player, had this dream in the 1980s, but not even he could make it work. Hell, I can remember, back in the early 1970s, before the SRU even got National Leagues off the ground, a unified Dundee team did operate, but, it fell apart after one campaign due to some local political differences.

As originally conceived, Stupid-6 for all its flaws, COULD have worked. An all-Dundee side playing at the highest level below full-time professionalism, acting as the original franchise documents laid-out, as: “a beacon of excellence within the Region” is a noble ambition. It is one which, if being driven by sensible people inside Murrayfield who cared for the whole of rugby and not merely the Performance Department, would have stood a chance of succeeding in Dundee, in Aberdeen and elsewhere on the somewhat disenfranchised fringes of the capital.

But, Ah hae ma doots if it could work now. Never say never, however; perhaps a Dundee version of the old system which made Hawick so great, with the lesser clubs competing hard against each other but never forgetting, the greater good was a Green Machine able to dominate Scottish Rugby, and freely giving-up their best talent to make that happen; it just might be made to work in Dundee.

Good luck to Gerry Tosh and the others involved in trying to make it so.

A WEE follow-up to yesterday's piece on the mini-Murrayfield project. The Edinburgh Reporter ran a substantial story on this, which included an image of the stadium blueprint. At the launch of the project, Dom McKay would not be drawn on costs, however, from somewhere, perhaps we should warn, from a journalist's over-vivid imagination, the figure of £5 million has emerged.

As I wrote in my last blog post, the ballpark figure of £1000 - £1300 per seat was given to me by one of THE experts on costing stadium builds in Scotland, so I don't think this is far out. That however, is for a substantial new build – a “proper” stadium. The blueprint, as imaged in the Edinburgh Reporter piece is difficult to read clearly, but, it seems to me, three of the four stands proposed for the new ground look very like those temporary stands behind the in-goal areas at Scotstoun. These, of course, have to be temporary and moveable, since they sit over the athletics track.

That is not an issue at Murrayfield, so, we can only conclude one of three scenarios:

• Edinburgh/the SRU are attempting to build the new stadium on the cheap
• They don't have great faith in the staying power of the Edinburgh brand
• It will be a piecemeal development – one permanent/three temporary stands as phase one. Then a second permanent stand as phase two; followed in time by third and fourth permanent edifices, phases three and four.

On the subject of funding projects, yesterday the SRU announced some projects by rugby clubs which will go ahead under their Club Sustainability funding, making the announcement at Waysiders-Drumpellier, with dear old Lance-Corporal Jones in attendance.

The Club Sustainability Fund launch at WAysiders-Drumpellier 

In all £1.6 million in project funding for 11 clubs the length and breadth of Scotland were announced, with Way-Drum copping £50,000 in SRU money, plus £58,000 in sportscotland cash for their clubhouse extension and refurbished changing rooms project.

I did notice, however, only 4 of the 11 projects attracted sportscotland funding, which appears to confirm cutbacks there. Sportscotland now has a £100,000 cap on funding they will provide, while, I did notice GHA did not attract sportscotland funding for their 3G pitch installation, having to settle for £50,000, or less than one-tenth of the final cost, from the SRU.

A wee question – what do these changes in circumstances mean for the funding and provision of those 3G pitches which are mandatory for the successful Stupid-6 applicants? Hopefully the Murrayfield Magic Money tree, which does its thing whenever the Performance Department needs some cash, can plug the obvious gap in funding.