It Was Sixty Years Ago Today

SIXTY YEARS ago today, on 30 April, 1960, the modern age of rugby union football really began – when South Africa played Scotland, in Port Elizabeth, in the first match of what was then known as: “A short tour.”

Prior to this opening game in a three-match tour, which lasted, from departure to return home less than a fortnight, rugby tours had been lengthy affairs, lasting at least a month and incurring a minimum ten-match schedule.

Gordon Waddell - captain on the ground-breaking tour

By cutting back to just three games, and only one Test, Scotland broke the mould, and set the template for an increasing number of tours in the future.

The thing which made the short tour possible was probably the introduction of inter-continental travel by jet airliner. This made is far-easier for teams to travel, no more lengthy sea voyages to South Africa or Australiasia.

The Scotland selectors named a 21-man squad for the tour. This squad was announced on 24 March, and it read:

Back Three – Ronnie Chisholm (Melrose), Arthur Smith (Ebbw Vale), Ronnie Thomson (London Scottish).

Centres: Ronnie Cowan (Selkirk), Ian Laughland (London Scottish), Tom McClung (Edinburgh Academicals), George Stevenson (Hawick).

Stand-off: Gordon Waddell (Cambridge University, Captain).

Scrum-halves: Brian Shillinglaw (Gala and KOSB), Eck Hastie (Melrose).

Props: Hugh McLeod (Hawick), Brian Neill (Edinburgh Academicals), David Rollo (Howe of Fife).

Hookers: Norman Bruce (London Scottish), Bob Tollervey (Heriot's FP).

Locks: Hamish Kemp (Glasgow High School FP), Franz ten Bos (Oxford University).

Back rows: Brian Edwards (Heriot's FP), Oliver Grant (Hawick), Ken Smith, Charlie Stewart (both Kelso).

The joint managers were Wilson Shaw (Glasgow HSFP) and Charlie Drummond (Melrose).

Between selection and the team leaving, Laughland and Smith had to pull out through injury, joning Ken Scotland, who had exams at Cambridge University, in the ranks of the unavailable to tour. Laughland was replaced by his fellow London Scot PJ Burnet, with Will Hart of Melrose coming in for Smith.

The two late call-ups would each receive their single Scotland caps in the Test match, against the Springboks, which opened the tour in Port Elizabeth.

The Scots flew out on 23 April, and for the Test match, which opened the tour on Saturday, 30 April, the teams were:

South Africa: MC Gerber (Eastern Province); JP Engelbrecht (Western Province), IA Kirkpatrick Griqualand West), JL Gainsford (Western Province), RJ Twigge (Northern Transvaal); DA Stewart (Western Province)' FW Gerike (Transvaal); DN Holton (Eastern Province), AJ van der Merwe (Boland), MJ Bekker (Northern Transvaal), JT Claassen (Western Transvaal), PB Allen (Eastern Province), DC Van Jaarsveldt (Rhodesia captain), GH Van Zyl (Western Province), DJ Hopwood (Western Province).

Scotland: RWT Chisholm; AR Smith, PJ Burnet, GD Stevenson, RH Thomson; GH Waddell (Captain), RB Shillinglasw; HF McLeod, NS Bruce, DMD Rollo, FH ten Bos, JWY Kemp, DB Edwards, W Hart, TO Grant.

Norman Bruce went over for the opening try, converted by Arthur Smith, but, a Van Zykl try, converted by Gerber, squared the match by the interval.

The out-weighed Scottish pack competed well in both tight and loose, but, in the second half, Springbok scrum-half Gerike, who had set-up Van Zyl's first-half try, twice repeated the move, breaking from scrum possession to score one try himself, then setting up another for Van Zyl.

Springbok skipper Van Jaarsveldt then completed their scoring with a 50-yard solo score. Two Gerber conversion had the home team 18-5 ahead, but the Scots had the last word, with Arthur Smith touching down and converting to complete the scoring.

From the coast at Port Elizabeth, the tourists climbed onto the high veldt for match two, against Griqualand West in the diamond town of Kimberley.

Geordie Stevenson and Oliver Grant, two of the Hawick contingent had been injured in the Test match, while it was deemed necessary to give the remaining players a run-out.

The Scotland team for this midweek match lined-up:

Chisholm; Smith, RC Cowan, T McClung, Thomson; Waddell, AJ Hastie; JB Neill, RM Tollervey, McLeod, Kemp, ten Bos, Edwards, Hart, Stewart.

Ronnie Cowan, the 18-year-old dropped a goal.

The tourists won this match by ten points, 21-11, scoring three goals, one try and a dropped goal, to a goal, a penalty goal and a try. They had gone ahead through tries from Edwards, Cowan, Smith and Thomson, with Smith converting two and McClung one, while, in an impressive debut, 18-year-old Ronnie Cowan dropped a goal.

The effects of the 4000 feet-plus altitude told in the Scots in the last quarter, but, by then they had done enough to secure victory, with Arthur Smith's 85-yard run for the final Scottish try a highlight.

The third and final game of the tour sent the tourists to Johannesburg, to face Eastern Province. Jo'burg is even higher than Kimberley and, again, the effects of altitude told on the Scots towards the end. However, once again they had done enough to secure victory, by an emphatic 30-16.

Arthur Smith was Scotland's main man, scoring a hat-trick of tries and adding three conversions for 15 opoints under the scoring values of the time.

On the opposite wing, Ronnie Thomson scored two tries, with Cowan and Chisholm also touching down. Hamish Kemp made good use of the altitude to land an outrageous 45-yard dropped goal, while the McLeod, Bruce, Rollo front row made hay, with Norman Bruce taking six against the head against a big South African eight for whom scrumming is a religion.

Smith was carried off the field shoulder high at the end. Everyone was under the assumption the game would be his last outing in a Scotland jersey. Thankfully, the man who had so-emphatically announced his arrival on the international scene in “Arthus Smith's Match” - the 14-8 win over Wales in 1955, which ended the terrible 17-game run of defeats, had a change of heart.

Arthur Smith - carried shoulder-high from the field

He kept on playing for two more seasons, taking his tally of Scotland caps to 33, before finally signing-off by captaining the 1962 British Lions back in South Africa.

The SRU considered the trip a great success, the only down-side was the belief things might have gone better had they acclimatised on the high veldt, before going to sea level – a practice which is now followed by most touring sides to South Africa.

We might not have won the Test match, but, cutting the losing margin from 44 points, the last time the sides had met, to 8, must be seen as a distinct improvement.

That improvement continued, when the sides next met, at Murrayfield in January, 1961, the Springboks saw their winning margin cut to seven points and, next time round, in April, 1965 – when it was the Springboks turn to make a short tour, of Ireland and Scotland, Scotland finally beat them 8-5.

David Rollo was the only Scottish survivor from the Port Elizabeth Test, although Ian Laughland played, as did Eck Hastie, while Davie Chisholm, younger brother of 1960 full back Ronnie, scored the match-winning dropped goal for the Scots. Three Springboks, Engelbrecht, Gainsford and Hopwood survived from the 1960 match.

Ian Barr - Come On Up

WELL, I did not see this week's developments around the governance of Scottish Rugby coming. I was given a 'heads-up' from someone involved in getting the 50 dissident clubs singing off the same hymn sheet, to the effect, the Bradbury Task Force would be stood down this week. But, no mention was made of Ian Barr being appointed to it, just before it was stood down, and also to the main SRU Board.

Ian Barr - his time has come early

It has been clear for some time that the Task Force, even if it had been allowed to continue, could not have concluded its investigations prior to the AGM itself, far less the cut-off date for motions to that meeting, so, in respect of it, we were always, to my mind, looking at a Special General Meeting, either late in 2020, or early 2021.

This assumed an early return to “normality,” which I don't see happening, so we now have the time to get it right – assuming we can. When rugby returns, the landscape will be a lot different, so, the guys steering the ship really have to get it right this time.

I await events unfolding with interest.

It is, however, to be welcomed that the incoming President is now able to influence events at the top table, rather than simply being an observer. I trust Ian Barr will grasp this opportunity; he is carrying a heavy burden of expectation from the clubs.

IT HAS seemed clear to me, since we began to feel the full effects of this pandemic, that when it is all over, at least at the professional level of the game, we cannot go back to the way it was.

When you read articles printed in English/Welsh media outlets, as I have done, you get the impression, the SRU's and Scottish Rugby in general's problems are not unique.

Indeed, given the big clubs' influence in England, they may well be facing a tougher future than us up here. Only Exeter of the top-flight English clubs made a profit (albeit a small one) last season. These clubs are about to find out, perhaps painfully, how shallow the pockets of their benefactors are at a time of crisis.

Of course, they've got a lot more millionaires in England than we have up here, and, with even well-heeled Englishmen being priced out of the football Premier League market, the top |English clubs might be able to find rich sugar daddies to keep them in a comfortable style for a wee while yet.

It may be, the reason we have had to take our full-time professional sides “in-house” financially is, as many suspect, the refusal of the control freaks on The Junta to even contemplate letting outsiders be involved in running our top clubs, or, for all we know, it may be that we are stuck with central control as the only viable management model – this does not appear to have held back the irish.

However, while I suspect, Edinburgh and Glasgow will survive, I feel this will be at the cost of squad numbers reduction, with the “fringe” players being down-graded to the Super6 franchises.

But, what we must ensure, when we start up, is that the club game can survive and receive enough central funding to allow them to continue to feed the grass roots.

“Fewer but stronger,” that much-despised phrase from the Agenda 3 debacle, might well happen, but, I am sure, if we start to see proper co-operation between big clubs and small, and between clubs and schools, we can emerge with a game better-suited than before all this shut-down stuff.

FINALLY, as if they didn't have enough to concern them at the present time, the Murrayfield High Heid Yins need to find a new Chairman, to replace the now-resigned Colin Grassie, by whenever, or in whatever format, the AGM takes.

Recruitment of the new Chairman is in the hands of the Nominations sub-committee of the SRU Board. At the start of the year, this sub-committee consisted of: Colin Grassie, Dee Bradbury, Julia Bracewell and Adam Gray.

Colin Grassie has now resigned, Adam Gray was so-cruelly taken from us, leaving Dee, who would be excused if she was “demob-happy” after the events of her presidency, and Julia Bracewell – with TCD himself available to “advise as needed.”

I have been discussing how they fill this important role, with several friends of this blog, and some of the other Scottish Rugby writers. You know what, no name immediately springs to mind.

I even sought clarity as to what type of chairman they were searching for, but, the SRU vacancies webpage shows no current vacancies, no guidance there then. But, given the new appointee will be chair of the full SR|U Board, we have to assume they will know their way around the world of high finance, and be more than a mere figurehead – which would appear to rule-out some of the names of past heroes being banded about.

I did hear one potential chairman's name mentioned, that of David Johnston. They wouldn't, would they??

Again, interesting times these, are they not?

Plus Ca Change Etc.? Maybes Aye, Maybes Naw

WHILE researching another piece, by browsing the excellent Google news archive of old Glasgow Heralds, I chanced upon the following Letter to the Editor, dated, 22 March, 1960. It reads:

“Sir,

I have spent the Rugby season up to the present time watching school and club Rugby each Saturday. My last experience of the standard of the game in your country was in 1932, when I accompanied the Springboks on their tour. Quite frankly the standard is lower now than 28 years ago, and failure in Internationals cannot be excused by hard-luck stories but by confession that success in Internationals will never come until these reforms are made.

1. The strength of university football must be raised by giving the universities first call on the undergraduates' services on the sports field. There is no injustice in this right being established as 90 per cent are there on government grants. (The university blue should rank as second in prestige to the international cap. To see how this provides Internationalists take the blues from Oxford and Cambridge who provide the backbone of your International sides in England, Scotland, Wales and Ireland – in Ireland's case with those of Trinity College, Dublin, and the colleges of the University of Ireland. Stellenbosch, Cape |Town and Johannesburg Universities form the nucleus of the Springboks.)

2. What is the strength year-by-year of your Border clubs? Surely it is because they build sides on Rugby-playing ability irrespective of the school they originate from. The same applies in South Africa, New Zealand, England, Wales. In fact in every Rugby-playing country other than Scotland.

The tragedy of the low ranking of Scotland in International rugby is the set-up of your sen ior game. You have the talent to build supreme Internaitonal sides, but, it is too widely distributed among too-many clubs to gaint he necessary experience.

Summarising, if your reporters have to stop finding excuses for poor International showing, then Scotland must either withdraw from International games or:-

(a) strengthen her university sides.

(b) make her former pupils sides second-grand standard and feeders for

(c) senior clubs based purely on Rugby excellence, not the old school tie. - I am, etc.,

H HILTON.

2 Park Terrace,

Glasgow. C3.”

You might well think: “These days are past, and in the past they must remain,” but, it cannot be denied, some of Mr Hilton's points are still relevant today, if not perhaps in the same form.

For instance, might not Mr Hilton's final two points: (b) and (c) above reflect what is going on today, where we have those six franchises in the FOSROC Super6 taken out of the club game into the bailiewick of the SRU Performance Department, with their playing squads selected on the grounds of rugby excellence and perceived potential as future full-time professional players?

It is interesting to see Mr Hilton so-strongly advocating the protection of University rugby. This never happened, but, one of the pillars of the S6 franchises is a link between these clubs and a higher education establishment, so, 60-years on, this is finally happening.

Back when Mr Hilton made his observations, certainly in Glasgow and Edinburgh, the former pupils clubs, with their limited membership rules were virtually all-powerful. West of Scotland was the solitary “open” club in Glasgow, with Edinburgh Wanderers in a similar position in the capital.

Mr Hilton, as a visitor to Scotland, was perhaps unaware some of the FP clubs were already easing membership criteria and certainly by the time the official leagues were started in 1973, there were very few FP (if any) such clubs still operating to the strict criteria for playing memebrship of 1960.

However, it has to be said, 60 years on, true democracy in schools/youth rugby has still to be achieved, and perhaps will not be until the one game per weekend rule, so-vigourously defended by the traditional “top” rugby-playing schools is broken.

THERE IS an interesting piece in today's Observer, suggesting one or maybe more English Premiership clubs might go bust thanks to the ongoing pandemic.

I will be amazed if this doesn't happen. Everyone knows the English Premiership is a league waiting to implode. Only Exeter Chiefs made a profit in the last season for which financial results have been released. The Premiership has been unsustainable for years.

Professional rugby will be operating on a totally-changed landscape when we finally get our of the current lockdown regulations. Given how determined the UK government has been to see the English, Northern Ireland, Welsh and Scottish administrations in “lockstep” in handling the current pandemic, might we see, when restrict6ions are eased, the four Home Unions perhaps finally persuading the RFU that a common approach to professional rugby might be the way forward, and we see an amalgamation of the English Premiership and the PRO14?

In fact, I would go further, and look for a northern hemisphere NFL type league. It would take some organising, but, I think it could work. This might lead to more-affordable semi-professional clubs coming tot he fore in the various unions. That way, there would be places for the very best, the potential successors to these top players and the vast majority of players who merely want to play for fun.

However the landscape eventually looks, it will be very different from how it was when we went into lockdown.

Change Is A Comin', But, The Junta Will Fight It

I FIND it extremely difficult to blog on rugby at the moment. Sure, when at the coal face, in normal times, I take the sport seriously, whether offering my twopenceworth on the matters of the day, or reporting on a match, but, I always remember the sage advice given me by the great Ian “Dan” Archer, these 40-years ago on the old and lamented 'Sunday Standard.'

“Commander, never forget, while we take our jobs seriously, we are the comic pages of this newspaper, the light relief at the back.”

This advice from a writing legend, contrasts vividly with the ethos of a managerial legend: my second cousin, twice-removed, one Wullie Shankly. Shanks, if truth be told, was a football zealot; some say the gospel according to Shankly was him joking, but, from what I have learned from those in the broader family who knew him – and one of my uncles was his “mucker” down the pit – when Shanks said: “Some of you people think football is a matter of life or death, it isn't, it's more-important than that,” he was being serious, he really believed that.

And that single-minded sense of football purpose drove him from relative poverty in Glenbuck to the status of a diety on Merseyside and beyond.

Any way, as I was saying, it's hard to find things to write about in rugby just now, when the world is in such turmoil. We do not know what lies ahead, what the game will look like when we come out the other end of this pandemic, but, one thing we can be pretty sure of, it will be greatly changed.

And this has very-serious implications for the Scottish Rugby Union and the game in Scotland. We are in the middle of what is a normal situation up here in God's Country – we are not totally at-war with the English, so we keep in trim by going off abroad as mercenaries, or, by staying at home and fighting among ourselves, be it MacLeod v Macdonald, Macdonald v Campbell, McGregor v Colquhoun, back in the old days of clan warfare, or, today's rugby battles.

Since Gala cannot currently take-on Hawick, or Heriot's have a go at Watsonians, or Glasgow Accies and GHK do battle across the Anniesland fence, we are taking sides in whats app groups discussing governance and the way forward.

Now, in an ideal world, the clubs would have put their differences aside and used the current breathing space to have formed a united front against the ruling Junta. But, they cannot even do that. Getting the decision-makers in the club game to agree is, I am told, even harder than herding cats.

And while all this in-fighting takes place, well, I am prepared to bet the farm on The Junta holding their own wee interweb conclaves and working hard to ensure, when the dust clears and we get back to normal – they will still control Scottish Rugby.

I think it is fairly obvious, once something like normality is restored, this will be a new normality. The SRU will need to be a slimmer, fitter organisation, better equipped to operate in a world where sports sponsorship will be more-difficult to come by.

I would suggest, a good few of the 450 jobs within the organisation will vanish as the new reality bites, but, this will perhaps be fiercely resisted by the imperial overlords in-charge of the various wee empires.

I have seen suggestions, we might be reduced to a single full-time professional team, competing in the PRO14, or even the long-suggested British Isles League. I don't think the SRU will cut that savagely, we do need a minimum of two full-time teams, in my view.

What I could envisage is these two teams having smaller squads, with the fringe players distributed around the Super6 clubs – perhaps with another two franchises offered-up.

I have never deviated from my belief, starting Super6 was a tacit admission from Murrayfield, they could not attract the private finance required to properly fund professional rugby in Scotland, and could only underwrite the two teams, so, they persuaded ambitious clubs to take-up the slack.

Well, when the current situation ends, things will be even tighter, and down-grading fringe players to semi-professional rather than full-time professional status is an option which will need to be looked at.

Further down the food chain, I can see the belt-tightening causing a cut in the number of national leagues. I have long maintained, to have approximately one-third of the clubs playing competitive rugby in Scotland playing at “national” level is a nonsense.

In football, by far a bigger and more-popular sport in Scotland, there are, excluding the 500 clubs in membership of the Scottish Amateur FA, or the 900 clubs in membership of the Scottish Youth FA, there are approximately 250 Scottish clubs playing in the SPFL, the Highland and Lowland Leagues, the East of Scotland and South of Scotland leagues and the various leagues in membership of the Scottish Junior FA.

Only 42, or 16% of these clubs play in a national league. In rugby, we have approximately 150 clubs playing in the adult leagues structure, with 46, or 31% of these clubs playing in a national league.

To me, that is too-high a percentage, better to cut the number of national leagues to make life easier for the smaller clubs. In the much-changed landscape which will follow the end of the pandemic, I can see the case for retrenching of clubs and resources becoming overwhelming.

As a wee aside here, when introducing |Agenda 3, my pal TCD attracted a lot of abuse when he came up with the phrase: “Fewer but stronger clubs.” I can see fewer but hopefully stronger happening when the pandemic is beaten.

Indeed, the fewer but stronger suggestion is not new, one of the football officials to whom I spoke when gathering my figures for this blog actually used that phrase – it was something his association had done, and it worked.

However, one thing I do believe, and I wish I didn't, is this. When the big decisions as to the way forward post pandemic have to be made, there is a very-good chance, the SRU will get it wrong.

Thoughts On The Laws, From A Man From Marr

I MET Jim Park at one of the excellent pre-match lunches at Marr's Fullarton clubhouse, earlier this season. Jim has been around the game for even longer than I have, it's 66 years since he first picked up a rugby ball. He is a Marr College former pupil who played for the Marr club, then went south, to play for London Scottish, before taking his love of the game overseas.

In retirement, back in the UK, he still attends games at Richmond Athletic Ground, while continuing to put in the Sunday morning hard yards, coaching the kids at his local club in the Sudentenland.

Jim knows the game, and, like most of us old codgers from the amateur era, he is concerned about where it is going. But, while the main arguments in these days when, without actual games to distract us, many are thinking of what happens next – Jim is not so-concerned about governance, or the fact the various Unions appear to be in a bit of a financial bind, but, about the actual soul of the game.

He is concerned about the way the game is played, more than how it is managed. So, he took the trouble to jot down his thoughts and send them to me. Having read them, I believe he is on to something, and his views are worthy of a broader circulation, so, I have today handed over the blog to him. What follows are Jim's thoughts.

Please, let me, and Jim, know what you think.

An opportunity to SAVE the game of rugby

Because of the corona virus there is a pause in the playing of rugby and an opportunity to take stock of the overall health of the sport.

At club and international level across the world the game is financially bankrupt and fewer players are active in the community game in its traditional heartland countries.

However there ARE major areas of growth - mini rugby, seven-a-side and womens rugby - all of which project an image of a fun, safe and fast game with the emphasis on skill and finding space and NOT heavy physical contact.

So rather than trying first to find solutions for the club and international game on the financial merry go-round, can we get our priorities right and first build a consensus: on major LAW changes/revisions to make the game more attractive, safer, faster, more aerobic, and more fun; to encourage more players of all shapes and sizes to play and stay longer in the community game and grow this area of the game again

The crowds and income will then follow.

These suggested law changes/revision have been prioritised after consultation with past and present club players , international players including British Lions with input from major rugby playing countries 

1. Maximum of two reserves on the bench but only as injury replacements
2. Ball in straight at scrums and line outs
3. Tackles waist high or below
4. No double tackles
5. No taking out players without the ball
6. In the breakdown penalise players, other than the tackled player and first tackler, for going off their feet
7. Bring back rucking
8. Players must be 5 metres back from rear feet at rucks
9. 6 points for a try, 2 points for penalties , drop goal and conversions
10. No penalties or free kicks at scrums except for foul play

Revert to old scrum laws -front rows go down alone immediately,

then 2nd row, then back row and ball put in straight at once

11. Ban lifting of players anywhere - especially fielding high kicks
12. Time wasting in taking penalty kicks , and forming lineouts and scrums

These changes need to be made quickly and the COVID -19 pause gives us the opportunity to do this.

I find myself in broad agreement with most of Jim's suggestions. Where I would go further is in his ninth point, regarding scoring values. The two-point penalty I accept, but only for what I would term technical offences. I have always agreed with something which the great Allan Hosie used to promote.

Hillhead's finest has long argued for a massive ten-point penalty to deter serious foul play (such as a typical no-arms, head-high Owen Farrell tackle). I would go further. Paint a penalty spot on the 22-metre line, central to the posts and for such serious offences – anywhere on the pitch – give a ten-point penalty from that spot.

Also, I would continue to allow lifting at the lines-out; this makes for much cleaner and better possession to the team winning the line-out than we ever got in the old days of free-for-alls at the touchlines. I do, however, think, on safety grunds, Jim has a point about lifting to take kick-offs.

Any way, these are the thoughts of an old rugby man – I commend them to the house.

A Contentious People - And Don't You Ever Forget It

ONE OF the guiding principles of this blog is my belief, Principal Seymour Skinner hit the nail on the head when he told Groundskeeper Willie: “These Scots sure are a contentious people.”

This was in response to one of Willie's rants, in fact this one: “Brothers and sisters are natural enemies. Like Englishmen and Scots. Or Welshmen and Scots. Or Japanese and Scots. Or Scots and other Scots. Damn Scots they ruined Scotland!”

Another literary quote which I have long thought had a basis in fact, is from George MacDonald Fraser's fictionalised memoir on his time as a young officer in the Gordon Highlanders. In the second of these: 'McAuslan in the Rough' Fraser suggests there is a long-standing Ministry of Defence general order, that the Scottish regiments must never all be in Scotland at the same time.

This is not, as some have suggested, to prevent them reforming the Scottish Army, marching on London and, this time, not stopping at Derby, rather, to prevent the threat to the peace of the country which would all but vanish, courtesy of inter-regimental fighting. The belief being, without 'Frogs,' 'Huns,' 'Wops,' 'Ruskies,' 'Towel Heads' or 'Fuzzy-Wuzzies', or in particular the English to fight with, the Jocks would very-happily fight among themselves.

I firmly believe this unfortunate thread in the Scottish character is behind the current unrest in Scottish Rugby.

The ill-feeling was ramped up yesterday, when President Dee Bradbury gave short shrift to the demand, from 38 clubs, that she disband the Task Force she recently formed to take another look at the governance of the game.

Right now, we are sailing in turbulent and uncertain waters. What sort of Scottish Rugby Union emerges from the “All Clear” signal as the pandemic eases and we return to “normality,” well – that's another QI question to which nobody knows the answer.

Rugby will, like most other things, be greatly changed by the time we next take the field – I doubt we will be able to resume as we were before the shut down, indeed, I worry about what sort of game we will be left with.

Governance has been the hottest topic for about the last 18 months, this dispute has seen The Junta, in an effort to lead the rabble of the clubs, come up with the Gammell/Murray Review, an initiative which was perhaps best-described by one of Billy Connolly's more-memorable quips; it was “made as welcome as a fart in a space suit.”

Gammell/Murray is now more dead than another early Connolly invention – the errant wife, murdered and buried in the back close in Glasgow – and no bum is being left above ground as a handy slot in which to park a bike.

As someone close to the Task Force explained to me this week: “The proposal to do away with elections in favour of appointing people to the Council and Board was totally unacceptable. The formation of the Task Force is an effort to preserve democracy within the Union. Sure, we need to modernise and the Task Force is geared towards this.”

There is an acceptance both around the Task Force and the 38 dissident clubs, that teyh want the same things – it's in the direction of travel, and seemingly, in personnel, where there is dispute – another case perhaps of Scot fighting with Scot.

The dissident clubs want Dee Bradbury to stand down and allow vice president Ian Barr, who is due to succeed her at this year's AGM, lead the governance review. The view in the Task Force is that they have to get the review complete as a matter of urgency, and before the AGM, the date of which remains uncertain.

There are suggestions that the current President and VP do not get on. Well that's nothing new, apparently it is almost de rigeur for the top two elected officials in the SRU to have irreconcilable differences.

The problem, according to some shrewd observers of Murrayfield Politics is, what mischief might The Junta being gettig up to, while the elected officials are squabbling among themselves?

It seems fair to see, once the reset button on ordinary life is pressed and we get back playing, rugby, in Scotland and elsewhere, seems certain to be much-altered. The bloated SRU wage bill will surely need to be trimmed to reflect the new reality we will be facing.

I can see one or two of the mini empires within the game being curtailed, with those running these empires asked to defend some pretty hefty salaries awarded to people who some others see as not providing value for money.

As one big fish in the clubland pond said to me this week: “Scottish Rugby has to decide, and quickly, what sort of Scottish Rugby community we will have going forward.” There will be change – because we cannot go on as we have been.

Some are suggesting we could be reduced to one single full-time team playing at the highest level of club rugby. This will, in the medium term, have to be an SRU-owned club. Others are suggesting the Union will stick with two full-time clubs, however, we might see a reduction in the number of full-tme players.

I can see Edinburgh and Glasgow continuing, but, without the bloated 50-plus squads of before the shut down. Perhaps, in the new reality post-pandemic, we will see a centrally-contracted core of perhaps 50 players, spread across the two sides, with the other current players forced to revert to part-time, semi-professional status, across the six Fosroc Super6 franchises.

I can also see strict amateurism being enforced in the club game, and a cut in the number of truly national leagues, from the present four to two.

As I was told this week: “We can expect many businesses to be looking to cut expenditure when they resume trading, so sponsorship income will probably fall. There may be job losses across all sectors, so less spare money going around. A few clubs were struggling to pay players etc before the shut-down, when we resume, a lot of clubs will simply not be able to afford the expenses of the past, so, strict amateurism has to be the way forward for nearly all the clubs.”

Should this be the scenario which emerges at the end of the current lockdown, well, the governance model will definitely be different. In fact, we could well see what a lot of people within the game in Scotland yearn for – a return to something like the old days, with the Council members, as the old SRU Committee were, being elected to serve theinterests of larger areas than the present ten or twelve-club constituencies of today.

That way, we would hopefully see that more-democratic elected body than we have today.

I detect, the Task Force and the dissident clubs would like to reach the same destination, they are merely failing to agree on the best route to take in getting there – and who should be driving the bus.

But, that's what you get when you are dealing with a contentious people like the Scots.

As an aside to the in-fighting, the excellent Hazel Swankie, the Midlands Region Council rep has been appointed to the Task Force, to take the place of the sadly deceased Adam Gray.