Rugby Could Learn A Thing Or Three From Football

I WAS CHATTING last night to a friend who is heavily involved in what used to be Junior Football. What he had to tell me was very interesting and might be a reality check for those who advocate the cancellation of the Super6 project with the funds diverted to the club game. A notion which I think is utter pish.

I have written this before, umpteen times. I dare say this will not be the last time I write it, but, here goes again:

• Super6 isn't perfect, but, most of its failings are down to the SRU and the dog's breakfast they made of introducing it.

• We do need a level of rugby between the amateur club game and the professional or semi-professional “performance” game – hence S6.

• They will never admit it, but, S6 was introduced as a cheaper option by the SRU, cheaper than a third full-time professional team, even a “Development” one.

• If we did ditch S6 in favour of throwing more cash at the club game – what controls would the governing body have on how each club spent their new riches?

• We would still have to go back to something like Inter-District Rugby as that bridging tier between the Club and Performance game – additional costs there.

So, we might well be better-off going with S6, smoothing over its difficulties, and it has had a difficult birth, and, in time going to S8 or even S10.

I also have difficulty with this insistence of many clubs, that they have access to National Leagues. Let's look seriously at this.

The RFU has 2000 member clubs, of whom just 39 play in a truly National League. These are the 13 Gallagher Premiership clubs, the 11 – including London Scottish – who play in the Championship and the 15 clubs in National League 1. Below that, English rugby is regionalised.

The 39 clubs playing in the three National Leagues, account for 1.95% of the member clubs. Up here, 1.95% of the member clubs means three clubs.

The WRU has 200 member clubs, of whom just 26 play in a truly national league. These are the 12 clubs in the Welsh Premiership and the 14 in the Welsh Championship. Below that, Welsh rugby is regionalised.

The 26 clubs playing in the three National Leagues account for 13% of the member clubs. Up here, 13% of the member clubs means 19 clubs.

The IRFU has 205 member clubs, of whom 50 play in the national All-Ireland League.

These 50 clubs playing in the All-Ireland League account for 24% of the member clubs. Up here, 24% of the member clubs means 36 clubs.

We currently have 44 National League clubs, which means 29% of Scottish Clubs have National league status, the highest percentage in the Home Nations.

Can we justify such a high percentage of our clubs having National League status? I think not.

However, put forward the notion that maybe we have too-many Naitonal Leagues, and while you may well get general agreement, this always comes with the caveat – so long as my club isn't one of the ones being relegated to the Regional Leagues.

Right at the start of this post, I mentioned a conversation with a friend heavily involved in football. His club was formerly a Junior one, they now play in the West of Scotland League, a part of the Scottish Football Pyramid.

In this pyramid:

• Level One – The Premiership: (Celtic, Rangers, Aberdeen, Hearts etc.)

• Level Two – The Championship: (Kilmarnock, Partick Thistle, Dunfermline Athletic etc.)

• Level Three – League One: (Airdrieonians, Queen's Par, Falkirk etc.)

• Level Four – League Two: (Kelty Hearts, Annan Athletic, Stenhousemuir etc.)

• Level Five – The Highland and Lowland Leagues

• Level Six – The West of Scotland and South of Scotland Leagues

Level Six is actually the top flight of the WoS League, clubs such as Auchinleck Talbot, Pollok and Irvine Meadow. The lower WoS League divisions are levels seven and eight.

Auchinleck Talbot, the team whose manager Tucker Sloan has more medals than the Duke of Rothesay, look well-set to win the WoS this season and gain entry to the Lowland League promotion/relegation olay-offs.

Succeed there, and they could be on their way into Senior Football. However, they have had to jump through hoops to be in that position. Promotion through the pyramid is not automatic. You have to become an accredited club to stand a chance.

The SFA, some years back introduced their accreditation scheme, their version of Agenda 3. This came at four levels: Bronze, Silver, Gold and Platinum, with strict criteria to be met for each level.

But, to rise through the various leagues to Senior level, each club has to meet certain standards at their ground. For instance, my friend was telling me, one of the smaller WoS League clubs, a Level Eight club, was in-line for promotion to Level Seven at the end of this season, but, to guarantee this, they would have to as an absolute minimum, erect a covered enclosure holding 100 fans. Now, I can think of Premiership clubs in rugby who do not meet that criteria.

Then there are things such as floodlights, seated accommodation, disability access, even facilities for those terrible men and women of the media – not criteria I see being sought-after in rugby.

I suspect such concerns were behind the often-disparaged “Fewer but Stronger” remark around Agenda 3.

The reality is, today, more than a quarter of a century on from Rugby Union going “Open,” we are at the stage where we have two different games – the Community one and the Performance one.

Time for the SRU to settle, once and for all, which clubs are “Performance Clubs” and which are “Community Clubs.” We can then establish base line criteria for both and then move to implementing this two strand approach to the game.

We then need to decide how many Performance Clubs we can handle, and stick with that number for a set period of time, say five to ten years. Then, we can let things settle down and see how it goes.

Going with the percentages of clubs playing in a national league across the four Home Nations, and going for a median figure – I reckon, in Scotland, we are looking at no more than 24 to 26 national league clubs. That might be a good figure to start with.