Social Media Toxicity - Discuss

HAVING SPENT Sunday night sticking every pin I could find in the house into wax effigies of Christophe Ridley and Ian Tempest, I am now feeling a lot calmer and ready to offer my opinion on another currently toxic area of Scottish Rugby Union – the BTL comments thread on The Offside Line's report on Saturday's Ayr v Hawick match in the Arnold Clark Premiership.

I have two particular sports-writing heroes, two gentlemen whose mentoring and advice I greatly appreciated as a young tyro. These gentlemen are Ian “Dan” Archer and Hughie Taylor. If we had a Mount Rushmore for Scottish Sports Writing, somewhere in Glen Coe or on Cairngorm – in my opinion, Dan and Hughie would be up there, alongside Bill McLaren, Hugh McIlvanney and Doug Gillon. Dan always reckoned, Clan Warfare never stopped, but in the late 20^th century – when he was speaking – it was confined to Junior Football.

Having had my life-long dislike-bordering-on-outright-hatred of Scumnock Juniors drummed into me at Primary School, fine Ah ken where Dan was coming from in that respect. Irvine Meadow's glory days are some 40 or 50 years in the past, but, still we relish any time our local heroes down here in God's County “mow the Medda”. Compared to the seethiing ill-feeling and air of menace which surrounds such pitches as those at Beechwood Park (Auchinleck Talbot), Valefield (Kilbirnie Ladeside) or Loch Park (Glenafton Athletic) when the noisy neighbours turn up, well, let's just say, The Union Bears and The Green Brigade are Best Buddies – and not of the Paisley variety.

Of course, these over-excitable fans follow football – you know: “A game for gentlemen, played by hooligans”; things are far-more-civilised where the ball is oval, Rugby Union is: “A game for hooligans, played by gentlemen.” One expects a higher level of comment, a greater show of respect for differing opinions on the fans' for a of Rugby Union websites.

Then you read the BTL comments below Iain Hay's match report on the match highlighted in my opening paragraph. Toxic hardly covers some of the comments, I fear TOL Editor David Barnes had to don full biohazard-proof safety equipment to edit the comments and you realise, in Rugby Union, just as much as in Football, in Scotland we have a lot of fans who clearly wear their IQ on their shirt numbers and struggle, even more than I do, to engage brain before hitting keyboard.

My own view is that large sections in the body of the Scottish Rugby “Kirk” are struggling with the state of our game in 2024 – 151 years on from the formation of The Scottish Football Union.

This is natural, the official SRU badge doesn't have a motto underneath the image, but, if it did, that legend would be: “It's Aye Been – An' Aye Will Be”. This motto resonates in particular down in the Borders, the supposed heartland of the game up here – except, the game has moved on a bit since 1873 and much-faster in particular since 1995, when the game went “Open”.

As an example of the speed of change, when Scotland last won a Grand Slam, in 1990, 9 of the 21-strong Scotland match-day squad came from six Border clubs. Hawick contributed try-scoring winger Tony Stanger and replacements Derek Turnbull and Greig Oliver; Iwan Tukalo represented Selkirk; Melrose supplied Craig Chalmers and replacement Craig Redpath; Gary Armstrong ensured Jethart was there; John Jeffrey was there on behalf of Kelso and Derek White was Gala's man on the day.

Fast forward a decade to the first edition of the Six Nations and we find the home-based Scotland players were no longer playing for long-established clubs, but forSRU-owned and managed fully-professional clubs, which, though there was a tenuous link to the old District XVs, were very-different animals.

The days were gone whereby a full Scotland cap, perhaps even a British Lion would, in his “Day Job” be just another member of the local community – before turning into Superman when he donned his club strip or his Scotland one of a weekend. Gone are the days when full caps strutted their stuff for thie local clubs, and some clubs and even-more supporters of them, are still, nearly 30 years into Rugby Union players being paid, still struggling with the changes in the game.

I get the impression, some supporters of some of the longer-established clubs have a serious Entitlement Problem. The first Scotland international team, the 20 men who faced England in the first International, at Raeburn Place, on 27 March, 1871 was drawn from just seven clubs. Edinburgh Academical and Glasgow Academicals each supplied six players, Edinburgh University, St Andrew's University and Merchistonians each supplied two players, while Royal High School FP and West of Scotland both had one representative.

Twenty five years on, the teams had been reduced to 15-a-side, but the Scotland team which faced England in 1896 was still drawn from seven different clubs. Three West of Scotland men were in that team, along with one each from Edinburgh Academical and Royal High School FP, but London Scottish – five players, Hawick and Watsonians – two each and Edinburgh Wanderers – one player each – showed that other clubs were getting a look-in.

In the 50^th year of international rugby – 1921 – the Scotland team against England was drawn from 12 different clubs; Edinburgh Accies, Glasgow Accies and Royal High FP were still contributing players, but the team was split eight/seven between players playing in Scotland and south of the border.

The 75^th year of international rugby was celebrated with a “Victory International” at Twickenham, but the two Academical clubs, from either end of the A8 were still among the nine clubs supplying players to the Scotland team.

The actual centenary of International Rugby Union was celebrated, at Murrayfield, on 27 March, 1971, 100 years to the day from that first game. Scotland won and of the 16 players they used that day three, hooker Quinton Dunlop, tight-head Sandy Carmichael and lock Gordon Brown were West of Scotland RFC players, maintaining a century-long tradition of that club supplying players to the Scotland team.

Another member of the team, flanker Roger Arneil, although then playing for Leicester, was an Edinburgh Academical, while centres John Frame and Chris Rea maintained the Universities connection to that first international, being respectively graduates and former players with Edinburgh and St Andrew's Universities.

So, when your club has been turning-out internationalists in the 19^th and 20^th centuries, being reduced to the level of a Junior Football team in the 21^st must be a bitter pill to swallow. Even worse, to be losing heavily to nouveau riche clubs who don't have anything like your history. Human nature being what it is, as a reaction, dummies are spat out and toys thrown from the pram at a great rate.

Some of the Establishment clubs have risen to this new challenge, others have taken the typically British approach, moaning loudly and long, and harking back to their great days, while slowly decaying.

Or say you are a junior club which has, over many years, produced players good enough to play for Scotland, or even the Lions, but, without the numbers, or infrastructure to reach the heights with you. One of the regular beneficiaries of your and your school's excellent development programme is the one in the next town. Over the years, you've sent them more than a few good players, and, to be fair, have got one or two back, the road between the two clubs being far from a one-way street.

Then, you get together a good squad of players, with a brilliant coach, who used to work for that other club. You reach heights you have never touched before and you are feeling pretty good about yourselves.

Suddenly, however, the coach leaves, one or two players also step away and the train hits the buffers. Well, some of your new-found fans, perhaps of the “glory-hunting” persuasion, take to social media to vent their spleen, and it all gets a bit messy. That, I feel, is where we are at the moment.

It is somehow, wonderfully British, Scottish even – and it's very sad, for the future of the game. It also shows, we Rugger Buggers are not any better than the Terracing Tams who follow the round ball game.