Normal Service After Internet Problems

A WEEK OF internet access problems ended on Saturday night, when Number One Grandson was able to set-up the replacement hub which I had to have sent-up. I had had no internet from Tuesday, it was Hell.

The gremlins meant, I was unable to comment on the Scotland squad for the Autumn Tests, while I could not watch Glasgow beating the Bulls on Friday night. Normal service was resumed in time for the Cardiff v Edinburgh game on Saturday night, which proved to be a hugely-entertaining affair, won by the home team, courtesy of a last-minute, long-range penalty goal.

I felt Edinburgh lost because they did not adapt as well as the Welshmen to the change of conditions in the second half. Also, Edinburgh's lack of depth in some places was exposed – the Cardiff bench made more impact than Edinburgh's - while they made too-many handling errors with the slippery ball.

I also felt, Cardiff played more of a team game. When a Cardiff player made an individual break, the support was there, quicker and in a better position, than when an Edinburgh player made a break. Support is crucial in Rugby and Edinburgh's game-breakers such as Wes Goosen or Charlie Shiel didn't get the immediate support available to opposition players.

All that said, I can remember when either of our professional sides emerging from a trip to Cardiff with a losing bonus point would have been considered a good result; these days, we are disappointed, so I suppose, that's progress.

FOR ME, the most-interesting game in Saturday's Arnold Clark Premiership schedule was the Balgray meeting of Glasgow Hawks and Heriot's – the first occasion on which Hawks High Heid Yin Phil Smith had faced the club with which he has been associated for so-many years.

The Offside Line match report reads like: “a game of two halves” - Hawks turning round 26-7 ahead, only for the Nails to come back to level matters, before Euan Muirhead's late try, converted by Liam Brins, saw Hawks home and sparked-off dancing in the leafy lanes of Kelvinside. Five welcome points to get Hawks off the foot of the table and up to eighth place.

At the half-way point in the campaign, it already looks as if the main interest in the second half of the race will be at the foot. Five points separate the bottom five, in descending order: Melrose, Kelso, Hawks, Selkirk and Hawick. Now, given the four Borders teams are in that bunch, and they are surely going to hurt each other, we might well be witnessing a reverse “Helicopter Saturday” on the final day; I reckon we might well be into extra time before we know which club will be going down.

At the top of the League, Ayr might not be winning friends and influencing people, but, they are still winning games and now have an eight point lead, plus a game in hand. Already, the title is theirs to lose, finding the consistency to even close the gap is going to be difficult for the rest. With six of their ten remaining games at Fortress Millbrae, the defending Champions will take some stopping.

THAT INTERNET FAULT certainly left me adrift for much of this past week, but, the silver lining was I was able to read Peter Bills' excellent disertation on French Rugby: Le Coq – a journey to the heart of French Rugby. I commend this tome to the house.

However, as I read of his journey through the Heartland of the game in La France Profounde, the small towns of the Basque Country, in the far south west, I was struck by the resemblances to Rugby Union in Scotland. For small towns such as Lourdes, Agen, Auch, Narbonne and so on, you might see Hawick, Gala, Selkirk, Kelso, Melrose, Jeburgh and Langholm. I can see little difference between the no-quarter-asked-or-given French battles which Bills references and the traditional Border Derbies over here – or indeed some of the battles between near-neighbours elsewhere in Scottish Rugby.

After all, one of the main reasons for England being so-keen, over so-many centuries: “rebellious Scots to crush” - an ambition finally realised in 1707 was to secure their northern border. If for no other reason perhaps than: “my enemy's enemy is my friend” The Auld Alliance has always bothered our southern neighbours.

Bills sticks out like a sore thumb among English sports writers – he is devoid of the usual English Exceptionalism, he is a very definite Francophile and this excellent book is indeed a love letter to that country. He meets many of the legends of the French game, Blanco, Rives, Villpreux, Boniface, Spanghero, Dupont and so forth. His recommendations as to wines to inbib and restaurants to visit is worth the price of the book alone.

But, to return to the main thrust of this piece. In outlining how the smaller town teams, once the main provider of players to the national side have adjusted to life below their Top 14, to being providers of talent for the existing big guns – Toulouse, Toulon, Racing 92 and so on. His description of the rise of La Rochelle also had me thinking: could Billy, Auchlin, Norrie and Co pull off something similar at Ayr?

Almost certainly not – The Murrayfield Junta will never allow any club which they do not totally control to be involved in full-time professional Rugby Union.

BEFORE I DISCOVERED Rugby, I played football, as a goalkeeper. Now, football folklore tells us, the last two places on Earth where you might choose to be a goalie are Brazil and Scotland – so, nil point for choosing that position.

Football folklore also tells us: all goalkeepers are mad, former team mates such as that weel-kent man about Scottish Rugby – Auld Auchlin – will tell you, often without having to be asked: “Aye, all goalies are mad, but Aristotle took that madness to extremes”. So, I suppose, as a gloves-wearer, I ought to be immediately on the side of one of our more-esteemed members of Scottish Football's Goalkeepers Lodge Number One – Gemma Fay in her new role as Managing Director of Women's Rugby.

I should be, but, nae harm to Gemma and I hope she is a success in the role, but, I fail to see what she has brought to the game since joining the SRU. Given how little she appears to have accomplished in her previous post, I see this new placement as yet another example of something the SRU has become very good at in recent years – blowing smoke and mirrors into the faces of the clubs as they shuffle the deckchairs at will.

 

Win Win Means Smiles All Round But It's Not All Roses

THERE WAS a Punch and Judy air to Edinburgh's comprehensive 43-0 win over Benetton, at The Hive on Friday night. “That's the way to do it” was the feeling in the end as Edinburgh put last week's disappointment in Cork behind them with the sort of bonus-point victory which will delight the hard-to-please capital Rugby Union community.

It wasn't a perfect display from Edinburgh, but, that lovely big goose egg against the visitors' name on the score-board will have pleased Sean Everitt and his coaching staff as much as the seven tries they scored.

Certainly the Italian Federation did their side no favours by insisting on a rest week for so-many of the Benetton Italian caps. But, there was a sense of: “we'd rather be somewhere other than Edinburgh” about much of the visitors' body language.

Back in my day we spoke a lot about “the pivot five” - in those amateur days of yore, we spoke often of the XV comprising three five-man pods: the “front five” - the front row and the two locks, were charged with winning set-piece possession: “the back five” - the four threequarters and the full back, their job was to finish-off the work of the men in front of them, but the pivot five – the back-row and the two half-backs, it was their job to knit everything together and make things work. On Friday night, the Edinburgh quintet were immense.

Magnus Bradbury's Captain's performance won him the Man of the Match call, but the other two back row men – Liam McConnell and Dylan Richardson were also on the short list. The half-backs – Graham Shiel and Cammy Scott worked very well together, as part of a crucial five-man unit. Elsewhere, I have, in the past this season, been perhaps unfairly critical of what remains a new centre partnership, between James Lang and Piers O'Connor. They certainly looked much better in harness on Friday night, a clear case of building an understanding on the park.

This performance was certainly a feel-good evening for the Edinburgh squad; the pressure now is on them to back this up on the road this weekend, when they travel to face Cardiff. They should travel South in confident mood, despite thr Welsh outfit's terrific start to this campaign.

BACK IN THE Amateur era of JPR Williams, JJ Williams, Steve Fenwick and other Welsh greats, a floodlit match, against Bridgend, at Brewery Field was often a chastening experience for any visiting team. These days may be history now, but, the ground still has an intimidating atmosphere and is one of those grounds winning visitors are glad to see the back of.

Ospreys may lack the star-dust of yore, but, at home, they remain a force to be reckoned with, so it says much about Glasgow Warriors that they could produce a performance with more swagger than Strictly in the battle for Saturday night television supremacy. It was professional, it was polished and as much as you can be certain in professional sport – the result was never in doubt.

Jamie Dobie, who is now approaching Finn Russell territory inasmuch as his name is on every megabucks club's wish list, was a deserved Man of the Match, but, on the night, there were no failures in the Glasgow ranks – with one or two of the youngsters, such as big Alex Samuel, showing up well.

Tight-head props don't often get caught up in the Super Trouper lights, but, maybe Saturday night was a turning point for Murphy Walker. The kid has had his struggles along the way, but, in Wales he came of age – a welcome sign too in the wake of Zander's continuing absence.

With Huw Jones another possible lkong-term absentee, it was good to see big Stafford McDowall, up to here considered more a 12, punching great holes down the 13 channel and combining well (again) with Sione.

One of the BTL comments in The Offside Line remarked on the absentees from the Glasgow squad, I don't want to get carried away, but, Glasgow are now approaching almost Leinster levels of squad depth, which is great for Scotland.

MIND YOU, over a day of Rugby-watching, which included a typically wow-filled cameo, in a losing cause, from The Gallus One, as Leicester edged-out Bath, the performance of the day came from the relatively-unsung Saracens winger Noah Caluori, who ruled the airways and scored five cracking tries in his club's demolition of Sale.

The man himself – Chris Ashton – on commentary duty for TNT Sport, reckons young Noah still has a bit of work to do on his Ashton Splashdown final dive over the line, but, with this kid and the more-experienced Henry Arundell at Bath, we must be happy that, in the international arena, English Rugby does not allow wingers to receive the sort of service wide men from elsewhere are used to.

Owen Farrell was at the heart of a lot of good stuff in the Sarries' win; apparently he is now Yesterday's Man as far as Steve Borthwick and his coaching group are concerned – which might be good news for the rest of us. For me, he's still the best 12 in England.

ON THE DOMESTIC front, the Ayr D11 continues to bulldoze aside all challenges, while the result of the day was surely Stirling County putting more than 100 points on Jed-forest in National One.

A look at the top two divisional tables must be worrying for Rugby-lovers in the Borders. In the Arnold Clark Premiership, which has already effectively split into a Top Five and a Bottom Five, the four Borders teams: Selkirk, Melrose, Hawick and Kelso, in that order, occupy places six to nine.

In National One, Gala and Jed are in places eight and nine, while both have already suffered demoralising stuffings this season.

The tale of woe continues in National Two, where Berwick are holding up the table, with Peebles just two places above them. Indeed, you have to go all th way down to East Region One, where Langholm lie in third place, to find a team from the Heartland of the game in Scotland in a challenging league position.

If “a strong South means a strong Scotland” then I fear we are in bother at the moment.

 

Sevens Is Back

THE CHANGE OF FONT for this post is quite deliberate: I've gone to Comic Sans, because I think it is quite funny that the SRU should suddenly have remembered the heritage of the game up here and taken charge of the Great Britain Sevens programme, while at the same time reinvigorating a purely Scottish one.

The trouble with a purely Scottish Sevens programme comes down to a single question: Where are they going to play? Team GB will play on the existing World Rugby Sevens circuit; does this mean Scotland will be playing one level down, at European level?

Because, if they cannot compete as 'Scotland' on the existing circuit and since Rugby Sevens isn't one of the core sports at next year's Commonwealth Games in Glasgow, it will be 2030 and the next Commonwealth Games – assuming Glasgow isn't the last – before they get a chance to play internationally. The 2030 Games are being pencilled-in for Ahmedabad, in the Gujarat Province in India. From a Sevens perspective, Melrose it aint.

Unless, of course, we get Independence before then, which under John Swinney and his hopeless snouts in the trough SNP isn't going to happen any time soon. There's more chance of Neil Lennon being the next Rangers Manager.

One other question has struck me around this announcement. Does this mean the SRU has prised the game of Rugby Union Sevens' place on the British Olympic Committee away from the vice-like grasp of The Rugby Football Union?

To explain why this matters:

• All Olympic Games – Summer and Winter – are organised by The International Olympic Committee (the IOC)

• Each nation within the Olympic family is represented on the IOC

• This representation is via their their National Olympic Committee (NOC)

• Each individual Olympic sport played in each nation is entitled to representation on their NOC

• This is done via the national governing body of that sport

For instance, Curling is a Winter Olympics sport, but, apart from a couple of rinks, it is not played in England. You might have expected The Royal Caledonian Curling Club, who administer the Roaring Game in Scotland would represent Curling on the British NOC, but no, a separate body, British Curling, was set-up to do this.

However, there are two Olympic Sports for which the sport's representation on the British NOC is NOT covered by a “British” governing body – even one specifically set-up for this purpose; these sports are Association Football, where The Football Association represents the four individual home Associations, and Rugby Sevens, where the NOC place is held by someone from the (English) Rugby Football Union.

I just hope, when they agreed to run the Olympic Sevens programme, Murrayfield thought to claim that NOC place. If they haven't, it's a definite boob. Mind you, long experience of living next door to Perfidious Albion has me convinced, since Women's Sevens is to be mainly an Anglo-Welsh production, this just might give Twickenham the leverage to hold on to that NOC place – always handy when the MBEs and upwards and UK government subsidies are being handed out.

Still, it's good to see Sevens getting its rightful place in our game – now, the mainly Borders-run King of the Sevens competition is all well and good, and I must admit to a certain respect for the guys at Melrose, who have managed to make their annual sports a sort of Scottish/Rugby version of The US Masters Golf, but, if we're suddenly going to play Sevens seriously again – maybe the SRU should be encouraging more tournaments and giving the short form a place on the annual calendar.

And, if Scotland is taking the lead in promoting Sevens, shouldn't we have a tournament on the World Rugby circuit?

 

It Was Deja Vu All Over Again

MID-WAY THROUGH Sunday evening's “entertainment” from Hampden, I yawned, stretched and told the watching cats: “I've seen this movie before – too-often for comfort.” In his legendary memoir on his time as a National Service officer in the immediate post-war years: 'The General Danced at Dawn' that wonderful wordsmith George MacDonald Fraser came up with the line: “The Jocks would follow their 'Ruperts' (Anglo-Scottish officers) anywhere, usually out of a morbid curiousity as to what particular bother they might lead them into this time”.

It's like that with The Tartan Army; will this game be The Somme, St Valery or on rare occasions Bannockburn? That is, too often, the question. Our next-door neighbours' weaknesses are English Exceptionalism and Over-Ambition – their Barmy Army of followere genuinely believe:

• It's our game – we invented it

• We run the Best League in the World – So

• We've got to be winners

Of course, they prefer Shakespeare and Kipling to Burns – tae see oorsels as ithers see us is an entirely alien concept to your average England fan. But, your Tartan Army foot soldier, brought up on his Father and Grandfather's tales of Switzerland 1954, Wembley 1955, 1961 and 1975, Argentina 1978 – particularly that latter campaign: well, he knows it's always better to travel hopefully and just occasionaly: Wembley 1928 or 1967, Madrid 1963, Bremen 1999, or Paris 2007, we actually arrive and get an “I was there” result.

There was a point in the second half on Sunday when I had a horrid flash-back, to 1965 and a World Cup qualifier against Poland. That night, for more than an hour debutant Willie Johnston ran the Poles ragged and we got one goal up. But then, as the game ebbed away, back came the Poles, scoring twice in the final five minutes to fatally hole our ambitions towards being in England for the big show the following year.

I honestly thought: “here we go again” and could, in my mind, hear dead old David Francey giving us his familiar: “Oh dear! Oh dear! Disaster for Scotland” lament – before we managed to pull ourselves together and scrape through into at the very least, a guaranteed play-off place for the next World Cup.

You could maybe argue, the team Jock Stein sent out that night, almost exactly 60 years ago – on 13 October, 1965: Bill Brown; Alex Hamilton, Eddie McCreadie, Paddy Crerand, Billy McNeill, John Greig; Willie Henderson, Billy Bremner, Alan Gilzean, Denis Law, Willie Johnston was individually a superior XI to that Stevie Clarke sent out on Sunday. No fewer than eight of the 1965 team have been inducted into the Scottish Football Hall of Fame. I will admit, the Polish team which beat us that night was almost certainly better than the Belarus team we beat, but, this is perhaps Clarke's USP – he prepares teams well, he has fostered an almost club spirit in the team and he gets results.

We now know we are guaranteed at least a play-off spot, and depending on how we do in our final two games, in Greece or at home to the group-topping Danes, we could maybe qualify direct, as group winners.

There will undoubtdly be a Steward's Enquiry, should the Danes fail to beat Belarus next time out, so, we maybe will need another super show, to win in Greece and set us up for a winner takes all final game against the Danes, a match which will surely deliver an electric atmosphere at Hampden.

Which brings us back to the old familiar problem of enlisting in the Tartan Army. We might wish for another two wins, to throw us straight into feverish preparations for that trans-Atlantic trip next year, but, and I hate to throw a wet blanket on things, but, great age and experience has taught me, that's not the Scottish way of qualifying.

So, more in hope than expectation, I caution my fellow Scots – follow the lead of the great Allan Wells and keep the heid we're not home and hosed yet.

RIGHT NOW I AM more than ever pleased to be off the tools and only posting this pish for my own delectation and the amusement of the easily-pleased. It must be Hell being a red top rotweiler on the Glesca football beat at the moment. I can see several cases of PTSD between now and the end of this season.

At least, Adolf Hitler had Joseph Goebbels keeping the media in-check, a luxury not allowed Dermott Desmond and the Parkhead Politburo, which explains why the Austrian house painter enjoyed a better press than the current Celtic board – a situation currently being mirrored across the pond in Trumpton.

But, the noises-off in the East End are but a whisper against the clamour for a new Manager down Ibrox way. Steven Gerrard has, wisely I feel, given the quality of player immediately at his disposal, passed on a second coming, so the PBI in the front line of the mainstream media are back playing what is, for some, their favoured game: let's toss a name, any name, into the melting pot.

Here's a wee idea: instead of wheeling them out, as a sort of British Unionist version of Statler and Waldorf on European nights, why not ask Alex Ferguson and John Greig to come back into harness until the end of the season – to scare the bejesus out of the under-performing current squad to restore some dignity, while they identify the new squad and back-room team for season 2026-27, to take the club forward.

Fergie and Big John might both be in their ninth decade, but, I reckon they could sort-out the mess in short order. Mind you, the hair dryers might break in the early weeks, from over-use.

 

The Monday Morning Moan

WE ARE TOLD one of the downsides to getting Dementia is, while you cannot remember why you just entered a room in your house – you can clearly remember a hugely-embarrassing incident from your Primary school days. So, before I go totally doo-lally (and yes, I know there are weel-kent folk within Scottish Rugby, convinced I reached that happy couldn't give a shit, D.I.L.L.I.G.A.F. stage years ago), can I recall a wee fact I picked-up from watching what is now known as 'The Profumo Affair' – a political scandal from the early 1960s, which went a long way towards the first decline and fall of the Conservative and Unionist Party.

Cabinet Minister The Right Honourable John Profumo MP wasn't kicked into touch by his party for shagging Christine Keeler – at the same time as Miss Keeler was being shagged by a KGB Agent, posted to the Soviet Union's London Embassy. no, that sort of behaviour was tolerated by the Tory Party (still is as far as I know) – provided their trysts at Cliveden House, the then home of Viscount Astor – were not conducted in front of the servants and didn't scare the horses. Profumo's fall from grace came about because he tried to cover up his indiscretions – by lying to the House of Commons.

Today, if you brazenly lie to the House – they make you Prime Minister, but, back then, you were political toast. Standards dear boy, standards.

The Scottish Rugby Union isn't the Tory Party – I like to think standards within Murrayfield have always been higher than inside Tory Central Office, but, I do wish The Junta would push for higher standards still in all areas of their broad bailiewick. I say this because I am currently emboiled in a wee stooshie in the pages of The Offside Line with a couple of the more intelligent Herioters: Iain Milne and Neil Meikle.

It's all much ado about very little – just the SRU's total inability to run a match results service that is fit for purpose. On Saturday night, on the official SRU website, in the official Fixtures and Results pages, at 9pm – four and a bit hours after the final whistle, the result of what was “the Game of the Day” in the Arnold Clark Premiership, the Braidholm clash between GHA and Ayr was still missing from the pages.

Thanks to the Ayr twitter feed – one of the few parts of their social media presence which works as it should – I knew the result almost on the whistle. The excellent Borders Rugby Radio, run by Stuart Cameron and his enthusiastic team also had the result up in jig time – even BBC Shortbread, who thinks there is no Rugby Union below the URC and in any case thinks “Sport” only refers to Rangers and Celtic and women's sports, had the result up on their platforms before 6pm. But, the SRU, the governing body of the game in Scotland, nothing, nada, zilch. Almost a case of “East Renfrewshire – there be dragons”.

Missing results is, however, nothing new, it has been a regular and recurring problem since the sad passing of Ron Evans back during the Covid pandemic – some four years ago now.

It's no secret that Ron and I didn't agree about much. He took the fucking annoying wee half-Welsh scrum-half act to extremes, but, he knew how to collate and publish match results and he went the extra mile to ensure he did his job properly. Then, after his death, the SRU decided to take the job in-house, and they've been fucking it up big time ever since.

I've been complaining about the Union's inability to collate the results ever since Ron's passing. Other journalists have also pointed out their inefficiency, but, it makes no difference – we still see missing or late-published results every week and nothing ever gets done about it.

When I was on the tools – mainly covering Football, one of my Saturday side-hustles was to be the Press Association's “stringer” supplying goal flashes and scorers from whichever of the local grounds I was working from that particular Saturday.

There was a tried and tested system to this. The goal was scored; once we had identified the scorer, I would call PA, the conversation then went: “Game 45, Invertottie Howkers v Wellgather Lilac, goal for Invertottie, scored in 25 minutes by Wan Fittit: score now Invertottie Howkers 1 – Wellgather Lilac 0”. Simples, and within seconds PA had flashed that score to the broadcast and print media.

PA also covered top-flight Rugby Union, and it demonstrates how far down the media food chain the Club Championship has fallen that they no longer bother. Not that long ago, I remember sitting beside Wee Ron while he passed on scores and score flashes to them.

So, Club Rugby in Scotland is now seen in the mainstream media as: “a (very) minor sport”, so, it goes without saying – if the msm isn't interested in your product, you have a duty of care to your sport to make them interested. You have to supply them with the news they are not prepared to dig out for themselves. You have to produce copy, including live scores, which they want to use.

But, you also have the same, if not a greater duty of care to your core constituency, those club members and non-aligned Rugby Union fans, who may not be able to attend matches, but want to know how their local club has got on.

In the UK, Ice Hockey and Basketball, two of the approximtely 54 different sports I have covered in my many years at the coal face of sports-writing, are even more minor sports than Rugby Union; yet these sports have their interaction with the msm and their broader public covered in a far-more professional manner than the SRU has our sport covered. They have media officers, who – if the home club hasn't got in touch by a set time post-match – will pro-actively call that club and get the result in.

Back in the days of last century, when I still had my L plates on in sports journalism, I worked on local papers in Ayrshire. This apprenticeship included spells of what was referred to as “front line action” covering Ayrshire Junior Football and such insignificant “friendlies” as Auchinleck Talbot v Cumnock, or Kilbirnie Ladeside v Beith.

Covering these games was a big deal locally, particularly for the local radio station West Sound. In truth, much of West Sound's sports coverage was supplied by wannabees - more coal men than Coleman, whose egos far-exceeded their talent, but, however badly, they got the job done and an important part of that was getting the Ayrshire Junior League results out by the end of their Saturday afternoon sports programme.

This they usually managed, but, there were one or two club officials, tasked with telephoning in their club's result of a Saturday, who took a great delight on holding off until about 5.58pm before telephoning. You cannot really legislate for that sort of stupidity, but, that apart, I can see no reason why – other than Murrayfield apparatchiks thinking: “speaking to people in club rugby is beneath me” for the shit show the SRU results pages have become.

OK, if the problem is clubs not teleponing Murrayfield with their results – the answer is simple: deduct points from the clubs, they will soon come to heel if that happens.

If however, as I suspect, the blockage is within Murrayfield, well, a few strategically-placed P45s will have an even quicker effect – I could make one or two suggestions, if Alex Williamson wants to give me a call – like Ko Ko in The Mikado: “I've got a little list”.

 

The Saturday Night Slant

REGULAR VIEWERS of the pish served-up herein will need no reminding, I lang syne grew tired of the wonderful efforts of the World Rugby High Heid Yins to kill-off our beautiful game.The old Bufties whose snouts are furthest into the game's feeding trough are clearly showing signs of having taken too-many stray boots to the head, through their addiction to re-shuffling the deck chairs rather than sitting down, reflecting for a while, then re-drafting the Laws of the Game to make them fit for purpose.

One of the results of their indolence and lack of vision is – the game, certainly at its upper levels, has become almost unrefereeable. I (again) fall back on the the advice I was given by one of the High Heid Yins of the SRU's Match Officials department, who told me of Rugby Union's version of that grand old Scots Law catch-all: “Conduct liable to cause a breach of the peace” - the cult of “Materiality”.

This is when the Referee stands back and looks at a pile of bodies and has to decide:

1. Which offence do I penalise here?

2. Was it the home team flanker's side entry?

3. Was it the visitors' number eight not releasing?

4. Did their lock seal-off when he went to ground?

5. Could that centre have got out of there faster?

6. Was there a knock-on in contact – or did the tackler strip the ball?

7. Did that home team lock drive past the breakdown?

8. What about that attempted clean-out?

9. Was that a “croc roll”

10. What would Nigel have done?

Then, while he is assessing his options, his mate, sitting there, nursing a large Grouse in the TV production truck, chips-in to draw his attention to a possible high tackle eight phases ago, which he has only just spotted.

I am surprised anyone would want to be a referee these days. Mind you, that said, I bet Nigel Owens and Wayne Barnes, the top referees of the more-recent past are delighted to be out of the firing line, given the way World Rugby continues to make the job well-nigh impossible.

OK, that's the excuses out of the way; so, how do we reconcile that with Ben Shitehouse's terrible display in Friday night's Munster v Edinburgh game? Before I go there, more wisdom from within the SRU Match Officials team and the explanation I got when I asked one of their High Heid Yins: “how come we get landed with so-many useless Irish and Welsh referees in the URC”?

The explanation: “We try, as far as possible, to have our referees making all their mistakes in domestic games – before we send them up to the URC. The Irish and Welsh let their young referees make their mistakes on the big stage.”

This partially explains Shitehouse's horror show on Friday night. My own view is, he's a typical Welsh official – Nigel apart – Homers to a man. When you see a Team Captain having the sort of one-sided conversation with a match official which Magnus Bradbury was involved in, several times, on Friday night; well, you just know, the Referee's a Homer.

I am positive Big Magnus didn't go back to his men and say, as Wee Fudd once did, after a: “Cut out the fisticuffs” warning to the Captains in a Calcutta Cup clash: “OK lads, let's keep kicking the shite out o' these (English) Bastards,” rather I think he said something like: “Try to cut out the penalties, but, it doesn't really matter – he's going to penalise us any way.”

Shitehouse's pro-Munster bias was that obvious. OK, Edinburgh didn't play as well as they can, the yellow cards definitely hurt them, but, considering they were playing 19 men all night – I am loathe to be too-hard on them.

IF THERE IS such a thing as a “gimmee” in the URC, then Warriors at home to Dragons qualifies. Sure enough, at Scotstoun on Saturday night, Franco Smith's boys got firmly back on the horse with a comprehensive bonus point victory.

Having to replace their Captain after an injury in the warm-up didn't help the visitors, but, give them their due, they made things hard for Glasgow, in particular slowing down the feared Warriors' maul, but, in the end, it was mostly damage limitation for the Welshmen.

Watching the action on Premier Sports, can I just show my appreciation for Tom Shanklin, who again had to try to find positives in another defeat for a Welsh side. He rose manfully to the task and he and the ever-professional Chris Paterson were excellent talking heads.

Alex Craig had an impressive debut, forming a great second row pairing with Scott Cummings, while Gregor Brown was a deserved Man of the Match in a Warriors' performance which banished any carry-over from last week's loss.

Five points banked, job done, move on.

I KNEW, BEFORE 5pm, courtesy of the Ayr twitter account, the result from Braidholm and their match with GHA. I then watched the Warriors' game on TV, before reading young Master Hay's The Offside Line report in full.

So, how come, when I logged onto the official SRU website at 9.03pm, to check the state of the Arnold Clark Premiership table – that's more than three hours after the supposed deadline for clubs telephoning results into Murrayfield – the result was still not up.

All the other outlets had it. I refuse to blame the clubs for this, it's yet another example of how, there are numpties holding down well-paid jobs at HQ, who couldn't get elected dog catcher in an unoppossed election.

But, this poor performance has been on-going since we lost dear old Ron Evans during Clovid. The Junta has been taking the piss for too long now.

MARK BENNETT signed for Marr this week – good luck to the kid, he's better than where he had been playing – West Division One for Cumnock.

But MARR FFS!!! Speaking as an old Cumnock hand, that hurts. They've nicked Coach Steve Raby from Cumnock this season, now they've got Marko. We should be better than a feeder club for that bunch of wannabee posh boys.

Out of interest I messaged one of the High Heid Yins at Millbrae, to find out why Marko would be playing at Fullarton and not reprising his past successful spell in pink and black.

“We couldn't match what Marr are paying him” was the not unexpected reply.

 

Governance And Side Hustles

WE ARE FREQUENTLY told, this here United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland is run by and for “The Hidden Establishment” - the God knows how many times grandsons of the Robber Barons who strong-armed that pudden King John into signing Magna Carta back in 1215. Some descendants of those medieval reformers still have power over us from their place in the House of Lords, while, of course, we must all bow down before King John's distant German descendants in whose name all UK laws are now enacted.

In so much of British public life, it's who you know rather than what you know that is important. Some people, with no official rank of status, somehow have more influence than the next, perhaps better-qualified guy. I still recall reading a piece in the Scottish Daily Express, when that now shamed organ was a half-decent newspaper out-selling every other rival; this was around the time of The General Assembly of the Church of Scotland.

Back then in the days before the Holyrood Parliament, the General Assembly was as close as we got to a meeting which brought all aspects of Scottish life togther and the Express piece mentioned the advice given to a young Elder, attending his first Assembly. He asked his Parish Minister how he voted and what was he to do. The minister pointed out a distinguished gentleman on the other side of the hall: “just follow his lead and do what he does” was the advice.

The man being pointed out was The Right Reverend Baron MacLeod of Fuinary, a gentleman who, even after his year as Moderator of the General Assembly in the 1950s, continued to have massive influence in the Church and in Scotland up until his death over 30 years later.

Rugby Union is not immune from that sort of hidden influence; those of us who have been round the block a few times still recall the influence of Lord John M Bannerman in affairs in the 1950s and 1960s, some 40 years after his days as national captain. Before him James Aikman-Smith's word was law for decades and in more-recent times the likes of Jim Telfer, Ian McLauchlan, Andy Irvine and John Jeffrey have continued to influence matters off the field long after their on-field shift was over.

But today, we are in the age of the Professional Sports Administrator. We have desk jockeys making calls who never had to fall on a loose ball in front of a rampant All Blacks team, or face down an angry Springbok pack at a five metre scrum. Some of the guys making the big political calls on behalf of the Scottish Rugby Union do not have, in the late Sir Bobby Robson's great phrase from his brand of Football: “time on the grass”.

The way the SRU is currently structured, we have three Boards:

1. The Main SRU Board – the members of which are known as: “The Custodians” - when the shite hits the fan, it's them who have to clean-up.

2. The Board of Scottish Rugby Limited – the money-making (or losing) operating arm of Scottish Rugby – here lurk the Chief Executive Officer, the Chief Finance Officer and the paid professionals (or in some cases rank amateurs/chancers)

3. The Club Rugby Board – the representatives of the Clubs, who we are always told “own” the SRU.

No single person is a voting member of all three Boards, but the three principal elected officials: The President, Vice President and Immediate Past President are required, to varying degrees to be the Clubs' (the ultimate owners of the SRU's) representatives on the three Boards.

In recent years, both before and since Professor Lorne Crerar, who drafted the present mode of governance, is Independent Chair of the Custodian Board and is, I suppose, as close as we have to a “Heid Bummer” in our game, came up with this format, we have been lucky with the quality of elected official we have had, but, we have also been in other years unlucky. Where we have been unlucky is in the twat we had as our last CEO, “The Fat Mancunian” or, as I dubbed him: “TCD” - we are still recovering from his almost Trumpian – or is the word Trumpton? style of governance.

Looking into the tent from afar, I sometimes feel the main Custodian Board remains a bit too “hands off”, perhaps unwilling to fully use their powers of oversight. They perhaps see themselves having the same “soft diplomacy” role as The King does in the government of the United Kingdom: being there: “To consult, to advise and to occasionally warn”.

Some feel the Main Board should be doing more to curb the seemingly rampant power of the Board of SRL, while the construction of the CRB – the body which represents the Clubs – seemingly sees the members all representing the interests of small groups of clubs, interests which are not always common.

Another weakness which some of us in the Rugby Media are concerned about is that some of the appointed Board Members, particularly on the Board of SRL, appear to have only limited connection to the game of Rugby Union Football – they are seen at Murrayfield on International Day, but, could not find Mansfield Park without the aid of sat-nav.

One of my own facourite sports teams is the Green Bay Packers of America's NFL. Based in the city of Green Bay, Wisconsin, in Scottish terms, the Packers are the equivalent of Jim McLean's Dundee United - “a corner shop, taking-on and beating the big supermarkets”. The Packers operate in the smallest franchise, and, uniquely in the NFL – a league dominated by billionaire club owners – the club is owned by the fans.

I reckon a British form of the Packers' ownership structure would work for the SRU – the shareholders can buy shares in the club, but, these shares cannot be traded and they grant certain rights and priveleges to the shareholders.

If we take the Scottish clubs as our equivalent of the Green Bay shareholders, enjoying the same rights etc, why shouldn't it work? One of the things the Green Bay Packers can do, is remove the club's off-field management if they are unhappy with their performance – given the bother the SRU had getting rid of TCD, long after we knew he was toxic, and the fact a seemingly equally toxic Heid Yin is still in situ – Green Bay style shareholder oversight would be handy.

OK, the Governance model, introduced by Professor Crerar, has only been operating since 2022, and maybe has still to fully settle down. But, already, there are signs that it perhaps does not work as well as had been hoped for and perhaps a bit more tweaking is called for.

Why? Some of you might ask, has Aristotle gone off on this tangent and ignored the big stair-heid rammy of this week: Gregor Townsend's new “Consultancy” deal with Red Bull?

Well, as Scotland Head Coach, Toony isn't exactly performing Herculean labours; he appears to have a lot of free time between international commitments, so, good luck to him in getting a lucrative side hustle going.

But, on the other hand – he only has one job to do: put a regularly-winning Scotland team on the park, and that really should be a full-time job.

And if he's not giving that job his entire focus, he should get off the pot and let someone else have a go – and the Heid Bummers and the Murrayfield Apparatchiks ought to be making that point to him, in no uncertain terms.