WHETHER SCOTTISH RUGBY?

I HAD hoped, by publishing Clubfans' recent post, to stimulate some debate on the vexed question of where Scottish Rugby was headed. Sadly, these hopes have not materialised, to the extent, I fear the various factions within our game are sitting in splendid isolation, talking among themselves, but, seldom to each other. This, I fear, is not a healthy situation.

The FOSROC Super6 clubs appear happy with their lot. The successful SRU-backed amendment to the GHA/Hawick motion to have S6 disbanded and replaced by an old-style Inter-District Tournament has guaranteed S6's short-term survival until Season 2023-24. The suggestion is, even before then, S6 will become S8 and hopefully, beyond then, S10. So, I would reckon, Super Rugby will be around until at least the end of this decade.

Super Rugby has also been confirmed as being “Performance Rugby,” rather than part of the community game, so, maybe now, those clubs and clubmen who don't want S6 to survive and blame that tier of the game for all the ills befalling Scottish Rugby, will look elsewhere for a whipping boy.

Here's a wee thing I noted. We are nine weeks into the S6 season and five weeks into the club season. To date, S6 has a 100% match completion rate, (27 of 27 matches played). The four “National” Leagues: The Premiership and National Leagues 1, 2 and 3, have a joint 94.5% match completion rate, (104 of 110 matches played).

When you get further down, into the real grass roots of Regional Rugby, the position is even worse. The overall regional completion rate, during the first five weeks of the season is 79%, (196 of 249 matches played). The Regional figures are:

• Caledonia Region 73% completion (88 of 120 matches played)

• East Region 87% completion (48 of 55 matches played)

• West Region 81% completion (60 of 74 matches played)

Therefore, overall, in the first five weeks of the new season, only 83.6% of the scheduled first XV club games were actually played.

When you get down to the lower XVs, the story is even worse. A check of the official SRU fixtures and Scores pages on their website reveals, to date, since the new season opened on 4 September, only 71 of 131 scheduled Reserve team games have been played – 54.2%.

The Regional breakdown here is:

• East Region 58.7% completion (37 of 63 matches played)

• West Region 50% completion (34 of 68 matches played).

The overall figure for adult male games played since September shows only 371 of a scheduled 490 matches were played – 75.7%

Murrayfield – You Have A Problem

When one game in four is cancelled during the opening month of the season, when the pitches are firm and the weather is, on the whole, good, and you cannot get the guys to play – something is very wrong.

It's not up to the SRU to get guys playing locally, it's the job of the individual club. Each club should be asking itself some searching questions:

• Are we keeping kids interested when they are ready to move up from Youth to adult rugby?

• Are we making them welcome?

• Are we encouraging them to improve and keep playing, even at a lower XV level?

• What is our conversion rate – from youth to adult rugby?

• Can we improve this?

• Have we got local schools offering rugby?

• If not, can we at the club step in and grow the game?

• Are we doing enough to get people involved? Have we enough volunteers, or is it a case of a handful of fanatics keeping things going?

• Are we doing enough to keep the players we have involved and active within the club?

• Have we got enough former players, perhaps successful local businessmen, involved with the club as sponsors or supporters?

• Could we improve our social media presence?

• Are we using the local mainstream media well enough to perhaps interest converts, as players or supporters?

• Are our facilities, clubhouse, changing rooms, pitches of a good enough standard to attract and keep new players?

• If not, what can we do to sort out our failings?

The future does not look too bright either. A glance at the Youth and Schools Results pages on the official SRU website is a tale of unplayed games. OK, Covid is a factor, but, when public schools which have been playing rugby for over a century are struggling to field XVs, the game as a whole has a problem.

While putting together this post, I had a look at the Glasgow Herald sports pages for 1981 – 40 years ago. Their Monday results service identified 40 schools in the West of Scotland which played rugby. Of these schools, 33 were state schools.

Today, in the SRU Boys West Schools Conference A, six schools compete:

Glasgow Academy, High School of Glasgow, Hutcheson's Grammar School, Kelvinside Academy, Marr College and St Aloysius College. Of these six schools, only Marr College is a state school.

In SRU Boys West Schools Conference B, we find six teams: Cumnock Rugby, Hills Rugby, Lenzie Rugby, Lomond and Helensburgh, St Columba's Kilmacolm and Strathendrick/Balfron High School.

Only St Columba's of these six teams is a single-school entity, the other five are alliances between a school and a local club. However, I am not implying these 12 teams are the only ones in the vast West Region providing rugby for boys.

Yes, rugby took a serious hit with the Teachers' Strike of the mid-eighties, but that strike was in 1985 – 36 years ago. Surely we should be long past blaming that for the current ills.

My own view is, at the time, the SRU took no responsibility for trying to overcome the problems which that strike threw-up, suddenly, teachers who had been quite happy to spend unpaid hours supervising and coaching rugby teams found other uses for those hours, most never came back to the game. But, I doubt if there are any, far less many teachers who dropped out of rugby coaching back then, who are still at the chalk-face.

It seems to me, the SRU were quite happy to concentrate their schools effort on those public schools who were generally unaffected by the strike. They have allowed a situation to develop where, only a handful of private chools matter – Murrayfield cares little for the state sector.

Yet, it is in the state sector that we have the greatest potential for growing and developing the game. The Development Department should be concentrating their fire on the state schools, getting out there, selling rugby, hard, as a great sport to play.

The talented kids will take care of themselves, the cream will, as always, rise to the top, but, we have to be doing more for the rest. To quote Iain “The Bear” Milne: “We need more bad rugby players playing.”

I don't think we are going to get them from the current staff of the Development Department. As one weel-kent club official said to me last week: “That department is not fit for purpose.” Now there's a familiar statement around Scottish Rugby.

As a matter of interest, here are the rugby-playing schools I was able to identify from the Glasgow Herald of 1981:

Ardrossan Academy, Auchinleck Academy, Ayr Academy; Bearsden Academy, Bellahouston Academy, Belmont Academy, Boclair High School; Camphill High School, Cumnock Academy; Dalziel High School.

Dumfries Academy, Duncanrigg School, Earnock Academy, Eastwood High School, Garnock Academy, Glasgow Academy, Greenock Academy, Hamilton Academy, High School of Glasgow, Hillhead High School.

Hutcheson's Grammar School, Hyndland Secondary, Irvine Royal Academy, Jordanhill College School, Keil School, Kelvinside Academy, Kilmarnock Academy, Lanark Grammar School, Larkhall Academy, Lenzie Academy.

Lomond School, Marr College, Paisley Grammar School, Queen's Park Secondary, Rosehall High School, St Aloysius College, St Mungo's Academy, Shawlands Academy, Stranraer Academy, Turnbull High School.

The private schools are in italics. I accept, some of these schools have since closed, others have amalgamated, I may have missed-out on one or two schools (such as Oban High School), which were offering rugby back then. But, I am certain, there are no longer that many schools in the West of Scotland offering rugby today.

Get the kids playing at school, the keen ones will transfer to the clubs and the game will flourish. Ignore or fail to capture this captive audience for the game, and it is done for. This is the task facing Scottish Rugby.