Yeah we’re playing Fiji (H) mate. Tricky enough game if the Fijians are still in the same mood as last years World Cup.
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Is there a Centenary Quaich type trophy to crown our famous rivalry with Fiji?
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The difference a good coach can make
No
Joe Schmidt is a serious operator.
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There’s surely some sort of diddy cup/shield/vase on the line
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The Aisake O’hailpin Vase
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The Ned Kelly cup would be good. Trophy being Ned Kelly’s bullet ridden helmet or a set of shackles.
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Wales giving an exhibition tonight under Coach Bellamy. With the likes of Brennan Johnson and an in-form Harry Wilson the glory days may not be completely gone.
Good article. God bless the IRFU
The Welch consistently railing against the URC looking over the ditch at the premiership as their saviour when there are clubs going under there regularly. Strong clubs underpin a strong national team…vast majority of funding should go into strengthening the clubs and building a pipeline of players again…I think Davies saying they should be planing for the world cup in 6 years time might even be ambitious.
I’d say if you added up the number of games that the Welch players this weekend have won at club level over the past three years you wouldn’t get to 100 combined across whole squad. That losing habit and culture very hard to break by going up a level to international rugby
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There’s no enthusiasm for the regions. Probably the same for the Scotch but at least they’ve concentrated the talent into two franchises so better chance of being competitive.
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Good shout, at least theyd eventually have one decent team then
There isn’t…but until there is they are going nowhere
The Welsh have been making excuses since professional rugby started
Firstly they had too many clubs
Then it was they didn’t like regions
Then they demanded the Anglo Welsh Cup which fucked the scheduling for the Celtic League at the time. The Anglo Welsh Cup collapsed year later
Then they blamed Irish provinces for not always fielding their strongest teams
Then they played their attendances on the games being free on S4C and BBC Wales
Then they backed the breakaway European competition with qualification from the league (to cosy up to the English)
Whatever about the English have made their fuck ups with club rugby, the Welsh should never be listened to.
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Are there any actual examples of merged clubs working anywhere in world sport? Outside of the GAA? Sampdoria maybe?
A point I’ve continually made is Irish rugby was extremely lucky with Ireland’s geographical peculiarities which meant you had four ready made provincial teams with a pre-existing identity. That number was just right for professional rugby but the pre-existing identities of the provinces, which came from society and wider sport - not just rugby - were the key.
Scotland and Wales had no such pre-existing regional identities.
Mergers of clubs breeds apathy and division. This is the case in the NRL, the AFL, Super League in England.
The Welsh public doesn’t give a fuck about the regions as they are either pre-existing clubs (Cardiff and Llanelli) or are pure mergers and thus have no identity (Ospreys and Dragons).
There’s no easy fix to that.
The only fix possible is a UK and Ireland super league and the Welsh are quite right to want one.
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A proper UK and Irish super league would have relegation which would likely mean teams like Dragons/Ospreys and even Connacht in a second division which is not something the IRFU or WRU would favour.
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You could have two divisions of 12 or 14 with promotion/relegation or two conferences of 12 or 14 with fixtures arranged a bit like the NFL.
Wales just don’t have the money in rugby.
Ireland is an economically rich country but if there wasn’t that private schooled investment in Leinster we’d be struggling too.