Gerry Thornley On RugbyAfter the debacle of the World Cup, the next two weeks of back-to-back Heineken European Cup fixtures may make or break the Irish rugby season as much as anything that happens in the Six Nations. Yet, increasingly it seems, the provinces are competing on an unequal pitch and with their hands tied behind their backs.
In a curious pattern, the trio of Anglo-Irish games in round one and three Irish-French affairs in the second round are now followed by weekends of a distinctly Celtic flavour. And while the Celts mightn't have the clout of Gloucester, Toulouse, Clermont Auvergne, Leicester and Wasps, the Ospreys now operate out of a modern, 20,000-all seater capacity ground and have brought in Marty Holah, Mike Phillips and others to bring their tally of Test players to 25, including three All Blacks, a Tongan and a Scot.
When Leinster travelled to Toulouse (whose squad contains 25 internationals, 17 of whom were at the World Cup), amongst their ranks were 10 foreign players - three Pumas, one All Black, two Springboks, a Scot, a Fijian, a Tongan and an Italian. That night, Guy Noves started with 15 internationals and brought on another seven from the bench, including four who had played at the World Cup. Leinster had just two capped players on the bench, Luke Fitzgerald and Juan Francisco Gomez.
The provinces are restricted to six foreign players - three of whom are regarded as high profile and three lower profile. A couple of weeks before, Leinster had proposed to the IRFU's hugely powerful seven-man Players Advisory Group (PAG), chaired by Neilly Jackson, that the provinces be allowed to sign six high profile players; that the Union would continue to provide around €140,000 per annum towards the players' salary but, as with the existing three high profile players, the provinces would find the means to make up the difference (the going rate being around double that).
The PAG went to the IRFU's Management Committee and, on foot of Leinster's proposal, recommended that the allotment of foreign players be reduced to four high profile players, in turn duly informing the provinces of this last week.
In reality the provinces would be better off with the status quo. The PAG's stance would, if anything, make it more difficult for the provinces to compete in Europe and even the Magners Celtic League.
Presumably, though, there was no round-table discussion involving all the provinces, Munster would support Leinster's proposal. For Connacht especially, and perhaps for Ulster too, making up the shortfall to sign six high profile players would be more difficult.
While presumably this matter is set to run a little further, in any event, not for the first time, one is left with the undeniable impression that the PAG is too restrictive and political a body. Their stance smacks of short-sightedness in the union's fear of giving the provinces any autonomy.
Leinster's proposal is not especially dramatic, and would merely have served to improve the quality of high profile signings. Thus far, all the mistakes with overseas signings have been at the lower end of the market. Christian Cullen's time at Munster was not a success, but that was just down to bad luck with injuries.
Recalling one former international berating Munster's decision to sign Doug Howlett, for all the Little Ireland, anti-foreigner mentality in the Irish game, it's worth bearing in mind that, say, Munster would surely never have won the European Cup but for the hugely influential performances of Trevor Halstead in the quarter-finals, semi-finals and final. And how much better off would Irish rugby have been if one more indigenous centre had been thrown into the fray at the expense of that triumph?
One would venture not one Munster player would lament Halstead's time here or the impending arrival of a world-class player and finisher like Howlett. Nor would one Irish player bemoan the signing of a foreign player if it made them more competitive on the European front. Above all else, Irish players want to be competing for trophies. Ditto the supporters.
There are those in the IRFU and the PAG who resent Felipe Contepomi holding down the number 10 jersey ahead of, say, Johnny Sexton. But Leinster wouldn't be nearly as competitive against the likes of Leicester, Toulouse and Edinburgh if Sexton was pitched in to outhalf now.
What's more, and this is critical, Sexton ought to learn considerably from being Contepomi's understudy, likewise the 20-year-old Cian Healy from Ollie le Roux (or Tony Buckley from John Hayes for that matter). And, as the darling of the Leinster supporters, Contepomi also puts bums on seats.
In the Deloitte & Touche Strategic Financial Review of top tier rugby, presented to the IRB in October 2006, the club/provincial game was identified as the game's greatest potential for growth and Ireland is a clear case in point. Indeed, of the 13,580 average attendance at the RDS this season, one ventures that this includes a whole new breed of rugby supporter, many of whom haven't been to an international simply because they cannot obtain tickets for them. Pointing out that the game's financial growth in the previous 10 years had quadrupled from €211 million to €844 million per year - though this was still a relatively small share of a global sports market worth €68 billion - the international game accounted for 55 per cent of the figure, and the club/provincial game 45 per cent.
The times are changing rapidly, and there's no greater evidence of this than the recent 10-year deal struck by the RFU with their clubs, in which the RFU pay the clubs £10 million per year for England to have greater access to their frontline players. The IRFU pay €23 million in running the professional game so they can have total control of their 128 professional playing pool.
Furthermore, as part of the deal, the English clubs have agreed that at least 14 of their match day squads of 22 will feature 14 English players, in other words a limit of eight foreign players. While retaining some control and allowing their clubs to remain competitive, this seems like an altogether more far-reaching, ambitious and better value deal.
The rugby landscape is changing radically all the time, but Irish rugby, and primarily the IRFU, seem not to realise this.
gthornley@irish-times.ie
