Another year older and a little wiser

Another year older and a deeper in debt? Almost certainly, but another year on in rugby's turbulent teething stages of professionalism, and as a watershed nears, there are also some signs that the game is a year wiser.

Nowhere has the professional era been more unsettled than in England, with the ripple effect spreading worldwide. It was thanks to a few hawks amongst the English club owners that the European Cup was held to ransom, with not a little unwitting help from a suppliant English RFU. Just as arrogantly, the latter themselves held the bedrock of the Northern Hemisphere game, i.e. the Five Nations Championship, to ransom over television rights.

Thanks to the unmitigated arrogance of a few English club owners who applied their business principles to the sport and leisure industry, the market place was grossly distorted; thereby upping the ante for everyone else, including the IRFU. And they, like the Scots and Welsh, are now also paying above the odds.

When their grandiose hopes for the Allied Dunbar League didn't come to fruition, the English clubs and their umbrella organisation EFDR blamed everyone else in sight, be it the IB, the unions or ERC. They never blamed themselves. They wanted unmitigated self-control, "to let market forces dictate". Heaven knows where we'd be now if that had happened.

Their long-term commitment to rugby has since been demonstrated by John Hall's departure from Newcastle and the game, along with Ashley Levitt from Richmond, leaving the latter, whatever about the former, on the brink of extinction.

NOTHING, it is said, concentrates the mind like impending doom and perhaps that is also the main reason why the English game now seems to be coming to its senses. To begin with, under threat of an e.g.m. this summer from the so-called Reform Group, Twickenham, the RFU's Board of Management has been considerably reformed.

For good or for bad, Fran Cotton is back on board, while on the board itself only Bob Rogers and the chairman Brian Baister survive. In what is surely a conciliatory gesture to the world game, the respected Bill Beaumont has been elected as one of the RFU's two International Board representatives ahead of Twickenham's chief executive Francis Baron. All of which may even forestall the need for a summer bloodletting.

Meantime, of course, the English clubs have come back into the European fold, having shot themselves in the foot by boycotting this season's competition. Reality dawns. But there have, and will be, casualties aplenty aside from the many players whose contracts will not be renewed.

A half-empty Twickenham for next Saturday's Cup final between Wasps and Newcastle is testimony to the clubs' and the RFU's short-term thinking - indicative of which was the flawed Sky deal (more money but less people watching the game) to the exclusion of terrestrial television, as well as the decision to expand Premiership One from 12 to 14 clubs.

Now, the club owners have decided to revert to a dirty dozen, whether by fair means or foul, and have turned savagely on each other. With London Scottish about to be absorbed by promoted Bristol, EFDR have swooped on the lamest member of the pack, Richmond, by seeking to exercise their right to buy out a club in financial peril. To whit, they have offered the administrators £700,000 for Richmond, not to save them, but to kill off the third oldest club in the world.

"The arrogance of these people is unbelievable," exclaims the Richmond president Tony Dorman. "They have been in rugby for two years and have decided it's time that a club that has been in business for 138 years should cease to exist."

With friends like these, there could be a salutary lesson in this episode for London Irish. The defeat at home to Saracens last Saturday week ultimately looks like costing London Irish a place in the top six and with it a place in next season's European Cup and, more importantly, an estimated £1 million plus in additional revenue.

Given the estimated annual costs of £1.5 million a year, presumably most if not all of the £2.8 million raised through the share issue of two years ago has been spent. Apparently, they are seeking to raise another £2 million through private investment, but that could take a while.

No doubt part of Sunbury could be sold for housing development, especially given next season's move away from their spiritual home to the Stoop and the inhospitable Harlequins - further diminishing the club's Irishness. Quite why they need a 15,000 all-seater capacity at Sunbury when their biggest ever crowd last month against Bath didn't even fill the current 7,000-plus capacity is a curious one. You'd worry about this club's future.

By contrast, the casualties in the Irish game have been few, which shows the wisdom of going down the union-controlled, provincial route. Imagine if the clubs had been let loose here?

The IRFU have still to grasp the nettle regarding the tug-of-war between the clubs and the provinces. Next season's the European competitions dovetail every fortnight with the AIL. There could be trouble ahead, remembering the precedent set by Harry Williams when he withdrew all his Ulster players from AIL action a week before the European final.

THAT remains the highlight of what was, by and large, a positive if volatile season for Irish rugby.

Team of the Year: Er, ahem, Ulster?

Club of the Year: Buccaneers. Constitution were the best, no question, but if ever there was an argument for going beyond the AIL champions then this was it.

Biggest disappointment of the Year: Ireland losing to France, though we'll forgive Humphreys that one.

Try of the season: David Humphreys' chip and gather from Sheldon Coulter's catch up the blind side against Stade Francais, and sprint from half-way.

Picture of the season: Humphreys' try-scoring dive in perfect harmony with the Bank of Ireland perimeter advertisement. But no property rights on that for young David.

Player of the season: David Humphreys.

Personal moment of the season: The eve-of-atch reception in Aras an Uachtarain the evening before the European Cup final, the splendiferous surrounds, and finally getting to meet the great person in question. Yep, David Humphreys was there too.