League gets going with a spring in its step

MAGNERS LEAGUE PREVIEW: Other competitions may have more hype but the improving Magners League can back up its case with statistics, writes Gerry Thornley

THE MAGNERS LEAGUE kicks off this weekend and at the eighth time of asking with a clear spring in its step as opposed to the slightly apologetic and even desultory starts of previous years. Nothing conveys a more serious intent than the availability of the Irish Test players from the opening weekend, for nothing grated with their Celtic cousins more than the Irish stars being wrapped in cotton wool for the first few weeks of the campaign.

At a stroke it sends out a message that this is a tournament worth winning.

David Jordan, the Celtic rugby director, maintains this is because "the evidence of last season's World Cup is that selectively resting players is not always the best way to ensure optimum performances", but he is possibly stretching things slightly.

It may simply be because of the new sense of harmony between the Irish management and the provinces in the wake of Declan Kidney's appointment, for he has been there and bought the t-shirt, much like Frank Hadden had when assuming command at Scotland straight from Edinburgh and then reversing a similar policy.

In any event, Jordan sounds a good deal more upbeat about the league's well-being than the sometimes frustrated figure of recent years, given his hands are largely tied by the three unions, and the self-interest which has helped to stymie the league's development heretofore.

As Jordan is keen to stress, the 2009-10 campaign comes with the advent of, as he puts it, "a more rhythmic calendar, with 20 weeks set aside for the Magners League fixtures, and top four play-offs."

It hardly seems fair that a team finishing fourth of ten can ultimately win the big prize, and a personal preference would be for a top three play-off, particularly bearing in mind the size of the league.

Nevertheless, it will ensure a fitting sense of climax to the league, in line with all the other leading non-Test rugby competitions in the world, and in front of bigger crowds and bigger television audiences. A less welcome novelty this season, at the behest of the competition's broadcasters Setanta, is the advent of Sunday evening matches.

The English clubs and Welsh regions are believed to be in talks to hold a cross-border competition from next season onwards, but during the autumnal and/or Six Nations windows. Hence, it will not impinge upon the Magners League as it has done.

However, the EDF Cup remains this season, and in order to squeeze a square peg into a round hole, its impact is immediate - with all four Welsh regions obliged to play their first three games in the first seven to nine days of the league.

Partly because of the bigger television bucks and Sky's slick packaging, the Magners League tends to have a slight inferiority complex towards the Guinness Premiership, whatever about the over-bloated and more imbalanced French Top 14. And while the Magners League clubs may not be in the market for Daniel Carter - rumoured to be on €700,000 for his six-month sojourn at Perpignan - the organisers dug up some statistics last week to show the league compares favourably to its European counterparts.

The average attendance at Magners League games in 2007/08 was 6,791; the fourth successive season of growth, during which time the average gate has increased by 78 per cent. Leinster's average league gate of 14,361 is only bettered in European rugby by three teams - Stade Francais, Toulouse and Leicester Tigers.

The Premiership has often been described as the most competitive league in the world, based on the average winning margin (the difference in points between the winning team and the losing team).

But, aside from having five different champions in the last six seasons. in last season's Magners League the average winning margin was just 11.13 points per match over the course of the 90 games; the closest results of any professional league in the world.

Similarly, the widespread impression is that the English and French leagues are where the stars reside. But the Magners League organisers maintain that in every matchday 22 last season in the league there were on average 10.8 fully capped international players - the highest proportion of Test players of any professional league in the world.

The English Premiership (9.5 players in each matchday 22), France Top-14 (8.5) and Super-14 (8.3) trail the Magners League.

Less surprisingly, last week's release states that "189 'home grown' Test players appeared in the Magners League last season - 76 internationals from Wales, 59 from Ireland and 54 from Scotland, the highest domestic talent total from any league in the world. By comparison the Super-14s had 161 'home' international players appear during 2008 - split very evenly 54 from both South Africa and Australia and 53 from New Zealand."

And, lest we forget, a Magners League team has won the Heineken European Cup in two of the last three seasons. In the long run, European glory remains the holy grail for the other contenders as well as Munster, not least Leinster.

Michael Cheika's side have proven they don't just pay lip- service to the importance of the league though, and have the reserves of strength and support level to demand they become the first side to retain the title.