Professionalism begins to yield rewards

For much of the 90s, and before, the advent of professionalism sparked enough gnashing of teeth for a dentists' convention. But the events of last Friday evening ought to have soothed some of the doubters' frayed gums. This was Irish rugby embracing professionalism and looking damned good in it, too. This was worth celebrating.

This was a squad of contracted and paid semi-professionals and full professionals, coached by a professional director of rugby, beating one of England's elite professional clubs. This was due in no small measure to them undergoing the most intensive pre-season training a Leinster squad had ever undertaken before. This was done to the backdrop of a professionally marketed game and a near capacity crowd of 7,000. This wouldn't have been possible in the rose-tinted amateur era of yore.

Everything about the occasion, both the performance on the pitch and all the paraphernalia that went with it off the pitch, reflected well on the Leinster squad and the Leinster Branch. Mike Ruddock, after all, was only in the job 104 days last Friday.

However, with an intensive training and playing programme, the Leinster team has progressed rapidly. It's the same with Connacht under Warren Gatland. As was said here before the interpros started, Irish rugby is all the better for the infusion of professional coaches from abroad such as these two and Brian Ashton.

Indeed, further underpinning the benefits of professionalism in Irish rugby, it may or may not be a co-incidence that the two victories in Europe (so far) have been achieved by the provinces with full-time directors of rugby.

If nothing else they appear to be fitter than any other Irish sides before. An abiding feature of the Euro games involving the Irish sides is that all of them have been able to last the pace. They've even been going ever bit as strongly as some celebrated opponents at the finish. Untypically, in what is admittedly a crude barometer, the Irish sides scored the final points in five of their eight ties.

But certainly it's easy to imagine that in times' past (amateur times' past) Friday evening might well have been another of those classic Irish moral victories, with Leicester scoring twice in the final quarter to pull away after a gutsy first hour by Leinster. In fact, you only have to go back to last season to find evidence of that.

As Jim Glennon succinctly pointed out afterwards, what the current fitness levels merely prove is how costly the previously inferior fitness levels had been to Irish rugby. And still the Irish sides - with the majority part-timers on a basic retainer of £7,500 - are not competing on a level playing field.

However, Friday also showed that Irish rugby doesn't have to rely on tradition (ie, Lansdowne Road or schools' games) to be a viable proposition. As said here before, the advance advertising, poster campaign, general marketing and match-day scenario (jazz band, temporary stand, bars and beer galore) should be a template for the other branches.

It encouraged a crowd which was already a 2,000 improvement on the game against Toulouse. Pending good results on the road in the next two weeks, the visit of Milan should induce more of the same. Once again, the ground was complete with perimeter advertising - a sure sign of good legwork. The only pity was that the cameras weren't there, for that would have been the best advertisement of all. Alas, continuing contractual difficulties between the IRFU and RTE meant that Irish rugby is still absent from our screens indefinitely. Still, the whole effort reflected well on the Leinster Branch.

By contrast, as workers continued their demolition of the Arms Park main ground on Saturday, barely 4,000 attended the Cardiff-Munster game on the adjacent pitch. One band was the only concession to any sense of occasion for the punters as the executive set quaffed whatever behind their glassed boxes. Scarcely 2,000 were at the Stoop for Harlequins' visit of Bourgoin. Even the Brive-Pontypridd affair apparently attracted only 4,500 and it was interesting to note that the receipts for the Moseley-West Hartlepool second division game were a mere £1,600.

Coupled with early performances, one suspects that like English football, its rugby counterpart is rather bigger on hype than it is in substance.

If Irish rugby can get even more progressive and professional, it might come out of this transitional phase with more than their heads above water. Heck, they could even become trend setters. But before this becomes a backslappers ball, as Glennon also observed, one swallow doesn't make a summer.

It's worth bearing in mind that the Irish provinces have still only manufactured one win out of six in the Heineken Cup. This is one less than the Scots, although taking Conference results into account the comparison is more equitable.

The fall-out from the Brive-Pontypridd game gave the lie to rugby's hallowed tradition for exchanging blows on the pitch and nothing more than a few pints afterwards. That, allied to a some roughouse games have seriously damaged Welsh-French relations, and shown the latter in their other, less savoury light.

Inconsistent interpretations of the tackle/ruck law and advantage law, and some rank bad decisions (usually favouring the home sides) has also highlighted the many teething problems for the European Cup. Independently appointed, professional referees is surely the only way forward.

As for Irish rugby, it's still at something of a crossroads. In funding the provincial players' contracts to the tune of £1.3 million, it's natural that the IRFU still wants to keep a grip of more than the purse strings. But the provinces need more autonomy to compete on something resembling a level playing field with their European rivals.

As chance would have it, Leinster have been able to offer Trevor Brennan the fulltime contract which Henry Hurley had to relinquish (and which was signed last night). But there are other players of Brennan's calibre out there - Alan Quinlan springs to mind - and six full-time contracts doesn't give the provinces sufficient clout to keep their best young players from covetous, wealthier cross-channel clubs.

Nor do one-year contracts enable the coaches to plan ahead. The structure of the season doesn't help. A summer AIL, followed by the first half of a six-series interpros, the European competitions, then the completion of the interpros and a Celtic Cup leading into the Five Nations, would make more sense.

Failing that, and possibly leaving the provincial coaches without a team from October onwards, all the representative coaches should have more flexibility and scope for manoeuvre in contracting players. Their hands are tied to a degree.

Much, much more could be done to embrace professionalism. Last Friday at Donnybrook merely pointed the way.