SCOTLAND ON SUNDAY REPORTS
IAIN MORRISON
THERE are reputedly only seven jokes in the world, with every humorous story simply an adaptation of one of them. In similar fashion, there only seems to be about seven rugby stories in Scotland, although any laughter they evoke is usually of the hollow variety.

So it is that once again the holiday season looms without Scotland's rugby fans getting the gift they ask for every year, a team in the Heineken Cup play-offs. Two years ago in Toulouse, Frank Hadden promised that Edinburgh's appearance in the Cup quarter-finals would not be repeated unless the purse strings were loosened and so far he has been proved correct.


Both Scottish sides were well beaten on Friday night which was perhaps expected in the South of France but the Firhill scoreline was a little disappointing. Still, there are signs of hope for all three teams. The Borders are enjoying their best ever season and Steve Bates has won admiration for the way he makes a little go a long way. Glasgow struggle when hit by illness and/or injury but if the squad is short on depth it has an excellent first XV. The young scrum, the front and back rows especially, has been a revelation and should develop into a fearsome unit given a little time and a following wind. The benefit of having someone of Jason White's aura and experience playing alongside their young forwards can only be imagined.

Edinburgh look even better qualified to progress and the day they avoid Toulouse in the group stages perhaps they will. The Gunners beat Wasps in Edinburgh and should have done the same to Llanelli at Stradey Park (which, incidentally, is about to disappear under a housing estate while the Scarlets move to a brand new facility). Once the capital side learns to win the really tight games, the ones that Martin Johnson's Leicester would invariably steal at the death, Edinburgh will be contenders.

The next few months are important ones for the city side because a host of their household names are out of contract come the summer and they will need their signatures if the club is to take the next step upwards. They also need to learn to live AB (After Blackadder) and whoever is chosen to replace the big Kiwi as coach will surely have a huge say in determining whether Edinburgh's stock rises or falls.

There are obvious signs of improvement on the field but the biggest controversy surrounding the pro-teams takes place not on grass but in the profit and loss ledger. The teams lose money. Lots of it.

There is no apparent agreement about the total cost of running three separate teams. The Union puts the net figure, after allocated income has been taken into consideration, at £4.8m. Others insist that, if the full cost of running the clubs was allocated to them, the actual figure would be nearer £7.5m.

For the purpose of this argument it doesn't really matter because the fact remains that without the financial burden of running three pro-teams the SRU would post a profit and with a £20m-plus hole in the books that is exactly what accountant Gordon McKie has been brought in to do.

Something has to give and inevitably the prospect of one team folding is back on the agenda (remember there are only seven rugby stories in Scotland). In truth the, subject has never really been off the agenda but the recent crowd at Netherdale has inevitably brought it back to the top because just 1,000 Borderers paid to watch their team beat Castres last Sunday.

Positioned in a town of 14,000 souls in a region that boasts no more than 100,000 all told, the Borders were always going to be a financial gamble but unless the locals learn to love their own pro-team it may not be there much beyond next season. Something similar could be said of all the three teams because fans have been strangely reluctant to get behind professional rugby in this country regardless of the team involved.

Glasgow attracted just 1,759 to their old/new home at Firhill on Friday evening and will need to do much better in future. Even Edinburgh, offering their supporters the best stadium in the country bar none, couldn't quite persuade 5,000 people to watch them play against the European champions. Munster took almost as many travelling fans to Newport when they played the Dragons last weekend.

If the Union cannot significantly increase revenues, they will need to cut costs, and after two years of doing just that there is little enough fat left on the three pro-teams. Instead they are crying out for an injection of cash and they need to look beyond Murrayfield to find it because the Unions' coffers are as empty as a bank balance on Boxing Day.

All of which points to a deal, with outside investors taking a controlling stake in one or more of the pro-teams and trusting that the fans' current cynicism about the game is not terminal.

One or two world-class names would bring some much-needed excitement to the sport in Scotland. Jonah Lomu looked hopelessly out of sorts against Calvisano last weekend but still attracted a full house to Cardiff for the return match. More importantly, the cash could be earmarked for facilities because, sadly, Scotland has nothing like the 12,000 seat Arms Park stadium that houses the Blues.

Through a combination of political indifference and short-sighted policies that would shame Mr McGoo, the facilities in Scotland tend to discourage rather than encourage attendance, with Meadowbank as exhibit "A" for the prosecution. When the opportunity to upgrade does arise it is ignored. Why the Meggetland redevelopment was allowed to continue without making it a suitable size for the city's pro-team to take up residence is anyone's guess.

Fans want to be able to drive, park, eat, drink and watch the match sheltered from the worst of the weather and Scotland has precious few places where those simple pleasures are possible. Meanwhile, the rest of the rugby world marches onwards. Stade Francais are refurbishing their Paris home at Stade Jean-Bouin and the announcement was made by the city's mayor. Civic responsibility towards sport is taken seriously somewhere but not, alas, in the country that produces the fattest kids on the planet.

With decent facilities on offer - and the brand new Falkirk Stadium is probably the best about - attracting a viable number of paying punters should not be beyond the means of man. If those facilities include a bar, restaurant, gym or conference centre then the owners can expect to make money from them for more than two hours at the weekend.

Getting the right facilities in place looks a tall order but with stability returned to the centre of the game and the cost of entry at historically low levels, a few intrepid investors just might be tempted. It has been done before. In both the north-west and north-east of England, Newcastle Falcons and Sale Sharks have proved that rugby can conquer even areas that are situated outside the game's traditional heartland.

Both clubs attract 7,000-odd spectators when a big team comes calling and both have achieved that by offering good facilities: Sale moved to share Stockport County's Edgeley Road ground and Newcastle completely redeveloped Kingston Park to its current 10,000 capacity. When Sir John Hall started the whole Falcons venture a decade ago, Newcastle boasted no more supporters than Glasgow had at the time.

Recent results suggest that the English league is probably more competitive than its Celtic counterpart, but probably not by as much as some would have you believe. The main difference is that the Guinness Premiership has marketed itself wonderfully well, never mind that much of the rugby on display would make you weep with boredom. Former Wasps and Gloucester boss Nigel Melville admitted as much recently when he spoke about the "dour matches that have littered the Guinness Premiership". Too many of them emphasise the physical aspect of the game at the cost of speed, agility, deception and all the others facets of rugby that delight spectators.

There is something primitive and pleasing to aficionados of the game, especially large round ones with cauliflower ears, about the drama inherent in endless five-yard scrums, but rugby needs to appeal to those beyond its traditional base - and that is especially true in Scotland where that base has never been very big.

The Celtic League certainly plays its part with more free-flowing rugby and less emphasis on the rolling mauls that blight the English game and seem to last until the spring. The more adventurous spirit of the Celtic teams is undoubtedly aided and abetted by the absence of relegation, just as it is in the Super 12, soon to be re-branded the Super 14. The Celts don't have to copy the English model but rather pick the best bits from around the world until they have a model that suits them.

The decision of Brian O'Driscoll to buck the trend and re-sign with Leinster was as much a vote of confidence in the Celtic League as in the Dublin province. Moreover, the Celtic League boss, David Jordan, declared himself hopeful that a long-awaited sponsor would be announced shortly, possibly as early as January of next year. Just as importantly there is a realisation that matches need to be scheduled at the same time each week and that very issue was discussed at a Celtic league meeting only last week.

The Celtic nations have an agreement that takes them to 2009 and they have a real chance to re-launch their league as the Northern Hemisphere's Super 11, concentrating on fast, attractive and athletic rugby. In other words, the sort of stuff that has seen the game's popularity grow exponentially in the Southern Hemisphere while helping the "big three" to dominate the world rankings for much of the last decade.

It is vitally important that the Scottish teams take better advantage of the rugby revolution that has turned the game on its head almost everywhere but here. There are plans afoot to give Scotland's pro-teams more independence from Murrayfield which is a good thing overall but it won't, in itself, solve anything.

In the end, the whole issue comes down not to romance, history or even Christmas wishes but something far less appealing and far more certain: maths. The Union needs to increase revenue or cut costs.

In the absence of outside investors or a sudden upsurge in crowds through the turnstiles or, in all likelihood, both of the above, the future for the professional game in Scotland looks bleak.

Scottish rugby could be reduced to just six stories, with none of them getting any funnier.

A BRIEF HISTORY OF PRO RUGBY IN SCOTLAND

1995: The game goes professional but Scotland sits out the first year.

1996: Scotland enters three districts, the Borders, Edinburgh and Caledonia, into the Heineken Cup, with Glasgow competing in the second-tier Conference.

1997: Players become full-time professional but were released back for club duty when not required by the four district teams. Three teams were in the Heineken Cup with Edinburgh playing in the Conference.

1998: At the end of the 1997-8 season, the decision was made to cut the four districts to just two professional teams, with the Borders and Caledonia the unlucky ones.

2002: The newly re-formed Borders team is back in existence as Scotland expands from two to three professional teams at what was to prove a difficult financial time.

This article was originally posted on 18-Dec-2005, 08:54 by Hugh Barrow.
Last updated by Hugh Barrow on 18-Dec-2005, 09:00.