EDINBURGH EVENING NEWS REPORTS
BILL LOTHIAN
THE future of Edinburgh Gunners and other centrally-run professional rugby teams was today firmly in the melting pot after Murrayfield bosses announced major financial cuts.

Following a board meeting yesterday the governing body outlined a series of measures with heavy emphasis on Edinburgh, Glasgow and Borders.

The SRU has attached priority to finding investors and in a key move have emphasised willingness to give up a measure of control. This centres on areas such as selection and availability of players for Scotland's squad sessions.

The SRU currently has a core debt of £23 million and the board were facing a potential projected loss of £2-3m on top.

The statement said: "Scottish Rugby will seek to enter into joint venture partnerships with external investors over one or perhaps more of its three professional teams. The governing body remains open-minded about which professional team or teams ... and where they would be located." Later the statement adds: "If suitable terms cannot be agreed and opportunities don't materialise we'll sadly have no alternative but to further reduce our investment in pro team rugby between now and the start of next season."

Besides clearly placing the pro teams on a sticky wicket the union today announced further additional cost cutting. This includes:

• Scrapping Scotland Under-21s apart from in world championships.

• Scrapping the Scotland Sevens team.

• Scrapping Scotland Under-19s, with the possible exception of a World Cup.

Fundamental to the planning is to bring more players into an extended National Academy structure.

Gordon McKie, SRU Chief Executive, said: "Scottish Rugby has lost over £20m in nine of the last 11 years. Our budget priorities now dictate this long overdue action.

"The changes to our representative teams are much needed. Historically there's been a serious lack of proper preparation and intensity of competition which has resulted in a consistent inability to compete meaningfully.

"We will introduce properly structured player development programmes which will allow more young players to make the grade."

This article was posted on 28-Apr-2006, 17:50 by Hugh Barrow.