THE SCOTSMAN REPORTS

Clubs ready to back move for bigger leagues
DAVID FERGUSON
SCOTTISH rugby is poised for another shake-up at next week's annual general meeting, which could begin to clearly separate amateur from professional rugby in Scotland.

Heriot's and Glasgow Hawks, two of Scotland's leading clubs, have withdrawn a motion which threatened to derail the SRU's new academy system for professional rugby players. The motion was effectively the latest move by top amateur clubs to keep in touch with the fast-paced developments of professional rugby, but they found themselves fighting a losing battle.

Stirling County, recently relegated from Division 1, produced a counter motion for expanding leagues and revamping the Scottish Cup, which spelled out a desire for club rugby to divorce itself from the professional game and look after its own interests. That infuriated the Hawks, but has met with growing support among Scottish clubs and the SRU, and now looks likely to be passed in some form next Friday.

Ray Mountford, the County vice-president, insisted: "We are working very much in tandem with the SRU on this, and we agree that the academies are the right route to the professional game. We are no longer the stepping stone for quality young players heading into pro or international level, although we will continue to develop players and hope we see them finally become Scotland stars of course.

"We will now have the academies to better prepare players for professional rugby, but we also need to ensure a lively, financially viable club game and that means matches week in, week out, not long breaks in the spring. Expansion of the leagues to 14 teams would allow meaningful 15-a-side rugby to be played throughout the season, but we have offered two alternatives to stimulate the debate - a 14-team league option and a 12-team league option.

"Some clubs will not support a change without a 12-month notice period, but a number of clubs believe it is nonsensical to wait. But we refute categorically the suggestion that this is about self-interest for Stirling County; it is what we believe is in the best interests of Scottish rugby, as a whole."

Ironically, Stirling could soon have its own professional presence, with Graham Burgess, the Aberdeen oil businessman, in talks to buy Glasgow and move the team to groundshare with Stirling Albion at Forthbank Stadium, but Mountford believes that will merely highlight the different spheres amateur and pro rugby now inhabit.

It was only a year ago that clubs voted to cut the existing 12-team leagues down to ten, in what was seen as an attempt to allow the country's leading youngsters to play in the club game and then leave after the turn of the year for national squad duty in various championships around the world. Glasgow Hawks and Heriot's were heavily involved in drafting that plan, but their recent motion demanded a clearer protocol, insisting that the 40 or so professional players left out of the 1st XV of Edinburgh, the Borders and Glasgow each weekend, must play in the club game, rather than in academy/ development matches.

However, Henry Edwards, the SRU's head of player development, met the clubs recently and explained that only six development games were planned per team, with players regularly returned to their "club of origin". That persuaded Hawks and Heriot's to drop their contentious motion.

Kenny Hamilton, the Hawks chairman, remains critical of the County proposals. He said: "Scottish rugby is generally supported and administered by fair-minded people, and I believe that no fair-minded person could possibly believe that changing the rules and prize for a competition two months after its completion could be considered fair."

Mountford countered: "It's an insult to question our credentials in such a way. What most clubs who have well- established development structures in place find unfair is the expectation of the few clubs who do not that players must leave their club of origin to have any chance of a professional career."

This article was posted on 24-Jun-2006, 09:51 by Hugh Barrow.