Edinburgh Evening News reports

Paterson in plea for more R and R
BILL LOTHIAN ([email protected])
PLAYER rotation systems are increasingly becoming a part of modern sport and, as stakes increase globally, Edinburgh and Scotland rugby skipper Chris Paterson insists the concept is here to stay.

And Paterson believes it is time the powers-that-be recognised the need to protect professional players from injuries brought on by the increased demands of the modern game.

"I do feel for the fans who want to see top players turning out all the time, whether it is in football, rugby or cricket, but we have reached the stage where, as games are played more frequently and with extra intensity, something has to give," claimed Paterson.

"I've watched squad rotation start to develop in football and, if they require it, then most certainly we do, too, in rugby which is even more physical. In the past five or six years the level of physicality and even brutality in rugby has risen massively and that is the nature of the times in which we live with commercial balances always having to be struck.

"But, while this increase has been occurring, extra games have been arranged and, frankly, it needs to be addressed not by players or coaches but by those responsible for implementing structures.

"This is not a moan because, as a player, you want to play every time. What's more, if you are left out, you become unbearable because of wanting to be on the pitch. Everywhere I look in sport, it seems the teams with the biggest squads are the ones who are most successful and I think in rugby we are fortunate that through closer connection with our fans, some of the pressures to play all the time might be more easily resisted.

"I know there are people out there who will say 'look at the car he's driving and the house he lives in' so why shouldn't every fixture be fulfilled. But there will always be folk who say that and where rugby players benefit is that we do a lot of the necessary recovery work in our local health clubs.

"At Edinburgh we have a deal with David Lloyd's and some of our fans can see us going for our rehab on a Saturday morning after a Friday night game. Fans do notice what our bodies go through as we pretty much struggle to walk to the pool or gym. Hopefully that helps supporters appreciate that, generally, for what we put ourselves through we are not massively well paid - we get an honest wage.

"Hopefully, being in the public domain as we undertake some of our training for speed, weight-gain, fitness, power, core stability, team planning and even injury prevention helps generate respect because, when you put all that into a week, there's not a lot of time left."

Paterson has touched on one of the great sporting dilemmas. With television money pouring into sport, how do clubs continue to give value for that money if they don't play all their stars every week?

Even cricket is affected, Paterson acknowledges, since the season now lasts all year round as a means of providing "live" entertainment. Without checks and balances, he says, the long-term losers will be the supporters who are sold short in terms of maintaining a high standard of play.

In Scottish rugby, where most professionals are centrally contracted and where even the privately-owned Edinburgh club players are invariably expected to prioritise national team commitments, fierce arguments develop every time a weakened side has to be fielded around the time of Scotland matches.

Paterson admitted that club versus country matters had potential for conflict but urged understanding on the basis that top players can't turn out in every match anyway and have to rest occasionally.

"What Scottish players tend to be up against is a structure which requires us to turn out up to 40 times a season. Contrast that with Ireland or the Southern Hemisphere where central contracts mean a limit of about 25 matches and it is easier to see how they are currently doing so well.

"I'm convinced everybody at Murrayfield has the players and the game's best interests at heart but where we are up against it is in matches with English clubs.

"I understand where the owners of Gloucester, Wasps, Northampton etc are coming from in wanting everything from players they have signed and whose wages they pay. But they are beginning to get round that situation by signing huge squads, including overseas players who aren't going to be away during England's international programme.

"In the case of Edinburgh it is often a matter of finding fifteen fit players - but there is another way. Taking into account the growth in physicality surely it is time to consider shortening the rugby season to something akin to American Football where they play for several months fewer each year?

"Cutting right back on fixtures would be even better than cultivating an approach where players maybe turn out for up to 60 minutes of an 80 minute match - that way standards would shoot up. I regularly look at games on television that are pretty dull, boring and quite slow. I think this is because the players have played so may matches already, including several against the very same opponents.

"If you are fresher you can play flat out all the time and surely that is better for everyone - especially the fans. That way, too, the closed season could last considerably longer, allowing players to develop better conditioning.

"It is a fact that, in Scottish rugby we get just three weeks off in summer by the time you return from a Scotland tour and begin the build up to the new domestic campaign. We make the best of it and increased awareness of the inevitability of squad rotation in all sports will help.

"But there has got to be a better way so that teams like Edinburgh turn up for training with everybody fit and hungry to fight for a place raising standards along the way."

In calling for change Paterson remains philosophical on how his generation of players has benefited from the increased exposure the modern game receives, but with this comes extra demands too and he

remains convinced better balances need to be struck.

"There is a way ahead and it based on reducing the number of matches. "Players will be missing out, too, because what we really want to do is play - but that is the nature of the times in which we now ply our trade."

This article was posted on 9-Jan-2007, 20:28 by Hugh Barrow.