It's almost the last game of the season for me with other commitments on weekends that have (apparently)
been in the diary for some time, a prospect that, I have to say, fills me with some sadness, having been lucky enough to be part of the match day set up this year, more so than in previous years with Gully moving on for health reasons late last season. Sad loss that, to be fair, and someone whose influence I've really missed this year.
So this will be my last away game with three to go after today - Richmond (A), Nottingham (H) and Bedford (A) to round it all off. I have to say though, I've really enjoyed being part of the scene and getting to know the players better. The ones who forget their ID when travelling to Jersey (or leave their boarding pass on the bus as we get to the airport), the quiet ones, studious ones, the ones who need an ear now and again. Bit like a family really, with brothers, sisters and cousins coming round all the time. And Coventry rugby, I'm proud to say, is a family. Big one maybe, but it's given me a home, like a wayward son I suppose.
Anyway, the league... But to what end? Wasps parachuted into the Championship despite, at this point anyway, having no ground, no club and no players - that we know of. Worcester no more. End of. Ealing denied promotion for a second time despite having access to more money than the RFU themselves at this point London Scottish likely relegated. I say likely, because last weekend I was given RFU inside gossip that there are plans for a 12, or 13, or 14 side Championshp next season with the most likely being 13, but an outside bet on 14. That 14 scenario, as given to me, suggested that Wasps, Rams and Sale FC (not the premiership Sale) would come into the league and LS relegated. Or not. Or, and here's the controversial bit, Newcastle having been offered £10m to take relegation and not to be promoted back into the Prem at the end of the 23/24 season.
So here we are. Again.
Three games from the end of the season with no idea how to prepare for next season in terms of the squad we'd need to cope with the league. And Cup, if that happens in the way Jon Sharp suggested this week.
So, if only for me and my last game this year, come to the Nottingham game and celebrate what has been a brilliant season for us, third as we stand today and likely to be there in three weeks, with a squad that a lot of people suggested would be lucky to finish 6th, a squad that shed tears when we beat Ealing at their place, a squad who have shown us all that they want to, can and do play attractive, winning rugby and who make the Championship the best spectators league in the UK.
All very much said as a family insider.
Whistle Watcher
Nearly the End - but Still no Nearer the Answers?
Posted by: Unofficial Coventry Rugby (IP Logged)
Date: 08/04/2023 10:40
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Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 2023:04:20:18:39:17 by Kimbo.
Rugby clubs are businesses and like all businesses it involves forward planning. It is bad enough when clubs, because of the nature of the sport and competition dont always know if they are being promoted or relegated until the fixtures play out. But at least that scenario creates some fan excitement.
But this on going situation of non decisions by the RFU regarding Championship, Nat 1 and Nat 2 is a joke.
The other day I took the opportunity to take part in their survey to help shape the future of rugby. Well how that survey will help shape the future of rugby is beyond me. Nothing on Nat 1 and Nat 2. I think I only got questions on Championship because I answered a question on being a fan of a Championship side.
The questions were very GCSE and not really about making the top 4 tiers of rugby stronger and more attractive.
The RFU seem to be soley focused on International rugby and the Premiership. They seem willing to disrupt any progress teams in the lower tiers try to make by meddling rather than structure and pathways. Meanwhile their darling Premiership is withering on its own vine.
For me until they package any sponsorship and tv deals across Premiership, Championship and National 1 the sport will continue to stagnate. But most of all it needs a dependable structure and not one open to change every six months or fans waiting after the season has started for the cup format.
Premiership teams routinely getting their bottoms kicked by European teams blame the salary cap
How about blaming themselves for their greed ?
We produce equally as good players, in fact more of them. How many Scot, Irish and Welsh players have English accents !
But premiership teams want to undermine the biggest pool of rugby players worldwide by bringing in foreign players on fat salaries.
We need to develop our own, not drive players away because they can't earn a living.
The RFU are useless, they propagate their own failures and that of England.
Now they parachute Wasps 2 into our division, a team without morals. Pick up and move on with the RFU's blessing.
We've had a great season this year, so proud of Cov doing it the right way, developing players.
Lets be quite honest its the middle of april and nobody knows anything about season 23/24. Even the name of the company with the rights of wasps has changed a week ago,(halo23) maybe thats a sign of things about to be announced. Wasps will continue to dominate the headlines, with their own forum generating incredible amounts of vitriol and self importance when the total sum of money misused was astronomical. Yes it does matter the quoted figures vary from £85 million to over £100million, imagine the good that sort of figure would do in the development of the game. Stability has been in short supply in our game and our league. We have ealing now relying on its lawyers more than its players, Wasps unknowns without any sting in the tail at this point,Wuss which has a wiff of Andrew Green all over it......However in amongst the gloom against all the odds has been a team virtually assembled from nothing that plays out of the butts, playing a great brand of rugby and excelling all expectations. The odd wise and mature head has certainly helped fuse a team together, one that cannot be written off. Its always difficult to compare teams of previous eras and seasons but Alex Raes TEAM has done a wonderful job and next season will have have some big markers to surpass. My grandson has completed his first year as a season ticket holder and now his sisters are joining him for 2023/24.
Where to start, a history lesson.........................the rugby unions sanctioned rugby taking the money, but the English RFU did not want the responsibility of running it, indeed someone who was in the room told me they downright refused to have anything to do with running the game. Time came to pass and they had to talk to each other, the RFU wanted players so had to pay the clubs for them. The clubs decided that the money would be pooled and all the clubs shared the money, even if they produced zero players, they all got the same dosh, still do. So England to compete at the 6 Nations and later World Cup need players who can compete at the world level. Seems the nation and most rugby supporters want that, so they need each other. Me? I'd ditch the England set up as it is, it doesn't work, the National side isn't performing, when we did and won the world cup, nothing was made of this legacy. Clubs in the other leagues, well they are what they are, it would be nice if they could share some of the lucre the cash cows like the Autumn International games make, but with an unrepresentative organisation running the show, accountable to no-one except themselves, self serving, corrupt? who knows. There are some clubs doing their level best to run a rugby team and make the environment to bring on young talent from the game to continue the merry go round. There are chancers putting next to nothing into the sport and leaving a trail of destruction and chaos behind them. The closed shop has to go with realistic opportunities to reward success with promotion and failure with demotion. Tarnishing all Premiership clubs with the same brush and blaming them for the woes of the Championship and below is aiming your bullets at the wrong target, proper, accountable governance from the top, with proper league rules without false hurdles is the way forward and to do that we need to change the RFU.
Total shambles really does not cover how OUR game bumbles along, even despite and because of having over a quarter of a century of errors, mistakes,cock ups,down right stupidity and criminal intent. The game sits at a crossroads, will there be yet another premiership team bite the bullet during the summer. The stress free season at cov has been a breath of fresh air and one i certainly was not expecting. There has obviously been an environment which the players have flourished in.
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