The Future of South Wales Rugby

http://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/0/rugby-union/22201954

Unfortunately the WRU and regions chose the wrong time to have a stand-off because the lack of success at club level coupled with diminishing 'stars' playing locally can only equal more people watching football at the expense of club rugby

Totally shooting themselves in the foot.

I have nothing against rugby at all but I would like our nation to be know for more than just that. Wouldn't want it to come at the expense of the grassroots game though. It would be a shame that local football's gain would come at rugby's expense.

Have they finally realised that Rugby is not the national sport and is far dwarfed by football. Apart from those 6 weeks in February/March.

i raised this issue several weeks ago. there was a debate over it involving messers hall, norster, cuddy, ridsdale, kingsley-jones and an academic guy from cardiff uni.
the an other said that it was not a problem with a solution, but a predicament for south wales rugby. if ccfc continue to rise then it could be acute for the blues and we may find them desperate to come back to ccfc.

The problem will be with kids in the remaining hard-core rugby areas being more attracted to football than rugby.

It's an arguement that started in the late 1960's when the former grammar schools (in Cardiff anyway) had to offer football to those who didn't want to play rugby.

I was caught up in the middle of that and although I will always support everything Welsh about rugby, at least on the field, the crass "parochialism" and (God knows why) desire to look down at football, off the field, leaves a bitter taste in my mouth.

They fully deserve to be in the position they find themselves.

TDA wrote:The problem will be with kids in the remaining hard-core rugby areas being more attracted to football than rugby.

It's an arguement that started in the late 1960's when the former grammar schools (in Cardiff anyway) had to offer football to those who didn't want to play rugby.

I was caught up in the middle of that and although I will always support everything Welsh about rugby, at least on the field, the crass "parochialism" and (God knows why) desire to look down at football, off the field, leaves a bitter taste in my mouth.

They fully deserve to be in the position they find themselves.

Even though I grew up in the eighties, I faced exactly the same thing and feel much the same way about it.

Arkay Dubya wrote:

http://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/0/rugby-union/22201954

The inability of Welsh Rugby to manage itself properly has nothing; absolutely nothing to do with the rise of Cardiff City into the Premiership. The seeds were sown right at the beginning of the true professional era in Rugby Union. For years the top clubs in Wales have regretted turning down the invitation to join the English Premiership system.
That the "s**t hitting the fan" in Welsh Rugby has coincided with Cardiff City gaining promotion is purely coincidental.

NN2Red2 wrote:

Arkay Dubya wrote:

http://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/0/rugby-union/22201954

The inability of Welsh Rugby to manage itself properly has nothing; absolutely nothing to do with the rise of Cardiff City into the Premiership. The seeds were sown right at the beginning of the true professional era in Rugby Union. For years the top clubs in Wales have regretted turning down the invitation to join the English Premiership system.
That the "s**t hitting the fan" in Welsh Rugby has coincided with Cardiff City gaining promotion is purely coincidental.

Spot on!
City's promotion and the arrogance of the regions isn't going to help though. The comments from the Blues hierarchy when they decided to return to the Arms Park defied belief. The Cardiff City Stadium, they stated, was soulless, sanitised and lacked atmosphere. Perhaps they should have been in the crowd for the Forest and the Charlton games!
The real reason why the Blues couldn't hack it at the CCS was the team, or as the WRU would say, the produce, were crap.
Unfortunately suffering from 'head in the sand syndrome' will not however help to solve their problems.

I (clearly) support Cardiff City, but I also support the Gwent dragons. Birmingham doesn't have a professional rugby side but if they did I would support them, the dragons is purely because they're the closest thing I have to a 'local' team.

I guess people like me have to face harsh realities sometimes - if both are playing Saturday then I can only feasibly go and see Cardiff or the Dragons. Invariably 9 times out of ten it will be Cardiff City. It's not the difference in success, it's not the slow rot of the welsh rugby teams, it's just deep down I prefer football to rugby.

It does fundamentally however mean that it is indeed footballs fault my own passion for rugby has been stemmed. Most sports fans tends to like lots of sports so when you put everything on the same day you force us all to make a choice. Instead of tackling football head on and apparently failing, they should look to see if they can accommodate for people to watch both their football teams and rugby teams with minimal cases of their seasons clashing.

Red614 wrote:I (clearly) support Cardiff City, but I also support the Gwent dragons. Birmingham doesn't have a professional rugby side but if they did I would support them, the dragons is purely because they're the closest thing I have to a 'local' team.

I guess people like me have to face harsh realities sometimes - if both are playing Saturday then I can only feasibly go and see Cardiff or the Dragons. Invariably 9 times out of ten it will be Cardiff City. It's not the difference in success, it's not the slow rot of the welsh rugby teams, it's just deep down I prefer football to rugby.

It does fundamentally however mean that it is indeed footballs fault my own passion for rugby has been stemmed. Most sports fans tends to like lots of sports so when you put everything on the same day you force us all to make a choice. Instead of tackling football head on and apparently failing, they should look to see if they can accommodate for people to watch both their football teams and rugby teams with minimal cases of their seasons clashing.

Separation:

When I was in Leeds, in the late 70's early 80's I used to go and watch Leeds Rugby League; they were just around the corner from where I lived in Headingley. Football was on the Saturday; Rugby League was played on the Sunday. But eventually the Rugby League has to change the season and become more of a Summer sport to avoid the juggernaut that is Football in the UK.

The Aviva Premiership Clubs have done OK competing against football; Leicester Rugby get crowds of over 20,000; London derbies can pull in over 70,000 at Twickenham - but the structure in England was always based on the Clubs; not artificial entities that eventually staggered into becoming the four Regions in Wales.

What was a strength for Welsh Rugby in the "Shamateurism" days - a large number of good clubs in a relatively small area - was a hindrance as the game turned professional and parochialism in Welsh Rugby stopped the hard decisions being taken from the start in terms of taking the professional game forward.

I like my rugby and I don't like to see the top level of "club" rugby in Wales looking such a mess. Maybe Cardiff and Swansea both being in the Premier League might focus minds, but I'm really not sure what a successful outcome will look like. Maybe the WRU will just hope that Cardiff are relegated quickly!
And being from Newport I would like to think that Rodney Parade would still be involved.