well....


no they're Inglish

Chairman of the RFU on Simon Mayo's show on BBC radio 5 live this afternoon.
I've just sent my question in:

[iSimon, could you ask Martin Thomas how he sees the present state and the future of club rugby considering the financial plight of some of the major clubs, the player drain to France and the calls for the salary cap to be raised.
Great show and good luck to Ireland this weekend.[/i

Look forward to hearing the answer tonight when I get back from work on the listen again service.

Not necessary. Simon Mayo has just asked him 'How do you see the present state and the future of club rugby?'. I know Mayo is a big rugby fan, but would it have been so difficult to actually ask him the whole question I sent?

The RFU chairman, Martin Thomas just reeled out Television figures and the fact that Harelquins sold out earlier in the season

If they finish top yes.

I do not think Wales have been a patch on last season and Gatland must have been tearing his hair out that they have taken a backward step but to be still in with a chance at this stage is probably more of a sad reflection on England and Scotland than anything else.

It will be tight and although Wales might just edge it I think it will be close enough to give Ireland the title.

Get in there. What a game!!!

By a lonely prison wall, I heard a young girl calling...

from what ive read on here and on a couple of websites the deciding game was awful.

great article

[urlhttp://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/sport/rugby_union/article5946900.ece[/url

Well done Ireland. Love or loathe RU you cannot deny that they have some good players who desreve to win a trophy or two.

As a loather I could only name O'Driscoll in the Irish side so have no idea whether they deserve to win or not. Prefer anyone over England tbh.

Wasps sign Steve Kefu, Dan Ward-Smith and Tom Varndell on 2 year deals

Wouldnt go so far to say "great article." Full of stereotype and conjecture. A sport he doesnt like is getting a bit of attention and he doesn't like it.

Its all opinion though.

As you said, it's all opinion. Having not lived in Ireland and therefore experienced what the writer has experienced I wouldn't want to use the words 'stereotypes' and 'conjecture'.
Interesting to see that the majority of the chosen comments are favourable towards rugby union.

A couple of rather tame affairs in this weekend's EDF Energy Cup Semi Final double header.
the crowd of 30,000 meant that it didn't sell out, despite there being four different teams playing and confident predictions from the RFU and the competition organisers that it would.

Friday's two Magners League's games drew crowds of 2,208 and 3,651.

Strange place to stage them, though, the Ricoh Arena, Coventry, home of the mighty Sky Blues. The football ambience must have filtered through, as both games were very turgid affairs.

Caught the end of the Ospreys/Gloucster game. The internationals in the Ospreys side looked a bit knackered. Some poor decisions making by the Ospreys in the danger area.

Dont think may give two hoots about the EDF Energy Cup. Seemed like the RFU trying to have a "magic weekend - lite." Backfired a bit.

There has been a push to get Coventry rugby union to grow with a few high profile union games being held there.
Plus Coventry is bang in the middle of the Leicester-Northampton-Worcester triangle making it a perfectly sensible place to have union events.
This and the fact that the English fans were at most an hour away make the attendance all the more disappointing.

news.bbc.co.uk/sport1/hi/rugby_u ... 972036.stm Saracens rugby union club are losing between two and £3 million per year and according to Nigel Wray all of the other rugby union premiership clubs will be doing the same. I don't care what walk of life you come from or what planet you may live on, any entity whether it's a business, an individual or a top flight sports club you cannot continue to trade for long losing this amount of money.

news.bbc.co.uk/sport1/hi/rugby_u ... 972036.stm Saracens rugby union club are losing between two and £3 million per year and according to Nigel Wray all of the other rugby union premiership clubs will be doing the same. I don't care what walk of life you come from or what planet you may live on, any entity whether it's a business, an individual or a top flight sports club you cannot continue to trade for long losing this amount of money.

[iWray denied Saracens would effectively become a South African club in exile, although he cited Arsenal as a football club that has continued to thrive despite a paucity of English players in the first team.

He said: "How many Arsenal fans are worried that there's one Englishman in their side? The answer is they sell out every week. It's about winning, the fans don't care.

"I'm not in the slightest bit worried because we've got nothing to lose. We are not sustainable as we are at the moment." [/i

What planet is this guy on? Utter disregard for the fans and the history of the club.
As a poster on the BBC forum said '[iI hope they get what they deserve - an empty stadium and relegation, they're going to ruin a great club'[/i

They should have been held at the millennium stadium, but the date clashed with the Wales _ Finland Football. Given the respective crowds perhaps the fottlball should have been played in Coventry & the Rugby in Cardiff.

The football drew less than 30,000?

yep. approx 22000 & they're considering a class action under the trades description act.

Still doesn't mean that four 'top' rugby union teams drawing an average of 7,500 fans each for the semi finals of an important competition is anything less than embarrassing.

In this case I think the location didn't help. Had the semis been at the Millennium Stadium you could have added at least 10,000 to the crowd. There was 24500 in there for the Blues - Gloucester game in the Heineken cup.

As I've said, it was bang in the middle of Northampton, Worcester and Leicester (the best supported rugby union club in England).

The EDF is an important competition to the bank manager, but that's it.

It falls well below the Heineken Cup and the Premiership on the players and fans radar.