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London Scottish bow out as fixtures for 2020/21 Championship season revealed
By Sam Smith
The fixture list for the 2020/21 Greene King IPA Championship has been confirmed, although one club has opted out of the new season. London Scottish will play no part in the new campaign, which kicks-off next month, but intend to return to the league next season.
In a statement accompanying the fixture list, it was confirmed that London Scottish "felt unable to participate this season." The league will instead comprise of 11 clubs, who will play 10 competitive matches over 11 league rounds, before a two-legged play-off final in June.
The details of the upcoming season were outlined in a league statement:
"Following loan assurances from Government as part of the Winter Sports Survival Package, 11 Greene King IPA Championship Clubs have elected to invest in COVID testing under the elite sport guidance framework to allow a start to the season on the weekend of 6 March 2021.
"Operating under the elite sport framework, teams will play each other home or away producing 10 competitive matches over 11 league rounds.
"This will be followed by a two-leg play off final (home and away) between the top two placed teams in the league to determine which will earn promotion to Gallagher Premiership Rugby for the 2021/22 season provided it meets the current Minimum Standards Criteria.
"London Scottish felt unable to participate this season but will return in the 2021/22 season. As a result, there will be one bye week per team and three reserve weekends (3/4 April, 8/9 May and 5/6 June) during the season."
Saracens start their campaign away to Cornish Pirates on March 6 before welcoming Jersey Reds to the StoneX Stadium a week later.
The full fixture list for the 2020/21 season can be found here.
The league also confirmed that it is hoped to stream "as many of the matches as possible" given the ongoing absence of supporters at sporting events.
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Stephen Larkham, Mick Byrne, Scott Wisental, Ben Mowen, Les Kiss, Jim McKay, Rod Kafer.
There are plenty of great Australian coaches who could do a better job than Schmidt.
Go to commentsThis piece is nothing more than the result of revisionist fancy of Northern Hemisphere rugby fans. Seeing what they want to see, helped but some surprisingly good results and a desire to get excited about doing something well.
I went back through the 6N highlights and sure enough in every English win I remembered seeing these exact holes on the inside, that are supposedly the fallout out of a Felix Jones system breaking down in the hands of some replacement. Every time the commentators mentioned England being targeted up the seam/around the ruck or whatever. Each game had a try scored on the inside of the blitz, no doubt it was a theme throughout all of their games. Will Jordan specifically says that Holland had design that move to target space he saw during their home series win.
Well I'm here to tell you they were the same holes in a Felix Jones system being built as well. This woe is now sentiment has got to stop. The game is on a high, these games have been fantastic! It is Englands attack that has seen their stocks increase this year, and no doubt that is what SB told him was the teams priority. Or it's simply science, with Englands elite players having worked towards a new player welfare and management system, as part of new partnership with the ERU, that's dictating what the players can and can't put their bodies through.
The only bit of truth in this article is that Felix is not there to work on fixing his defence. England threw away another good chance of winning in the weekend when they froze all enterprise under pressure when no longer playing attacking footy for the second half. That mindset helped (or not helped if you like) of course by all this knee jerk, red brained criticism.
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