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Despite weeks of training in Limerick, RG Snyman and co have yet to meet up with the whole Munster squad
By Online Editors
Johann van Graan has shed light on the unusual situation currently existing in Irish rugby, explaining how the new signings at Munster such as RG Snyman have yet to even meet up with the full squad despite being at training in Limerick for some weeks now.
Irish rugby is hoping to be part of the Guinness PRO14's restart on the weekend of August 22 after the season was shut down in March due to the outbreak of the coronavirus pandemic.
A series of new signings have since arrived at the club, including 2019 World Cup-winning duo Snyman and Damien de Allende, but they have largely been kept at arm's length from their new teammates due to the pandemic return-to-training protocols.
“Damian, RG, Matt (Gallagher) and Roman (Salanoa, Leinster) haven’t even met the whole squad because we have been training in small groups so guys are meeting each other over Zoom and Microsoft teams," explained van Graan on the Munster website.
“Everybody knows the ambition and dreams that we have as a club and it’s important to note that if you look at the four individuals, they all come from championship-winning teams and that is something that we want to become. Everyone would play tomorrow if we could because we are certainly missing the thing that binds us all together, which is the game of rugby."
Premiership Rugby officials have reported that 13 of its players have tested positive in recent weeks for coronavirus ahead of the August 14 restart of the league in England, but players in Ireland have so far reported a clean bill of health.
“Who knows what will happen in the coming weeks so we will just take it day by and luckily that is something we have been doing all along. We just hope that we can all keep to our government guidelines and keep everybody healthy and safe and hopefully play a game of rugby again," continued van Graan.
“We don’t see it as having to finish a season. When we started four weeks ago, we started with a new season and that was an important step for the team because we have some very good players that have moved on. We had to make a definitive stop and move on towards the future.
“There is a PRO14 to finish but we see that as the first competition that we’re playing in for the coming year. We’ve got two rounds of games to go and if we are good enough, we’ll qualify for the semi-final and there is potentially a final so that’s the way we’ve looked at it.”
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The only benefit of the draft idea is league competitiveness. There would be absolutely no commercial value in a draft with rugby’s current interest levels.
I wonder what came first in america? I’m assuming it’s commercial aspect just built overtime and was a side effect essentially.
But the idea is not without merit as a goal. The first step towards being able to implement a draft being be creating it’s source of draftees. Where would you have the players come from? NFL uses college, and players of an age around 22 are generally able to step straight into the NFL. Baseball uses School and kids (obviously nowhere near pro level being 3/4 years younger) are sent to minor league clubs for a few years, the equivalent of the Super Rugby academies. I don’t think the latter is possible legally, and probably the most unethical and pointless, so do we create a University scene that builds on and up from the School scene? There is a lot of merit in that and it would tie in much better with our future partners in Japan and America.
Can we used the club scene and dispose of the Super Rugby academies? The benefit of this is that players have no association to their Super side, ie theyre not being drafted elshwere after spending time as a Blues or Chiefs player etc, it removes the negative of investing in a player just to benefit another club. The disadvantage of course is that now the players have nowhere near the quality of coaching and each countries U20s results will suffer (supposedly).
Or are we just doing something really dirty and making a rule that the only players under the age of 22 (that can sign a pro contract..) that a Super side can contract are those that come from the draft? Any player wanting to upgrade from an academy to full contract has to opt into the draft?
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You’ve got the perfect structure to run your 1A and 1B on a quota of club representation by Province. Have some balance/reward system in place to promote and reward competitiveness/excellence. Say each bracket has 12 teams, each province 3 spots, given the Irish Shield winner once of the bottom ranked provinces spots, so the twelve teams that make up 1A are 4 from Leinster, 3 each from Connacht and Munster, and 2 from Ulster etc. Run the same rule over 1B from the 1A reults/winner/bottom team etc. I’d imagine IRFU would want to keep participation to at least two teams from any one province but if not, and there was reason for more flexibility and competitveness, you can simply have other ways to change the numbers, like caps won by each province for the year prior or something.
Then give those clubs sides much bigger incentive to up their game, say instead of using the Pro sides for the British and Irish Cup you had going, it’s these best club sides that get to represent Ireland. There is plenty of interest in semi pro club cup competitions in europe that Ireland can invest in or drive their own creation of.
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