Broonster and other Crossers with rugby connections may wish to comment on this; given the possible implications for Holy Cross and other
Scottish Cricket clubs:
http://sport.scotsman.com/rugby/David-Ferguson-Seasonal-shift-needed.5968865.jp
'Start by scrapping winter rugby for all youth and club levels'.....
Posts
It'll never happen. Too many 'aye beens and ayeways will bees' involved in the Scottish game.
ReplyDeleteglad to hear it.
ReplyDeleteso we can discount it...like Boris becoming PM...
Britain needs more BoJos!
ReplyDeleteI've been to the Genesis meeting a few years back. The SRU spent £750k on a 'think tank' to produce a blueprint for the game. We sat at Murrayfield for a day listening to nonsense, stats and sheer fantasy then wrote things on post-it notes and stuck up on the walls.
Did anything pioneering come out of this? No. Just Alistair Gray with a healthier bank balance.
The topic of Summer Rugby comes up every time temperatures dip below 5 degrees in this Country. One thing appears to be missing in a lot of it - who consults the players? I was never asked when I played about whether or not I'd like to play in the winter or summer. The Committee would make their decision and take it to the AGM and vote on what the Committee decided.
There simply arent enough sports facilities in the Capital for a start to go round. A lot of School playing fields take down their posts for Athletics before the end of the current season ends (hence Edinburgh's decision to move from Myreside) and for Cricket.
I don't know what the answer is, but shifting the calendar has been discussed at nearly every SRU led meeting I've been to! It doesn't tie in to the IRB calendar for International Rugby and this seems to be one of the main blocks.
But remember - hard pitches bring their own injuries - popped shoulders, knackered knees etc. It's easy to say shift the dates, but will it really help?
And finally, I just dont think enough people care!
ReplyDeletethanks for that, Broonster-I hope you're right
ReplyDeleteSummer rugby and football seems to be inevitable. Then when they move they will find it doesn't make much difference. There are hardly enough facilities about to accomadate cricket, never mind traditional winter sports as well. There are only so many potential players around. I used to play rugby and cricket as the seasons perfectly overlapped. If they were both summer sports, people can only play one or t'other. You'd lose half your potential player pool just like that. All sports would probably suffer. What is so obviously needed is proper investment in recreation and sporting facilities so that if the weather is too bad, we can train and play indoors. We have three 50,000+ stadia in Glasgow, none with a roof. Look at the Amsterdam Arena, Gelsenkirchen or the NFL for what can be done with stadia. Another of my old favourites is the national cricket facilities at Mary Erskine which we couldn't get access to for winter nets a couple of seasons back due to (I think) a badminton tournament. Laughable. Or what about the changing rooms at Arbo? The argument that all these things need paid for is all very well if we weren't chucking billions at private companies to prop up incredible pay deals or purchasing the latest uranium tipped wedding party ending missile to drop from an unmanned drone in Afghanistan. With a majority tory government looming, with a mandate to slash public funding everywhere, I can't help but sound like WE'RE ALL DOOMED!!!!
ReplyDeleteInteresting post Frazerio! I still can't see the move ever happening.
ReplyDeleteThe SPL are adamant and gloves, scarves, hot pies and Bovril will win the day for the status quo: http://news.bbc.co.uk/sport1/hi/football/scot_prem/8434852.stm
Rugby wont move as its not compliant with the overall global rugby structure and lets face it, a couple of weeks lost due to no play isn't exact cause for panic and reform? Have a 4 week winter break and get rid of the pointless Cup Competitions.
Investment in Sporting Stadia or even basic Council-led improvements on facilities just clearly WONT happen in Edinburgh. The Council, with a reported £250m black hole in their finances (where did the £25m surplus from 2004 go?), certainly dont see parks / sporting facilities as their priority to spending money. Staff cuts aplenty being announced to save money (but the Millions they pay in redundancy payments will be counterproductive here surely?) and don't even start on the Trams...
Perhaps the Council could get of thyne erse and collect the £15m of unpaid Council Tax from last year (or the £117m since it's introduction in 1997)
Look at the knee-jerk reaction to Glasgow 'winning' the Commonwealth Games. Building all sorts of facilities that clearly should have been there before now, but the Council didn't really care.
Maybe the Cricket and Rugby Club should work together to get the Pavillion restored to it's former self by getting in the faces of the local Councillors and be like a dog with a bone until something is done. Get the media onboard and basically lets embarrass our City Faithers into getting something done. I'll put my hand up to help the ball rolling if there are others willing to fight with me.
Finally, I don't agree with your throw away comment re slashing public funding from the impending Conservative Government. The inept SNP/Lib Dem Coalition in Scotland has shown that they couldn't organise the proverbal in a brewery hence the state that our Local Authorities are in.
If you're trying to get me onto politicals, beware, my ideal scenario would be an independent Scotland with Sheridan & Galloway leading the two main parties. Tell me that wouldn't get folk interested in politics again.
ReplyDeleteIn this new utopia, there would exist many small states, one of course being Arboretumia (twinned with Catalonia) where an elite sporting institution would rise from the humble cricket and rugby clubs therein residing. After marching on the city chambers and demanding some fancy new portakabins and a larger wheelie bin, a brick for brick replica of the MCG is built (inadvertantly blocking out all light at our fragrant neighbours (smellies of course!!!) leading to their demise within 2 weeks). Err, I've forgotten where I was, or am, or was going...
Part of the issue for both cricket and rugby is that at a grass roots level its not being played in schools. Lack of equipment for proper cricket and a fear of the litigation from injuries sustained learning rugby see kids (myself included) having to play 'Kwik Cricket' and 'Touch Rugby League', despite having passionate games teachers who played both sports, you could see there frustration.
ReplyDeleteMy school had a Football team and through my years a started up cricket team as we had 13 lads who played cricket outside of school for clubs and the school realised they could get some good ratings from a successful cricket team for 5 years, once we left it died, there was no one following us up in the years. It never had a Rugby team.
The other thing that sports miss about summer sports is an issue the Cross are very use to. We lose players to family occasions, holidays, weddings throughout the summer when these things are held, not because its the football/rugby off season, but because the weather, schools and work situations are built around a summer getaway.
Finally, if you can't get people off their backsides in the winter to play the sport, it won't suddenly make them play in the summer, this isn't about people protesting bad weather, its simply why play the sport when i can sit at home and watch it on my Sky TV? Ultimately teh death of grass roots sport will be because of Sky, no matter how much money they generate for governing bodies to pump in.
all getting a bit political here!
ReplyDeletewith a General Election taking place soon, Mr Admin will have
ensure that this blog remains disinterested in such matters...
You asked for me to comment....
ReplyDeleteThe words China and Google are starting to fill my mind here, cje.....
'The words China and Google are starting to fill my mind here, cje.....'
ReplyDeletehow dare you suggest we'd employ the type of measures found in a place such as China...North Korea perhaps:
http://tinyurl.com/ybctgdc