The Rugby structure in Ireland

whysomoody

I was doing some analysis on how rugby is currently set up in Ireland and where our resources go in terms of development and facilities, but most especially in terms of where our best players play i.e. which is most important.

I think at the moment the IRFU have set up the current hierarchy would be

• Ireland Team, Senior Provincial Team, Ireland 20's, Provincial A Teams, Schools Teams, AIL.

I am not sure about people on here's stance about this, but do people believe that the AIL should be given a more prominant role in developing player or should we pigeon hole people as quickly as possible to create a more professional environment.

At the moment a player coming from school is under pressure to get himself into one of the provincial foundation places and whilst the players who make it in there are given a great taste of what Pro rugby will be about, due to limited numbers there are often going to be more than capable players missing out.

I was thinking that it might have been more benefical for them to feed into a more competitive AIL team, where they should be under the same routine as with the development contracts (so they do not miss out on conditioning) and it also helps to give more players a chance to step into the shop window, especially late developers who might put on a couple a KGs in the mean time etc.

What are your thoughts?

Lawstudent1

Things are changing. Jonathan Sexton stated in a recent interview that he was rewarded for his form in the AIL by Leinster when he lined out for Marys RFC during a patchy part of his season. Darragh Fanning and Robert Sweeney were picked up by Connacht after performances in the AIL. Coughlan for Munster was picked up after performing in the AIL as was Simon Shawe for Leinster. I believe Sean O'Brien came through the club game as well.
I'm sure there are more examples that I just can't think of right now. Even in the past you've had the likes of Shane Horgan, John Hayes and many more of the older players coming through the club game. I really do believe that whilst it might take longer, if you're good enough you will eventually get selected.

bamboozle

Lawstudent1 wrote: »

Things are changing. Jonathan Sexton stated in a recent interview that he was rewarded for his form in the AIL by Leinster when he lined out for Marys RFC during a patchy part of his season. Darragh Fanning and Robert Sweeney were picked up by Connacht after performances in the AIL. Coughlan for Munster was picked up after performing in the AIL as was Simon Shawe for Leinster. I believe Sean O'Brien came through the club game as well.
I'm sure there are more examples that I just can't think of right now. Even in the past you've had the likes of Shane Horgan, John Hayes and many more of the older players coming through the club game. I really do believe that whilst it might take longer, if you're good enough you will eventually get selected.

most of the older players have played a lot of AIL rugby, i remember maybe 5 or 6 years ago seeing Clontarf playing a lansdowne team featuring Johne Murphy, Dr Phil, Darcy & Aidan McCullen, Shannon last season regularly had the likes of Horan, Flannery, Dowling, donacha Ryan and Felix Jones play. Dolphin last season had Dave Ryan, James Coughlan, Nick Williams & Julian Brugnaut making up their pack. Cork Con always seem to have a number of fringe munster players in their 15.

its a shame really, so many of the new provincial rugby fans rarely if ever go to AIL games, the standard in the AIL is pretty decent and some credit has to go to the IRFU for changing it from a 16 team top division to an 8 team division as the standard has improved since.

JustinDee

I think the balance is absolutely fine.
The international game is what primarily funds the sport in Ireland and all roads lead quite rightly to that. I don't think there is much being missed. The High Performance team follow players with an eye to taking them into the next stage.
As in other unions, getting players early in their development is the key. With the club underage rep sides as well as the schools rep sides now getting competition to compete against, this is all the more probable.

Personally, I'd like to see more people going to the club games. If the game is this big here and means that much to people then the number of folk out there that can get to their local games is there too.
It would be more attractive to sponsors too.

nice_guy80

JustinDee wrote: »

I think the balance is absolutely fine.
The international game is what primarily funds the sport in Ireland and all roads lead quite rightly to that. I don't think there is much being missed. The High Performance team follow players with an eye to taking them into the next stage.
As in other unions, getting players early in their development is the key. With the club underage rep sides as well as the schools rep sides now getting competition to compete against, this is all the more probable.

Personally, I'd like to see more people going to the club games. If the game is this big here and means that much to people then the number of folk out there that can get to their local games is there too.
It would be more attractive to sponsors too.

big problem is that are no/very few 'AIL only' weekends
the provinces or national team are always playing so people make a choice

I firmly believe that all Irish sports fans like supporting local teams/clubs - if they are given chance to with proper promotion of games

JustinDee

nice_guy80 wrote: »

big problem is that are no/very few 'AIL only' weekends
the provinces or national team are always playing so people make a choice

There's plenty of opportunity to go support a local side. I work at internationals and rep intls, go to ERC and ML games and still get to club games.
If people really want to go to games, they will.

kensutz

JustinDee wrote: »

There's plenty of opportunity to go support a local side. I work at internationals and rep intls, go to ERC and ML games and still get to club games.
If people really want to go to games, they will.

Hit the nail on the head. As a photographer too who mainly shoots rugby, I can get to International, ERC, ML and club games even with time to referee at weekends too. It depends on how committed you are to the sport.

JustinDee

kensutz wrote: »

Hit the nail on the head. As a photographer too who mainly shoots rugby, I can get to International, ERC, ML and club games even with time to referee at weekends too. It depends on how committed you are to the sport.

You do the internationals at the Aviva? You've probably met me so.
Actually come to think of it, I did see someone browsing boards.ie in the photographer's room before one of the nov tests. The mystery continues ...

whysomoody

bamboozle wrote: »

most of the older players have played a lot of AIL rugby, i remember maybe 5 or 6 years ago seeing Clontarf playing a lansdowne team featuring Johne Murphy, Dr Phil, Darcy & Aidan McCullen, Shannon last season regularly had the likes of Horan, Flannery, Dowling, donacha Ryan and Felix Jones play. Dolphin last season had Dave Ryan, James Coughlan, Nick Williams & Julian Brugnaut making up their pack. Cork Con always seem to have a number of fringe munster players in their 15.

its a shame really, so many of the new provincial rugby fans rarely if ever go to AIL games, the standard in the AIL is pretty decent and some credit has to go to the IRFU for changing it from a 16 team top division to an 8 team division as the standard has improved since.

The issue with the above is that the Munster Team regularly recognise the importance of using the AIL system to give guys run outs but the Leinter set-up use A games in stead which I think is a bit of a shame really.

Like O'Connell playing for Young Munster on the way back from Injury, you would never seen O'Driscoll lining out for UCD on his way back from injury or Kearney either.
If you had more of the more seasoned players lining out every now and then you would have more of an interest created in the games and hopefully more attendences => greater revenue for the clubs and it all becomes self-funding.

profitius

I'd like to see more involvement with the provinces in helping clubs develop underage players with the best players moving to the provisional academy system and the clubs have the benefit of coaching expertise. Sean O'Brien is a recent success story of non schools player making it and Ferris before him.

Theres a big pool of talent out there and needs to be tapped into.

Also clubs should be rewarded for players that make it to provisional level. A simple reward of a few thousand euro per player would be good for the club and peanuts for the provinces.

kensutz

JustinDee wrote: »

You do the internationals at the Aviva? You've probably met me so.
Actually come to think of it, I did see someone browsing boards.ie in the photographer's room before one of the nov tests. The mystery continues ...

That was me. I've seen you a few times in and around the venue. It's a case of knowing who you are, and you not knowing me I'll give you a shout next time I see you.

JustinDee

whysomoody wrote: »

If you had more of the more seasoned players lining out every now and then you would have more of an interest created in the games and hopefully more attendences => greater revenue for the clubs and it all becomes self-funding.

Self-funding??

JustinDee

kensutz wrote: »

That was me. I've seen you a few times in and around the venue. It's a case of knowing who you are, and you not knowing me I'll give you a shout next time I see you.

Well, there ya go.
Mystery solved.

whysomoody

profitius wrote: »

Sean O'Brien is a recent success story of non schools player making it and Ferris before him.

Sean O'Brien just didnt play schools but he played very little AIL, he played one season with UCD after U20's and then played one game with Clontarf after they spent big to buy him.

JustinDee wrote: »

Self-funding??

Poor choice of words, I mean that if you were getting 1000-3000 at an AIL match the clubds themselves wouldnt need to be funded by the IRFU so that would remove a burden from the coffers, the clubs would fund themselves.

JustinDee

whysomoody wrote: »

Poor choice of words, I mean that if you were getting 1000-3000 at an AIL match the clubds themselves wouldnt need to be funded by the IRFU so that would remove a burden from the coffers, the clubs would fund themselves.

The reason the clubs formed the union in the first place was to administer the sport amongst them and above. You're touching into the revenue side of things here. I thought you were discussing structure and how to make sure talent was developed and not overlooked which is why I was saying there is a large net out there to catch the talent playing the sport and bring to the professional side.

If you're discussing revenues then in my opinion, more money should be invested in youth development at a club.
I've seen clubs borrow to the hilt (my own former club included) to buy players and coaches and who now have almost zip to show for this. Thats not an investment. The benefits are severely outweighed by the negatives. So you win the division one year. What next?
Spending on youth development within the club, making sure they stay on from minis level (which is going very well around the entire island). Investment in structural and functional areas such as playing surface, floodlighting or clubhouse facilities is also important. Any of these factors comes at the same price as a coach and a bunch of players.

Building the club from the bottom up on solid foundations rather than the quicksand of transcient staff is what I would be plumping for if I was running a club.
Coaching grants, reffing courses, academies for promising players, loans to clubs etc are all facilitated by the union and all funded by the pro game mostly from revenues yielded by the international game.

Regarding the spectators, as I said, the competition is there if they want it. Promotional activity can only help to a certain degree.

whysomoody

JustinDee wrote: »

The reason the clubs formed the union in the first place was to administer the sport amongst them and above. You're touching into the revenue side of things here. I thought you were discussing structure and how to make sure talent was developed and not overlooked which is why I was saying there is a large net out there to catch the talent playing the sport and bring to the professional side.

If you're discussing revenues then in my opinion, more money should be invested in youth development at a club.
I've seen clubs borrow to the hilt (my own former club included) to buy players and coaches and who now have almost zip to show for this. Thats not an investment. The benefits are severely outweighed by the negatives. So you win the division one year. What next?
Spending on youth development within the club, making sure they stay on from minis level (which is going very well around the entire island). Investment in structural and functional areas such as playing surface, floodlighting or clubhouse facilities is also important. Any of these factors comes at the same price as a coach and a bunch of players.

Building the club from the bottom up on solid foundations rather than the quicksand of transcient staff is what I would be plumping for if I was running a club.
Coaching grants, reffing courses, academies for promising players, loans to clubs etc are all facilitated by the union and all funded by the pro game mostly from revenues yielded by the international game.

Regarding the spectators, as I said, the competition is there if they want it. Promotional activity can only help to a certain degree.

I completely agree with the above.

I think the two kind of compliment each other in that if the clubs were given the opportunity to play some of bigger name players more often, they have more of an incentive to develop a talent pool of players, the clubs attract more supporters with a better product for them to watch and in turn make more money from the turnstiles.

I think that Ireland is such a small Island that we need to try to develop as many players as possible, for instance there are several counties which dont have a club with a team higher than J2 which obviously needs to be looked at. I dont think the provincial set ups cater for this type of area well enough as people are dislocated from the head office.

I am not sure how many people in Kilkenny would feel an affinity with D4 or in Donegal with Ravenhill etc - but they might locate to a thriving club scene if it was well enough supported.

Khan77

Personally I don't see how a 48 team AIL is developing club rugby (soon to be 52). All it does is haemorrhage money out of the domestic club game on transport, requirement for larger squads etc and deprives resources further down in the club. If we want a meaningful club competiton then I would advocate that the AIL is slashed in size, maybe an eight team 1st and second division and below this a ten team north and south Division 3 leagues. Below this is then the provincial qualifying leagues. The cost and time of travelling is crippling smaller and remoter clubs from playing AIL rugby and the structure needs to reflect that better. Adopting a more regional setup at Division 3 levels would maintain players and reduce cost to clubs. Culling the size of the leagues also reduces the physical number of clubs academy and contracted players can play for and inherently drives up the quality of the competition. In terms of promotion to and from the provincial qualifying leagues the bottom clubs in the Division 3 drop out to be replaced by the top two in the qualifying leagues playoff so clubs still have a realistic path up and down, maybe the second last placed clubs in the two Div 3 leagues could play off to allow a further qualifying team up. In short the AIL is cut to 36 clubs from its present 48 clubs.

nice_guy80

my point, is that if sunshine supporters (who are the majority of 'fans' in any sport) are deciding and choosing to go to rugby games - they will invariably go to the provincial and international games

the AIL needs a Friday night or Saturday free of provincial or international games to get crowds to it

profitius

nice_guy80 wrote: »

my point, is that if sunshine supporters (who are the majority of 'fans' in any sport) are deciding and choosing to go to rugby games - they will invariably go to the provincial and international games

the AIL needs a Friday night or Saturday free of provincial or international games to get crowds to it

Out of sight out of mind. The AIL needs some media coverage too and try to promote it different ways. Maybe the IRFU should advertise it more.

Teej

Noticed before the Munster match RTE were advertising coverage of AIL & Cup - though this could mean they'll mention the result on the news based on past performance.

Personally as a non-player find it difficult to forge enough of an affiliation with any particular club to justify the admission fee (€10 last time I went- comparatively steep)on a regular basis. When there was regular TV coverage I was more inclined to attend as I was following the teams & was familiar with the players

JustinDee

profitius wrote: »

Out of sight out of mind. The AIL needs some media coverage too and try to promote it different ways. Maybe the IRFU should advertise it more.

The media get preview releases. Some choose to cover and some don't. What sort of advertising do you suggest? And in what way would it stick a jolt to the rugby public?
I'm afraid it would take a whole lot more than a PR campaign to poke people into heading to their club every second week. Take this forum for example. People are aware what goes on each weekend but I'd bet that only a small percentage of them go to their local club to support an AIL game.
The IRFU runs various programmes and campaigns such as Get Back in The Game, Play Rugby, its own tag rugby programme and later on, a national Sevens competition. Friday night floodlit AIL games are also promoted as well as the rest of it. A new sponsor coming on board would also help proceedings.