Freestate cheetahs the proverbial cow.

You got to feel sorry for the Cheetahs, as if they don't have enough of a problem with the Sharks, the Bulls and the Stormers forever looking over the fence at whatever new talent is emerging, they added a number of European clubs to the list who comes looking.

Last year the Waratahs decided to do a little shopping whilst they were in town, and now the Western Force found the shopping satisfactory.

Just from memory:


2007: Philip Burger contracted to Perpignon
2010: Jonge Nokwe contracted to Kings
2010: Bjorn Basson contracted to Bulls
2010: Wian du Preez contracted to Munster
2010: Barend Pieterse contracted to the Kings
2011: Frans Viljoen contracted to Aironi
2011: Corne Uys contracted to Newcastle
2011: Sarel Pretorius contracted by Waratahs.
2011: Lionel Mapoe contracted by the Lions
2011: Riaan Viljoen contracted by the Sharks
2012: WP Nel contracted by Ediinburgh
2012: Ashley johnson contracted by Wasps
2012: George Earle contracted by Scarletts
2012: Izak v d Westhuizen contracted by Edinburgh
2012: Sias Ebersohn contracted by Western Force

The list is endless.

That is some seriously good players all making their way either ashore or to another province.

Now the problem for the cheetahs has always been finance, they simply do not have the market to compete with big clubs or wealthy provinces.

This in my opinion stands to reason that Clubs or provinces should be forced by the IRB to compensate other clubs or provinces when they take players away.

Even if it is only a marginal amount.

There are about 50 players who were bought or contracted by other clubs, that's after the Cheetahs have effectively developed these players into recognisable players worthy of getting bigger contracts.

Instead of agents getting away with a percentage of these contracts, these Provinces/clus must get a compensation.

If the cheetahs were able to get 10 000 Euro's compensation for each of these players they would have had an extra 500 000 Euros in the bank, it certainly would help them to retain at least some core players.

This year the cheetahs are thus far equalling their best ever number of wins in a Super Rugby season, but like every other year, they struggle to retain continuity due to budget constraints.

Something needs to be done.

Out of interest Biltongbek - are the Cheetahs your team?

Have to say I feel for the Cheetahs, but as an Edinburgh fan I am absolutely delighted we are stealing WP Nel and VDW from them! We've made a lot of signings this year but I reckon those two will have by far the biggest impact.

With regards to your OP - who is going to step in and do something about this? Is there anything that really can be done?

I completely agree with you that clubs should be rewarded for developing home grown talent, and rewarded financially. In football I think clubs get a cut of the transfer fee for young players, but rugby doesn't have transfer fees so where is the money going to come from?

RDW no not my team, but I love watching them play.

Perhaps the IRB should institute a transfer fee?

Surely that would just widen the gulf between the rich teams in Europe and the rest? The rich teams would price out anyone else as they could pay a much bigger transfer fee.

I think something along the lines of paying a % of the wages of a player who was brought up in an academy and played for a club for at least 3 years or something like that.

The rich teams will always outprice everyone else, it is already happening, at least by getting some form of compensation the "poorer" teams will be able to retain other players.

I know that in soccer all clubs who "owned" the player under a certain age think 23. When a player is sold they get a percentage according to time spent at the club and his age when there (I think clubs where you play u18 gets a bigger percentage).

If you had to pay say 1% of the contract to previous clubs where they were for more then one year when u21.

Players under the age of 24 who are offered a contract by the team that qualifies as developing them (can't remember what the qualifying criteria is, it's something like 3 years) are due compensation. The contract must be equal to or higher than the players current contract and the compensation is agreed between the clubs or is administered by the relevent governing body using the method Brendan pointed out (time spent at the club, costs of bringing player through etc).

This isn't a bad idea when talking about regions and provinces or even top tier clubs but it would have a potentially ruinous outcome on smaller clubs. Championship clubs for instance would lose a lot of their buying power, as an example this year Leeds have signed Tigers former England under 20s lock Calum Green. Green wanted to get regular first team action and so chose to step down a level despite a contract from Tigers. Fair enough, however, using the football method Tigers would be owed compensation if they chose to claim it and because Green has been at Tigers for roughly 7 years and the club has paid for all his development and his expensive medical costs previously the compensation would not be a piddly amount. It would in football terms be roughly £500k but say 10% of that as rugby operates on a much smaller financial scale. £50k to a club like Leeds would make the move impossible as that compensation would mean that they would be not far off doubling the cost of the player.

It would make it to easy for the regions, provinces and bigger clubs to ring fence the talent and stop player movement.

biltongbek wrote:RDW no not my team, but I love watching them play.

Perhaps the IRB should institute a transfer fee?

completely agree, I like the current football system where the club that has been "breeding" a player always gets a cut of future transfers of a this player. means that some money will always go to the deserving teams that spend ressources in their own youngsters.

Personally I think the Cheetahs and Lions should reform the Cats, that way they both would have a better chance in the Super XV and may be able to hold on to players better.

Didn't work in the past, won't work now, the rivalry between them is too strong.

Can you do the compensation as a percent of the players wages. That way if it was 1% the play would hae to take the cut. As far as I know it is used in football to funnel some money down to "grassroots" level.

You also could do a scale when going down levels so from prem to cham it could be half the fee.

You can't base compensation on costs incurred as you could include renting the pitch to train in costs of a player.

biltongbek wrote:Didn't work in the past, won't work now, the rivalry between them is too strong.

But might they now agree since one will be dropped?

nganboy, it has been discussed in meetings already, the history and tradition of these two provinces are too strong, they won't.

What is the distance between the Lions and Cheetahs. Not to close if I remember.

I think that the union would have to put in a limit on number of players that can move between the teams

420kms