European national progression. And the 6Ns.

According to the IRB rankings we have

Italy: 12th
Georgia: 14th
Romania: 18th
Russia: 17th
Portugal: 20th

I know that dragging themselves up the table is really, really hard. But remember that ranking points count double in RWC contests.

But how would the 6Ns deal with a real contender?

How is the 6Ns organised to cope with an intruder?

Are the participants sealed in and can veto a reorganisation? or a majority vote?

And which countries would vote for change?

It took years for it to eveolve from the 4 to 5 nations and longer again from 5 to 6.

I can't see them extending it anytime soon but I do think more coverage should be given to the B Comp that takes place (don't even know when).

I doubt at the moment if either Georgia, Romania, Russia or Portugal have a huge rugby following so why not stick them on as a curtain raiser to the manin 6 Nations Comp, least that way they would get some gate/tv money.

bedfordwelsh wrote:It took years for it to eveolve from the 4 to 5 nations and longer again from 5 to 6.

I can't see them extending it anytime soon but I do think more coverage should be given to the B Comp that takes place (don't even know when).

I doubt at the moment if either Georgia, Romania, Russia or Portugal have a huge rugby following so why not stick them on as a curtain raiser to the manin 6 Nations Comp, least that way they would get some gate/tv money.

So what you are suggesting is to let them hang out to dry rather than encourage them.

That's not a very sporting attitude.

"I doubt at the moment if either Georgia, Romania, Russia or Portugal have a huge rugby following so why not stick them on as a curtain raiser to the manin 6 Nations Comp, least that way they would get some gate/tv money."

You are joking right ? Do you realise that rugby union is the national sport in Georgia ? And in Romania, before the civil war killed all their players there was a massive support there. I for one think that it will not be to long before the eastern block countries are going to be a force to be reckoned with. I also watched a programe the other day about rugby union in the middle east and India, and the Indians are ploughing some serious cash into their game.

Not suggesting at all that they maybe hung out to dry just that given how long it took to get Italy into the Championship I can't see them changing it again anytime soon.

Look how long Argentina have been trying to get into a regular tournamnet.

As for the fan base point, I doubt that economically many of them good afford to travel/supoort their side so there wouldn't be a huge demand for extra tickets.

There is a European League already well established but it gets very little (if any) press or tv coverage. Maybe thats where they IRB should look at improving first.

I dont think theres enough calendar space to fit in more teams in 6 nations however.........

What about having a second tier to the six nations with the champions being promoted to the 6 nations and losers of 6 nations being demoted to the second tier.....the home unions would never go for it but it would add extra interest to the matches between russia, georgia, porugal etc and the wooden spoon decider in the 6N

That is the nub of it dubh_lin.

Would any of the cartel agree to be potentially relegated?

It's a tragic impasse.

I reckon how Georgia/Romania do in their world cup group will be a valuable benchmark on their progress since in theory they will be playing 2 teams they would be competing against in a theoretical 7N tournament.

England will be too strong but I would not be surprised if either give Scotland a fright.

they should have a 5 nations for Italy, Georgia, Romania, Russia and Portugal but keep it out of the 6 nations, i would be all in favour of having it as curtain raiser on tv or something to that effect. seriously they are not close enough to being 6 nations standard and i watched connacht hammer portugal just 2 years ago. lets be honest things like the ireland georgia game in the wc are complete flukes. Italy consistently beat ireland and other 6 nations teams during the 90's till georgia or romania can do that then there is no point even discussing it.

kiwicraving wrote:they should have a 5 nations for Italy, Georgia, Romania, Russia and Portugal but keep it out of the 6 nations, i would be all in favour of having it as curtain raiser on tv or something to that effect. seriously they are not close enough to being 6 nations standard and i watched connacht hammer portugal just 2 years ago. lets be honest things like the ireland georgia game in the wc are complete flukes. Italy consistently beat ireland and other 6 nations teams during the 90's till georgia or romania can do that then there is no point even discussing it.

But if Italy's going to be in the mix, then so should Scotland.

The point is that many posters suggest ways of encouraging the second tier nations to improve - but few who can suggest a realistic mechanism to really challenge.

The glass ceiling seems to be resilient.

Anyone voting for a place in div 2? <tumbleweed>

Italy consistently beat ireland and other 6 nations teams during the 90's

When have Italy consistently beaten Ireland? Have they ever beaten Ireland

or am I reading this wrong?

TrailApe wrote:

Italy consistently beat ireland and other 6 nations teams during the 90's

When have Italy consistently beaten Ireland? Have they ever beaten Ireland

or am I reading this wrong?

No that's not true. But don't let that divert us from the central issue.

... er there is already a division below the 6N called the European Nations Cup - won this year by Georgia. Russia finished fourth but were competitive enough, yet were beaten by both Canada and Italy A in the Churchill Cup. Yes that's the same Italy whose first team struggles in the the 6N.

Georgia would have to be able to stage some Internationals over a few years against 6N teams to show they are capable of both being competitive and commercially viable to have any chance of usurping a current team.

TrailApe wrote:When have Italy consistently beaten Ireland? Have they ever beaten Ireland

Once in 95, twice in 97.

Consistently probably isn't the right word. But if you remember how bad Ireland were in the 90s it wasn't that big a shock.

Portnoy wrote:That is the nub of it dubh_lin.

Would any of the cartel agree to be potentially relegated?

It's a tragic impasse.

Thats it exactly portnoy, how do they improve if they don't get enough tough/tougher matches?

I think the first thing that needs doing is having these teams to play during the Autumn internationals inbetween playing the big guns like we do with Canada, Japan, Fiji, Samoa and the likes. Then we can see exactly where they are agianst the top tier teams.

A two tier competition with promotion and relegation would be great, ideally with the 6N wooden spoon holder playing the winner of the2nd tier competition in a play-off, but at present the 2nd tier teams are too far behind to make it a realistic proposition. The 2nd tier sides need to compete againt top sides on a regular basis to improve but its a slow process - look how long it took Italy.

So if the 6Ns is best served by the top six European nations in the 1st division with promotion and relegation is the consensus, then there is only one small problem to be resolved.

How.

Which interested nation is going to agree?

I think that no hands will be raised and the hopes of World rugby expansion are just pipe dreams.

Portnoy - it will simply have to reach the stage where these guys are performing to a level that can't be ignored like Argentina in 2007.

Stag, You mean that we will sit on our hands until the doors are being ram-rodded. Then form a sub-committee and spin it out in the hope they'll go away, and then fudge it.

Great way to go for European rugby expansion. Not.

Portnoy wrote:Stag, You mean that we will sit on our hands until the doors are being ram-rodded. Then form a sub-committee and spin it out in the hope they'll go away, and then fudge it.

Great way to go for European rugby expansion. Not.

No its not great. But thats what'll happen. We need to get to the stage where these teams are marketable enough.

1st up more should be done to encourage schools and youths in these countries. Simple as.

How to do that? I think the best way forward is for a "top" (hahaha) European team to be twinned with a 2nd tier one.

Scotland - Portugal
Wales - Georgia
Ireland - Romania
England - Russia
France - Spain

......or something along those lines...

Some funding could be made available to fund some youth teams coming over to the host countries 2 times a year and an excahnge program...

Funding for a few people (like Red Stag) to go over and coach for a period of a few months...

Overall, more interest should be shown (and some well spent cash) to these nations, otherwise they will struggle.


I for one thing its a worthwhile investment. I love the game and I dearly want to see it go truely global.

Now that rugby is a Olimpic sport countries goverments who prioritise sports have invested heavily in the game.

Russia for example has a fully professional league with their clubs having budgets of several million Euroes. The main sticking point is their players must mostly come from Russia hence why we dont see their clubs spending big amounts on foreign players. What holds Russia back is the lack of public knowledge about the game their internationals are barely watched by the public and their home attendances in the 6 Nations this year have ranged from 80 to 100 people. Sadly the game isnt really taking off in Russia. They are however lobbying hard to have a professional team (VVA-Podmoskovje) included annually in the European Amlin cup, as they have just built a new 12,500 purpose built rugby stadium however they haven't been accepted by the tournament organisers. The building blocks and money seems to be in place, now they need to raise the profile of the game. perhaps the most telling thing of all is rugby is now a core sport in the schools national curriculum as a result of it's olimpic status. Russia has a population of 143 million people, thats a lot of kids learning rugby!!!

Spain is another country on the up they aren't that far behind Scotland in terms of adult male player numbers and gaining ground each year. When their national team plays they have had attendances up to 9,000 people and the Spanish Union is trying to set up a professional league in the country. Real Madrid are reportedly looking at add a rugby francise to their sporting network. Unfortunatly there also seem to be a break away professional Spanish league already set up outside the Union, so progress depends on bringing the renegade clubs into line. 2 of the big French clubs took a top 14 game to the Catalan region in the Basque country to test the water in the region and ended up getting a 32,200 sell out in the Real Sociedad football ground.

Georgia, their probably the most high profile of the countries in the 6 Nations B however the vast majority of their players are professional in France, playing between the first and third leagues. They have managed to get attendances over 35,000 for International games and attendances below 15,000 are very unusual. Their recent 6 Nations B home game against Romania attracted 23,541 fans to the game, despite nearly all of Georgias key players being absent due to clashes with Frances Top 14 games. Despite the success of Georgia they only have 838 adult male players registered. Sadly while there is a lot of national interest in Georgia there is very little rugby in the country and seemingly very little being done to promote it. They have the fans but nearly all the players are based in France. So the future of rugby in this country will depend on serious investment to create rugby clubs and get young people playing it. Personally I think whilst the Georgians are immensly proud of the progress of their team it's built on sand because Georgia isn't actually producing the players their coming from France, and as their manly professionals they have an advantage over other teams they tend to play. Spain at least have large players numbers, while Russia is investing and driving the game forward based on it's new status as an Olimpic sport.

Most people will know of the magnificent history of Romanian rugby, especially during the 1980's when they crushed many of the 5 Nations teams reglularly. Sadly politics at the time of them being an eastern bloc country meant that they were never invited to join the 5 Nations. 8 wins against France, 16 against Italy, 2 against Wales and Scotland point towards this success. They have also played in every World Cup since 1987. Romania rugby collapsed the same time as communism, their 2 biggest clubs Dinamo Bucharest and Steaua Bucharest, represented the police and the army respectively, so their state funding fell. Many of their players as a result of being Police and Army employees were killed in the revolution. this wasn't the complete end of the game though as they did manage a 12-6 win against France in France in 1990, and a win against grand slam champions Scotland after that. Romania suffered terribly when rugby went professional in 1995 as 150-200 players went to earn a living in France as the game went professional basically ripping the guts out of the country's game. Most of those players also made them selves unavailable for Romania as well. By the time 1997 came around they played against Wales in Wrexham and got smashed by 70 points against a young Welsh team. by the time 1999 had come around their clubs had dwindled to only 28 and 75% of their players had quit the game. The first 6 Nations B competition started in 2000 and Romania won it fairly easily, but gradually the other teams have imporved and over taken them. 2001 was the lowest point of Romanian rugby when England smashed by 134-0 in and Dinamo Bucharest lost 151-0 to Saracens in the European Rugby Shield. The IRB and France stepped in at this point and (funded by France) they supplied Bernard Charreyre to be the Romanian National coach. Rebuilding work began, since that time they have increased their clubs from 28 to 83 and their adult male playing numbers to 1,000. Sadly it will be a long time before Romania are back to where they were in the 80's.

"Russia for example has a fully professional league with their clubs having budgets of several million Euroes."

That just simply cannot be true. Not a chance in the world.

What do they spend the money on????? If its wages, then why dont you have the likes of Flutely and Happie sniffing round.

-Journeymans dream that!!!

Boyne wrote:"Russia for example has a fully professional league with their clubs having budgets of several million Euroes."

That just simply cannot be true. Not a chance in the world.

What do they spend the money on????? If its wages, then why dont you have the likes of Flutely and Happie sniffing round.

-Journeymans dream that!!!

Boyne, they do have a fully pro league. The league is expanding next year to include clubs from Latvia, Lithuania and Kazakhstan. The League is only 6 years old but fully professional.

Boyne wrote:"Russia for example has a fully professional league with their clubs having budgets of several million Euroes."

That just simply cannot be true. Not a chance in the world.

What do they spend the money on????? If its wages, then why dont you have the likes of Flutely and Happie sniffing round.

-Journeymans dream that!!!

I love it when you take a while gathering reaserch and statistics together for the benefit of interested people and some idiot comes along and rubbishes everything you have written without actually bothering to do anything himself. Why not go on the russian Federation Website and get it translated into English, or if your really lazy look at wiki or something?

Here is information on one of Russias clubs:
Krasny Yar Krasnoyarsk is a Russian rugby club founded in 1969 in the city of Krasnoyarsk, the unofficial capital of Russian rugby. They compete in the Professional Rugby League, the premier league in the country. They have an operating budget of 2.5m Euros, making them one of the biggest clubs in the competition. Their main rival is fellow Krasnoyarsk based, Yenisey-STM Krasnoyarsk.
Krasny-Yar play in white and green, and recently moved into their own purpose built stadium. The stadium holds 3,200 spectators and is the first rugby-specific stadium east of the Urals. The stadium was recently sold out for a game against VVA-Monino (2 August 2010), emphasising the growing popularity of the sport in Russia.

The VVA-Podmoskovje is a Russian rugby union team currently playing in the Professional Rugby League. The team plays at Gagarin Air Force Academy stadium in Monino, a garrison town just outside Moscow. VVA-Podmoskovye have strong links to the air force and also supply the bulk of Russia, with which they share a head coach, Nikolai Nerush. The team has ambitious plans for the future - it is lobbying hard for inclusion in the European Challenge Cup and is close to completing a 12,500-seat purpose-built rugby stadium.[1]
VVA-Podmoskovye have won the title eight times, in 1993, 2003, 2004, 2006, 2007, 2008, 2009 and 2010. They were also nine-time winners of the Soviet Championship.
March 2011 saw two stars depart for Aviva Premiership clubs, with Moldovan international Vadim Cobalas joining former Russia coach Steve Diamond at Sale Sharks and Vasily Artemiev agreeing to terms with Northampton Saints.

referances:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Krasny_Yar_(rugby_union_team)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2010_Professional_Rugby_League_season
http://www.russianrugby.ru/
http://www.irb.com/unions/union=11000087/index.html
http://www.vva-podmoskovje.ru/
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Russia_national_rugby_team
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Professional_Rugby_League

I also clearly stated that the money comes partially from the goverment because of rugby status as an olimpic sport. Many countries will now invest heavily in rugby to chase gold medals at the olimpics.

The issue here is the turkeys voting for Christmas so to speak. For example, the SRU are already struggling a bit financially, so why would they vote for a system which would mean Romania and Georgia came to Murrayfield as opposed to England and France?

However I do think that a playoff betwen the 2 tiers would be a good idea, in reality the 6 nations would probably remain unchanged for years as the 2nd tier nations aren't strong enough but at least the door would be open and there would be a clear path to the top for them.

Bathman_in_London wrote:The issue here is the turkeys voting for Christmas so to speak. For example, the SRU are already struggling a bit financially, so why would they vote for a system which would mean Romania and Georgia came to Murrayfield as opposed to England and France?

However I do think that a playoff betwen the 2 tiers would be a good idea, in reality the 6 nations would probably remain unchanged for years as the 2nd tier nations aren't strong enough but at least the door would be open and there would be a clear path to the top for them.

I really don't think thats a good idea at all, personally I believe we should look more to Footballs model in the short term. The European Football International game works in a 2-4 year cycle. 1 Season you qualify for the world Cup, the next year you play the world cup. Then you qualify for the European championships, the following season you play the European championships. The 6 Nations has been going since 1883! Do we really want to tinker with something that we have cultivated over 128 years?
Why not hold a European Cup while the Lions are on tour? having 4 pools of 4 with the 6 Nations teams using their A sides or even full teams. There is no reason why this couldn't be done and as the British season is build around a 5-6 week Lions tour there is no reason why the European Cup couldn't be incorporated. It would make European rugby much stronger in the long term, remember everyone laughed when th rugby and football world cups first started off, no one said they would last but look at what both competitions are today! Everyone joked about the Football european Cup in it's first time but today everyone wants to qualify for it. It will take time but rugby will be better for it.

Pot 1 Ireland, England, France, Wales

Pot 2 Scotland, Italy, Georgia, Romania

Pot 3 Russia, Portugal, Spain, Belgium

Pot 4 Morocco, Moldova, Czech Republic, Kazakhstan

Theres no reason why we couldn't do that every 4 years based on World Rankings. If everyone in Pot 1 hosts a pool each and the top 4 teams from the pool go stright into the semi finals, to compete for the top 4 places. With the teams finishing second in the pool going into their own semi finals, for a ranking of between 5 and 8. the third places teams in the pool could go into semi finals for a ranking of 9-12. While the teams finishing bottom of the pool could go into a semifinal to compete for a final ranking of 13-16.
All of the 16 teams entering the tournament would play 5 games and get a ranking of between 1 and 16 at the end of it.

My understanding of it was that Russia have a club side or two with a budget over 1 million euros. Not exactly budgets of several million euros each but it is a starting point.

Again 7's being included as an Olympic sport and Georgia beating them regularly and getting a good press from it really spurred on the Russia government effort.

Not to sure if Wiki is the best source for references. It all sounds a bit suspect to me. I'm sure they have decent budgets but nothing to compete with the rest of Europe.
I was watching videos the other night on Russian rugby and they didn't suggest that there was only between 80-100 people. I'm also sure that I've read somewhere before that certain games can attract thousands of people, I believe it was Georgia.

Anyway for these teams to keep developing they need to keep doing what there doing. Each country needs it's pro-leagues who are allowed to compete in the Amlin, even if that means at the expense of English and French teams. A pro-league to develop skills on a full time bases and cross boarder competition is the real back bone of any team, look at what Italy are attempting.
The second aspect, I believe, that needs to be addressed is these teams getting involved in international tours. Remember when Canada pushed Wales the whole way one November Friday. Just one or two games a window. For Example-
Ireland Vs South Africa
Ireland Vs Argentina
Ireland Vs Russia (played in Ravenhill or RDS)
Ireland Vs All Blacks

Which would leave the Russian with
Russia Vs Scotland
Russia Vs Belgium (to help tier 3 nations)
Russia Vs Ireland
Russia Vs Georgia

It's all about integration. Teams need to play teams weaker and stronger than them, to test current players and bleed new ones in. I personally don't feel any change is needed. Just three things needs strengthen.
1)Pro League
2)Cross Boarder competition
3) Integrated International tours during Autumn and Summer.

Simples

simple make Russia communist- then every child forced to play rugby- better players progress while the failures are sent to the death machine factories, you will suddenly find Russia ranked 1st within a few years

bit extreme but could work?

Why not try it in Wales and find out?

Firstly, I would like to see Promotion and Relegation brought in as a principle and I think it would be a good idea if we had a "European Championship" of Rugby (similar to what they do in roundball). My way of fitting this all in would only work if we used the Southern Hemisphere season format (something I am a big fan of doing, although I know others aren't. Read below, unless any suggestion of changing the entire format of the season enfuriates you.

We have an extended European Club Championship in February - May, then we have an International season from June - Novemeber (with domestic cup competitions running at the same time without International players).

In even years, after summer tours in June we would have a home and away 6 Nations (10 games over something like 13 weeks or 3 months) running from mid-July to mid-October, with a couple of weeks recovery before 4 Autumn International games in November. Not just the 6 Nations or even 6 Nations B, I would have the leagues all the way down all run in this timeframe. Promotion and relegation would exist as it does now, and extend to the top division (the Six Nations). One up, one down in every league.

In Lions years, obviously the 4 Nations involved will tour one of the Tri-Nations, and Italy and France will tour the other two. However, after these tours and before the Autumn Internationals, I would play a European Cup. 4 home and away pools of 4 (3 games, week off, 3 games, week off) before the quarter-finals (top side at home) and the semi-finals and final at neutral grounds (decided before the tournament by a bidding process). 11 weeks (as opposed to the 13 weeks in Six Nations years) and 1 less game - if you go the distance. This raises the exposure of the second (and some of the third) tier, and forces the bigger European Nations to play full-blooded test matches there (especially if you have a 30 man squad like at World Cup time). At least 2 non top tier countries will also be guaranteed to make the quarter-finals, so they will be involved in the sharp end of the competition as well.

Obviously in World Cup years there is the World Cup and I wouldn't organise any other competitions, just leave it to the Unions as to how they best want to prepare. With a good few months off between the end of the European Club Championship (May) and a World Cup (September/October time), several fixtures could be arranged (as the season would end around October/November for the players, giving them (November), December and January off after the World Cup). Maybe a "minor" tour could be undertaken (North America, Pacific Islands, Japan, Tier 2 Europe etc) in June and then 4 matches in July/August, 2 home and 2 away to other major European Nations).

I think the point is:

At present the B nations ie Russia, Georgia etcv...are not quite at a level to join the 6n.

They are improving however, and competition in the Euro Nations cup...and division C,D,E etc (which have relegation and promotion) are improving this.
Teams like Germany etc are coming through now.

They also get regular competition in the chruchill cup against the Irish Wolfhounds, Saxons etc.., and also having teams in the club competitions.

These teams wont automatically become world beating teams...and will especially not achieve anything getting thrashed constantly by full England, Ireland, Wales etc teams.

Away from Europe, Rugby is also developing, with the Asian 6nations and subsequent divisions (Thailand, Malaysia etc) and even a similar competition in Africa....

It can only bode well...and teams are improving...but it takes time...it wont happen overnight.

GeordieFalcon wrote:They also get regular competition in the chruchill cup against the Irish Wolfhounds, Saxons etc.., and also having teams in the club competitions.

I don't think they get enough, TBH. The NZ and Australian 'A' teams have played in the Pacific Nations Cup against Japan, Tonga, Fij and Samoa. I'd like to see the six nations 'A' teams play the likes of Romania, Russia, Georgia etc on an annual basis.

But grey beard....

What would be achieved for the likes of Romania etc having a ton put past them on a regular basis playing the 6n A teams.

Teams like Russia and Geogia...spain and Portugal and even others further down the line like the Czech republic Norway etc have all improved in the last 5 years due to the developments put in place.....

They will improve even more through the next years...but lets not rush it too much.

I for one would rather be in a good game against the England Saxons...or Wolf hounds etc than a 100 point thrashing against the 1st 15....

THe point is these teams 1st teams are developing just as our youngsters are...