The good news is that Pontypool recorded a hard fought victory
over Tata Steel on a cold, grey and windy afternoon at Pontypool Park
Pooler got off to a fast start playing down the slope when
lock Jones crossed after some good interplay by the backs and forwards. There
was a strong cross wind that made kicking difficult to judge and the try went
unconverted. The home team continued to press and increased their lead when,
following a lineout on the visitor’s 22 metre line, Norton took a well-timed
pass by Mills at pace to slice through and score without a hand being laid on
him. The successful conversion gave Pooler a handy 12-0 lead. Tata stormed back
and showed that they had plenty of pace in their back line but it was the power
of their pack that paved the way for an unconverted try. Pooler almost
immediately responded when loose head prop Prosser scored a try after an
attempted relieving kick was charged down near the away team’s line. The
successful conversion increased the lead to 19-5. The last score of an
entertaining first half was a penalty for Tata that closed the gap to 19-8.
In the second half, Tata emerged with real purpose and began
to dominate possession and territory with their scrum getting on top. They
hammered away at the Pooler line for about 15 minutes but the home defence somehow
managed to keep them out. Very much against the run of play, Pooler managed to
escape from their 22 for Mills to kick a penalty and increase the lead to 22-8.
The play returned to the Pooler 22 but Tata still couldn’t manage to cross the
line despite their best efforts. It was left to Taylor to hammer the final nail in the coffin
when he scored Pooler’s bonus point try after a kick and chase.
This was another gutsy performance from Pontypool
who once again took their chances and scrambled well in defence. Hopefully the
team will continue to develop and we can look forward to a successful new year
and a top three finish in the Championship.
So on to the bad and the ugly but I will let you choose
whether it is the WRU or the Welsh regional rugby teams that are bad and ugly.
So the Welsh regions have finally realised that Welsh rugby
needs to be saved. They didn’t seem to be the least bothered when the WRU funding
of the smaller clubs spiralled downwards as they frittered away money on second
rate overseas players rather than helping the clubs any distance away from the
M4 to develop their own. A lot of people warned that the roots of the game in Wales were
being irreparably damaged in large swathes of the country as they were starved
of funds. Small wonder that, after a while, the other parts of the tree are
feeling the effect. If we are not careful the whole lot will collapse and have
a major negative impact on the national team.
We currently seem to have just enough high class players to
be competitive at test level in Europe but it
wouldn’t take too many injuries before we would start to struggle. The exodus
of our top players to France
and England
will surely lead to more injuries as they are forced to play week in week out
in a far tougher league than they are used to.
The regions have recently launched a Protect Our Game
campaign but perhaps it should be Develop Our Game. This not only sounds more forward-looking
but the acronym also sums up the performance of the regions as businesses.
The regional product has never really worked in Wales as the
results in the Heineken Cup and the poor attendances at home games clearly seem
to indicate. The Welsh are a parochial race and we like local derbys and the only time the regions get
decent crowds is when the play other Welsh regions - perhaps there is clue there.
In order to be competitive we hear, the regions need even more
money to spend on players’ wages. This of course will just serve to fuel the
upward spiral of player wages in Europe and we will inevitably end up in the
same position as we are now but paying higher wages to even more mediocre
overseas players as we can surely not compete with the deep pockets in England and France for the best players. Since
there is no extra money available something else would have to suffer and I
don’t suppose it would be the wages of the WRU staff but more likely the clubs
again.
So what can we do?
The regions answer seems to be to bully the WRU into
submission by getting popular support for their demands and threatening to go
and play in England .
They even talk about getting politicians involved but this is surely the kiss
of death for any campaign. Could the WRU just cast the regions adrift and let
them play in England
like our major soccer teams? If they did that what would be the impact on the
national team? This of course means that the WRU relinquishes control of the
top players but at least they wouldn’t have to subsidise their wages.
From the WRU perspective, there is talk of central contracts
for a small number of key players to keep them in Wales but they will need to
pay big bucks to be competitive - even Ireland could not persuade Sexton to
stay when the French came calling. There therefore doesn’t seem to be any point
in wasting even more money in this way particularly when the regions may not even
give these players a game. Then there was the empty WRU threat to players that
they would not be picked for Wales
if they played outside Wales .
It soon became clear that this was not practical as the exodus of players
gathered pace.
If you add to this standoff the uncertainty surrounding the
Heineken Cup then you indeed have a recipe for disaster. I think it was Richard
Burton who said that if you put a Welshman in a room with a hundred doors he
would leave through the only one marked self-destruct and he should know. So it
is no surprise that it seems to be the way that Welsh rugby is heading.
What would I do? I think that I would bring in the highly
developed interpersonal skills of Vincent Tan to sort things out
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