LOOK AFTER YOUR OWN

I predicted in OATH that World Rugby wanted an Australia v New Zealand final, as soon as England were knocked out of their own tournament a few weeks back. I mean who would want to watch a Scotland v Wales final? Lucky for WRIT (World Rugby Incompetent T*****) that both Scotland and Wales were conveniently eased out at the QF stage in the last few minutes of their respective games. Credit to both Tier 2 teams, and to Argentina for rocking the cosy Tier 1 establishment. Having Japan beating SA was great for WRIT and awareness of the tournament, and the image of the game, especially as it was in the Group stages, and has had no bearing on the latter stages - losing South Africa, as well as the hosts, would have been too much.

The Tier 2 nations have had to put up with a lot, from outdated group seedings based on form in 2013, to poor match scheduling, to unfair treatment from referees on the pitch and citing officers off the pitch. It hasn't helped that WRIT has continually undermined the authority of the referee, sometimes ignoring their opinion completely (in the citing of two Scottish players against Samoa). Also, their treatment of Craig Joubert has been disgraceful.

Everyone is looking after their own, from the English, Australian and Kiwi press comment that Scotland were served justice on Sunday, as Laidlaw knocked the ball on against Samoa (and got away with it) so they should never have been in the QF anyway. As I said in OATH earlier in the week, who knows what would have happened in that game of only an Australian scrum been given instead of a penalty - the same applies to the Samoa game, where let's not forget, Scotland were in the lead, and five metres from Samoa's line, so had they stayed there would have won the game anyway. The thought that Scotland should have won that game, and that Wales were so close to winning theirs with a patched up team scares the Tier 1 elite greatly (oh no, they are getting better, and with a fraction of the money that we invest). Great coaching, team spirit and pride in the badge count for a lot.

Ireland, Wales and Scotland are improving, as they have adopted the centrally contracted player model of the Southern Hemisphere, whereas France and England are in a mess as the clubs control the players and call the shots. The decision by the English RFU (every country has an RFU) to not select players outside of England is clearly club influenced, as they don't want their best players plying their trade en France. It appears the scope of the English RFU inquest will not cover this, so will probably be as effective as a chocolate teapot. Any review panel that consists of those blokes who had an influence on either the coach's or each other's selection is doomed to failure (Ritchie and McGeechan appointed Lancaster, Metcalfe helped appoint Ritchie). So, until these two marvellous rugby nations put country before club, nothing will change. You can have the most registered rugby players in the world, and the best Youth development system, but if you do not have the ability to identify, select and coach your best 31 man squad at RWC 2019, you will get the same result.

Even the re-negotiated terms of the European Rugby Cup smack of looking after your own, as those elite English and French clubs who consider themselves "considerably richer than yao", carved out a bigger share of the loot for themselves at the expense of the clubs in Tier 2 nations in Italy, Scotland and Wales. Good business strategy, to remove any potential new competitive threat - the only thing is that history showed in Scotland that watching Celtic v Rangers (read Bath v Northampton, Leicester v Toulon) every week got a little boring for the customer and they voted with their feet.

I think that WRIT should split the RWC going forward into Tier 1 and Tier 2 nations, with Australia v NZ being one final, and a choice of Fiji/Samoa/Japan v Scotland/Wales/Georgia being the other. I know which one I would pay to watch. But then, when did the paying customer matter to idiot administrators/egotistical club owners only concerned with their own self preservation/world domination?