The Champ, The Prem, and the future of English club rugby

0:14Welcome back to The Ruck, the journalist's rugby podcast from The Times and The Sunday Times. Will here as Alfie's taking a well-earned rest after basically running every pod for the last, what, season and a half or something, Alex? Yeah, he's a workaholic, that boy. machine. Alex Lowe's with me. Enjoyed your weekend at Twickenham? Yes, well I'm back, I've actually been at Twickenham three days out of the last four. Workhorse. World Cup Final on Saturday was wonderful and we did a whole pod on that from the gates of Twickenham on Saturday night and then I was back here yesterday for a sort of world rugby chat I guess their review of the tournament and all the records that were broken which included record food sales at Twickenham on Saturday of over half a million pounds.

1:00I contributed two pasties, which is not both of them for me. Every little helps? Which probably accounts for about half of that bill because they're not cheap pasties. No. They were nowhere close to breaking the bar record, but what that food record in all seriousness does show is how many people came early. This wasn't the first doubleheader match at Twickenham that the RFU or that Twickenham was hosted but usually remember they used to launch the Prem with a double header and there'd be the number of fans in the stadium remained about the same, they just changed jerseys from one game to the next whereas on Saturday 50-60 ,000 watching the first game and they stuck around for two hours, final so epic on Saturday, really interesting catch up on Monday with some World Rugby people just about the tournament about how bold they were and some of the risks they took and how that sort of mindset is what they want to take into the next Men's World Cup in Australia.

2:04So the next time we speak to Bill Sweeney, remind me to ask him this question because I went to the final as well with my partner and just as a bit of a going as a fan kind of thing and it was every women's game I've gone to, it's almost like a cliche to say now, but it's such a different vibe, isn't it? And I feel like there's sort of three categories of Twickenham. There's an England women's game, which is super diverse, loads of women around. It was amazing. Out in the West Car Park, you've got 80s and 90s tunes going, everyone's partying, lifting line outs and all that sort of stuff, loving it.

2:39And then you've got the sort of middle ground, which is a premiership final, which is quite a fun party atmosphere, but obviously a little bit more tribal, perhaps because it's a final and it's a big trophy. Lots of neutral fans. Lots of neutral fans, yeah. And then totally on the opposite end of the scale is an England men's test. So how do we kind of make those closer together? Is it just the fact that an All Blacks game is 200 quid? Yeah, I don't think you do because the audience is different. The pricing is currently different and the commercials are different. So that All Blacks game that England men will play this November would be huge corporate presence, which affects the atmosphere.

3:25And the RFU make, what, 15 million quid in one day? They make a fortune. Oh, sorry, the revenue is a fortune. And the ticket prices are£200. So it just is different. And I don't think... We always look at these things rather cynically, I guess, But my concern for the women's game is if they grow to become what they want it to become, it will lose some of that edge because the commercialism becomes bigger and therefore the prices go up. and it becomes, you know, I think what they want to capture, I think what the women's football has retained, even as it's got bigger, is that it's a real family audience and how they grow the women's game while retaining that will be one of their challenges.

4:18But I think what they have, what this World Cup has demonstrated to the game is how to connect with people and communicate and personalities drive everything. And if there's anything that the men's game can learn from the women's game, it is about access. And don't be afraid of being yourself. And there's a lot of protectionism media-wise around the men's game. I went to the Lensbury Club on Sunday where the Red Roses were staying. And the sort of plan was that John Mitchell and a couple of players would do a live press conference before they all went off to Battersea for the party. turned out to be John Mitchell and about six Red Roses, two of whom had only come in from the cabbage patch about three hours earlier.

5:07And they were full of personality. They were full of booze. But it was great fun. Like, there was no reservations. They weren't worried. They weren't being controlled. They were just being... Or giving cliched answers. There were zero cliched answers. They were just being themselves. and that's a massive lesson for how the men's game wants to grow yes it yes it's elite on the field but you grow it through the force of personality and that's and that's something that the world rugby execs were discussing on monday which was really interesting and then we're back here today will yeah twickenham yeah to see simon gillam yeah Yeah, one of the big moves and shakers now in English rugby.

5:54He's the chair of the Tier 2 board. The co-owner of Breve. Yes, and as you'll hear in a bit, he's still wearing his Breve jumper, so he's wearing two crowns at the moment, isn't he? But before we get into Simon Gilliam and all that sort of chat about the Prem, the champ promotion, relegation, franchising and all that sort of thing, let's do a little quick rattle round of the Prem, which started on the weekend. I went up to Newcastle and when the fireworks subsided and the red balls, the kick from the red ball kind of faded off, I felt it was a bit of a reality check that it was sort of, ah, right.

6:31Newcastle, I've still got quite a lot of work to do. And I don't think there was anyone up there going, it's all going to be brilliant immediately. In fact, they were very clear that it's going to take time. But yeah, I don't know. It actually made me feel that there's a parallel here between what they're doing in R360. Both are trying to play kind of fantasy rugby, aren't they? And build something from kind of nothing. And like, obviously, there's something there with Newcastle already. It does literally exist where R360 doesn't. But it made me think about when you're playing fantasy rugby, be in reality you need to build it from the front row like newcastle didn't have a scrum they they were pinged at the first scrum penalty next one penalty and so you can have all the nice back three players liam williams christian wade coming darcy graham was in the stands actually interestingly watching the game and so that get got the rumor mill turning a bit but if you don't have a tight head a loose head a couple of massive locks you're toast so that saracens are a bit clunky a bit kind of early seasony but had way too much and so you feel like the project is going to take a long time to really take flight up in newcastle no well it will because they've got they've got the access to a high performance network they've got the investment you wrote peace will when you went up there the week before about all the small things that are already changing and they do make a difference to performance reasons to i mean to fly home from exeter rather than sit on a bus for 10 hours that that sort of thing it has a knock-on effect it makes it makes a difference but they're incremental differences over time and recruitment um is is the biggest challenge that they face and that that you can't you can't build a team in in a month when most players are already signed up so that will take them a year or two and it's once they've got a top six prem squad that I think they'll be able to tap into the high performance expertise that comes with their new owners will benefit them right now they're they're trying to make the most out of a squad that isn't it isn't competitive at the top end of the prem and they know that it's definitely better than it was last year oh yeah it's a definitely better squad that already than it was last year and they've just got no worries off the field there's now no like Like, oh no, are we going to lose our contracts at the end of the season?

8:57Are we going to go bust? Whatever. You only have to look at what Red Bull have done in other clubs around the world. They pick clubs who are either going nowhere or on their last legs. Leipzig is a really good example. They build something from nothing. But the key word is they build it. And there is a lot of excitement in Newcastle and the surrounding areas about what this could mean for the club, but it is not an overnight fix. I mean, you witnessed that. Interestingly, I was at Saracens last week talking to Mark McCall about the return of Owen Farrell and his role at the club. They specified he's here as a player, but as I wrote, he's only ever really been a player coach.

9:47He just is that character. Since he was 19. And the importance of, there were people connected to the club kind of wondering, you know, it's that whole thing, you should never go back. You know, they're trying to rebuild. Should we have just moved on from that area? Should we have just moved on and give other people their head? But they see Owen as having this really important role within a rebuild. And for Mark McCall, as he described it, it's his second rebuild since he's been at the club. And they have a lot of promising, exciting young players. and that can't, despite the history of success at Saracens and their own network of high performance, I guess, with internally and the knowledge that all of those coaches have of winning European Cups and Premierships, you can't build it overnight.

10:36They have a crop of exciting, really promising young players, some of whom played on Friday night, even though they weren't supposed to and they see Owen's role in that as being really important. But there's a connection between Saracens and Newcastle in that there's a lot of excitement and expectation, but they have to build it. It's not going to be there overnight. Yeah, two leaping off points from that. I had a chat with someone from Saracens after that game on Friday night, and the first bit plays perfectly to the point you just made, is that they're someone who's newish to the setup, and they were going, I'm amazed by Farrell, absolutely amazed by him.

11:17like the stuff that you don't see from the outside that we never see and we've sort of been frustrated that we've never heard about we only hear about it second hand because he's never given us too much until more recently but he was just saying for the young guys he was so brilliant during the week being like go and express yourselves make mistakes i want you to try stuff and make mistakes and i'll make up for it i'll smash someone on your behalf kind of thing and so it's filling them with loads of confidence which then the second bit of it is noah calori the you the young guy on the wing who's only turned 19 last week, 6 '4".

11:50He's listed as 99 kilos on the website, which I feel like is maybe slightly optimistic, but he's a big fella, and they're very, very excited about him. The same guy was saying that he's never seen anyone as good under the high ball as him, and he catches a ball like Israel Folau above his head. I mean, it was a bit of a random leggy try that he scored, but chased a foul line drive, kicked down the right, sort of half-volleied it, tipped it over the final defender and did a sort of version of an ash splash. It was a bit... He needs to work on that maybe, but I think he's one to watch. And as you said, he wasn't meant to be playing.

12:28I think there were three other players that were picked ahead of him and they kept getting injured through the week. So he's definitely one to watch. I think the Owen conversation is fascinating for me because you look at the signings, the Prem signings heading into this season, he's obviously he's the most eye-catching maybe Tom Jordan and and Carreras at Bristol Carreras at Bath they will make a huge impact on the field immediately but the return of Owen Farrell is it's huge it would be it was sort of like I guess Ronaldo coming back to to Man Utd United yeah that sort of that sort of size of character and level of player but he He still invokes anger in a lot of people.

13:18Under the piece that I wrote from Saracens last week, talking to McCall about the rebuild and his role in it, most of our readers' comments were just agitated by, oh, he's a guy who can't tackle. He still invokes, even after what happened after the World Cup. Basically 18 months out of everyone's front of their mind. Yeah, coming onto the Lions tour. demonstrating that he's still a test rugby player still triggers people in a way that I do feel people their image of Owen Farrell is the guy who made the shoulder led tackle on Andre Esther Hazen all those years ago 18, 2018 the guy who couldn't control his emotions enough to be able to communicate well with the referees on the field, barking getting angry having that sort of you know he does have a an idiosyncratic tackle technique he is too high sometimes we know we know all that but i do you know people change people evolve people grow and what we see in owen farrell and certainly what the people who work with him see in him is is a very different character to the to that that guy and i think you know i think it's absolutely true that Owen when he was at Saracens before was so commanding and so dominant almost to a fault but in fact I'm pretty sure at times to a fault I don't think he's that character now I think the year in France basically the year away from everything France didn't work out he didn't play very much but he talked to us in in Australia and he talked when he'd re-signed for Saracens he's he's refound his passion for the game and I think he's grown he's 34 now self aware maybe self aware but also aware of his role within teams and I just think people need to give him give him a bit of a break and give him a and I can relish the fact you've got a guy here who's won everything he's won and you know Saracens don't make decisions just through emotion they're not it's not a hand out to bring Owen Farrell back.

15:36He's back because they know he can add value. Everyone you speak to is saying that he's already doing that. Another link from Saracens, which will take us on to the other stuff, is that Mark McCall was a bit annoyed that particularly Owen Farrell, Fergus Berg and Tom Willis hadn't played any pre-season games. And this is an interesting topic because I felt that looking across almost all of the Prem weekend, it felt a bit early season, bit clunky, bit kind of teams were good for half an hour and then terrible. You look at Northampton being miles ahead and then Exeter performing a ridiculous comeback.

16:11That doesn't happen very often in the middle of a season, does it? And Marcour's point was that he thinks that the 10-week stand-down regulations are too stringent. And lots of head coaches would say that. It's like, let us look after our players. Don't give us hard and fast rules about when to rest them. but a can of worms a bit that to say right we're going to have a 10 week stand down from the moment you finished your last season to the moment you start your next and then go oh yeah but pre-season you know that's fine Prem cut let them come back in that that's that's a similar type of game as a there's no different physicality or anything to a Prem game so has he got a point there or Well, from a pure head coach of a Prem club perspective, yeah, of course, because he wants his players to be hitting the ground running from day one.

17:04Mark McCall was saying just the other week that England need to harbour some of the responsibility of resting players. As Mark said, they're easier games in the autumn. Maybe they should rest some players now. I think if England pick a second team to play Fiji in November... remember the prem coaches have won that progress have won and fiji are going right well they don't they think we don't respect us yeah they think we're an easy beat we're you know i i think it's so i see his perspective because his responsibility is the players who he coaches and the team he coaches and he would as sarahsons have always said trust themselves to manage their players but then the wider issue is that the calendar is too packed yeah um and it it doesn't there aren't enough as um Simon Massey Taylor was saying on our pod last week you can't get 60 weeks in a year and if you did they'd probably be filled with more fixtures anyway the the players do need do need a rest and it's back to the the thorny issue of how the game is governed in this country that the players have two masters and and we initially felt that those England players who have a central contract than the 25 of them who have that that RFU contract that might give England more authority to control their schedule but it doesn't seem to so therefore you have England who are paying these players a lot of money to play for England Saracens and the other clubs paying them a lot of money to play for clubs neither of whom wants to rest them and there aren't enough weeks in the season, there's no perfect solution to it.

18:47Yeah. And when we've, I guess, talked to the people on the other side, the kind of player welfare advocates, they all go, well, when we trust the head coaches, loads of people break the suggested match limit. So Ben Earl, Mara Toje, Tommy Freeman, they go over the 30 matches a season thing. So we have to put in some hard and fast regs, otherwise they'll play 40 games because they'll have to be available for everyone all the time. And I know for a fact that, for example, Bristol got dispensation to let Harry Randall come back earlier and what happens to him in week one of the season? He pulls his hamstring, which happened again three years ago.

19:23And look, we're not saying that Bristol have forced him to play or that they've done the wrong thing necessarily, but everyone's got to be very careful with these top-end athletes and how much they use them. But sometimes it means that the product may be diminished because people aren't quite ready for the start of a new season. But rugby doesn't work, as we've worked out. If you want the Alliance Tour that switches into August, as a rugby community, you have to accept that those players, particularly after the intensity of one of those trips, aren't going to be available for the start of the season and might need to be managed more carefully through the autumn tests as well.

20:02And the one team that, in inverted commas, have got it right by circumventing the regulations, let's say, is Bath. Because they created a friendly against Worcester Warriors and pitched it as we're respecting Worcester by picking a great team, which cynics would say was a very good way of playing your first team once before the season started. Because the regs seem to suggest that a Premiership Cup game counts as a competitive fixture, so you can't play it if you're in that 10-week window of rest. but a friendly doesn't count so Ben Spencer, Ted Hill, Charlie Ewells etc etc all played against Worcester and then they go to Quinns smash them in the second half win 47-31 and again it might not have been the reason but that's clever from Bath but they've kind of sidestepped the regs a bit there and by the way just just thought comes to mind about what Mark McCall was saying there about England resting players through November the RFU are as guilty of this fixture congestion as anyone, that routinely in a Lions year, England will only play three November tests.

21:12This year, the RFU have added in a fourth. And they added a France 15 game as well. Before the tour. But this November, they've added in a fourth test outside of the window. So a commercial deal with Australia to host the Wallabies at the start of the November window. which means the England players will go from playing the Prem the week before straight into a Test match without their usual prep but it's that fixture congestion that I think Mark McCall would have an issue with that in a Lions year where there's already more intense fixtures for these players the RFU have broken with their recent tradition certainly going back a number of Lions tours by adding in an extra international into the autumn schedule.

22:03Yeah. Well, look, we're not going to be able to go through every result. We don't try to these days on the ruck, but plenty more Prem coming on the weekend. But why don't we stop there and get Simon Gilliam on the pod? He's the chair of the Tier 2 board, so he feels the perfect guest to chat to with the revamped champ starting this weekend. You've got to remember champ, no EShip in all of these leagues now. So promotion, relegation, franchising, the English pyramid, future of Tier 2, all these massive issues in the game that trigger such divergent responses from our readers and listeners. So let's delve into them all with Simon Gillum.

22:39He's coming up next after this.

22:48Welcome, Simon Gillum. Thanks so much for having us at your, I guess, your new offices. Thank you very much. But you're still wearing a Breve jumper, so you're wearing, I don't know, both your clubs in one. It's a great pleasure to be here and thank you very much. Yes, yeah, I guess I have sort of two day jobs at the moment. One is involved in running Breve Rugby Club in France and also chair of the Champ board and enjoying both very much. Tell us about how Courtney's getting on. folk hero already Courtney's captain Courtney is captain his interaction with the referees is very interesting because he uses the F word quite a lot in French that he struggles a bit with that doesn't really translate does it his team talks before the matches are very funny am I allowed to swear on this or not you can we can bleep it out his team talks before the game whereas the French all tend to be very passionate and cry and bash their heads and things like that, he just goes, do your f***ing job.

23:57No nonsense calling laws. Love it. It's that way forever. When you're back over this way, Simon, how are you adjusting to the life of English rugby politics? Because it's a whole complicated web, isn't it? I'm sure there's plenty of similarities with life in Prodide and France as well. But what's it like at this side of the channel? I'd say almost when you're on, because I joined last November, I've learned an awful lot I came in a bit naively and thought that everything was seamless and that everybody would be able to work together for the good of English professional rugby and I've found out that it's not quite as simple as that and there are a lot of different stakeholders pulling the game in different ways and I think that our challenge at the moment as governing bodies is to make it seamless and that we all work together, be it the RFU, the Prem, the Champ, National, that we all work together for the good of the game.

24:58What's keeping you busy at the moment in terms of that politics? I mean, we've been writing about the Champs starting this weekend with Worcester back, which is a great thing to have them back in the league, but then also this seemingly endless discussion about the future of Tier 2, the future of the Prem, the Champ, how they knit together. what's really the hot button topic for you guys at the moment? I think we're right in the middle of it at the moment and it's common knowledge that there's a council meeting on Friday the 3rd of October I think it's really what the five year plan is going forward and we're very excited, you just mentioned Worcester we're really excited about the beginning of the champ season and so much has been done in the last few months to make it more exciting and I'll come back to that in a while but at the moment it's really the five year plan, people are talking about expansion to the Prem and automatic promotion with no playoffs for the next two seasons there's a whole school of thought that says that at some stage there should be no relegation I'm a firm believer in aspiration and jeopardy I think that's what puts bums on seats that's what puts eyeballs are in front of TVs or in front of screens these days.

26:18So, you know, and the chant board is very firmly in favour of everything that encourages aspiration and jeopardy. Is that translated into pure straight promotion and relegation or is it translated into other criteria as well? That's what the discussions are around at the moment. Your belief in that aspiration and jeopardy, I guess, is fuelled by your experiences in France, where you've been with Brief, I think I'm right in saying, three promotions, two relegations. So you've been on both... No, the other way around. Other way around. Unfortunately. Yes, the other way around. Three promotions, three relegations.

26:57Yeah, yeah. And a playoff frustration, I guess, in the last season where... Dreadful. Awful. Trying to get back up. So I can understand why that drama and that jeopardy is really strong for you. But then you also operate in an environment in France where there is a proper, fully pro, well-remunerated, well-funded, joined-up pro-de-der into the top 14, which isn't the case here. And that, I guess, is part of the whole discussion that we saw how desperate the Prem were to keep Newcastle in the prem because they feared that if they went down last season, that would be the end of them. And that's too much jeopardy, isn't it?

27:47And how do you balance, how do you find the solution to that? Well, that's short term and you're quite right, re-Newcastle. But on the other hand, if we become strategic rather than tactical, strategically, it's in everybody's interest that there are two very strong professional leagues because then aspiration, like going up or coming down, is not such a big deal. All the words that have been used by the Premier, by the Prem, or by people is, if we go down, it's Armageddon, and these sorts of rather not very marketing-y words. And I think that strategically we should all be working together, the RFU, the Prem, and the Champ, for developing that.

28:31Now the problem is that at the moment there's investor fatigue in the Prem and everyone's looking for new solutions and for some people a closed league seems to be the right solution but I think that if we stop relegation for say two or three years and then we prepare everybody for that in three years time four years time we will you will be sanctioned for poor performance and you will be rewarded for excellent performance that seems to me absolutely possible to do. You talk about the five-year plan going forward, which I'm fascinated to hear about, but it made me think of the last five years and the turbulence that's existed.

29:15If you kind of go back to when, at one point, the Prem was 13 clubs, 13 pro clubs, and obviously three went bust, but the plan was for three to drop into the Champ, and that would have then strengthened three professional clubs dropping in to the Champ, along with four or five clubs in the champ who all have aspirations of being at the top table. And that idea of a slightly smaller prem, but then immediately strengthening the champ, made a lot of sense until those three clubs went bust and COVID hit. And so we're coming out the other side of a rather turbulent period. How do you go about turning the champ into a fully pro second tier to create that seamless entity of two top leagues in England?

30:07Well, I think firstly, we've got to work very hard on ourselves. And I think it's much better to inspire desire than pity. And, you know, we're not a charity. And I think that what we've done very well in the last few months and congratulations to the teams in place is we've put in now, we've got aspiration, We've got six clubs now have a chance of being the champions because we're going to have playoffs, we're going to have play-downs. That's really exciting. You'll see. I'll tell you now. Numbers will go up because of that, it's sure. Secondly, it's been rebranded. Thirdly, there's a TV deal.

30:48Okay, it's a streaming deal at the moment. But there's a deal. You can watch your club every week. And that is really exciting. Next, we've brought Worcester back. and that was, you know, Chris Holland, bless him, himself said, you know, it's been like I've been at the dentist for six months when the process that we went through. Very proud of that process because we got really good financial guarantees. Worcester have really got their act together. There's a full house against Coventry next Saturday. It's really exciting. So that's good. Now, in answer to your question, I don't know what happened before and actually I think it's probably better to just keep looking forward all the time.

31:30Very excited about the champ, excited about the fact that we're all sitting around the table with the RFU and the Prem. And my absolute wish and the dream is that we can create a seamless game. I'm going to say something quite perhaps controversial. Why have we got two boards? Why have we got a governing board for the Prem and the champ? Why don't we just have one board with representatives of everybody on that board? Like you do in France with the LNR. Yeah, exactly. Presumably because the Prem's a private. Absolutely, that's the reason. That's the answer. But these are all things that can be resolved.

32:07And we're talking about investment coming in. Well, you look at... Actually, instead of just investing in the Prem, why don't you say, well let's invest in the prem and the champ and build the leagues up and that everyone's very worried because there are competing competitions around the world and you know we've we've heard about r360 and so everyone's saying oh my god we've got to stop r360 but do we have to stop r360 why don't we invite r360 into the tent and say how can we all discuss this together how come And, you know, cricket more or less has done that quite successfully. There are all sorts of issues about player availability.

32:51But people today are playing for their country, playing in the IPL, playing in the 100 when they're available. And that's, you know, they're working through that. And that's what we should be doing. And self-interest, you know, is one of the issues. Because self-interest is about survival. You know, if you talk to Cornish Pirates about the R360, well, that's really not on their radar because their issue is surviving at the moment. And we desperately need Cornish Pirates to be there, to be a stronghold of Cornish rugby. and so for me the more we have people sitting around the table together be it from Alan Gilpin and World Rugby right down to the third division in England that's what we need to do and at the moment everyone's sort of just looking at their little island Just quickly on the idea of a fully pro champ does every club in that league want to be a professional club?

33:58My understanding is there are some who maybe have had their fingers burned in the past who actually don't want to make that step and is your vision over this five-year plan that they will all change their outlook and their own futures or that you may have to make some decisions at some point that if you don't want to be fully pro then you can't be in the champ? No. What we would say is that there are minimum operating standards, and we're putting some very strict minimum operating standards in place at the end of this season, and there may be some clubs that decide that that's not for them, and therefore they decide to drop down a league.

34:39Well, that's perfectly acceptable. And on the other hand, there are probably at the moment three or four clubs who would have the ambition and want to go into the Prem. but that's the same in France most clubs are very happy to be in the Pro D2 and most clubs and I'm not going to name any I don't want to make too many enemies but in the Champ most clubs out of the 12 this year I'd say there are about 4 who desperately want to go up but there's no problem with that Has the landscape in France always been seamless? No in the way that you are, as it is now, and the way you're looking to create in England.

35:27You say, no, how did it become seamless and what lessons are you able to draw? It's a different landscape, different culture. They don't have the Premier League, for example. We know all those. But what lessons can you draw from that unification experience, I guess, to apply to what you're trying to achieve here with the five-year plan? I think it was really when everybody got behind the national team. And everybody agreed that it would be better for French club rugby if the national team was stronger and that we weren't competing because at one stage there was a sense of competition between Toulouse and France and things like that.

36:07And then from some very good work in terms of governance between the two chairs at the time, we pulled it all together. But the most important thing, I think, that happened is that we created the LNR with one board. And so there are 30 clubs who are under the jurisdiction of that board. Here, there are 12 clubs under the jurisdiction of the board that I chair, and there are 10 clubs under the jurisdiction of the Prem. And I would love it if we were able to put all that together. How are you going to do that? because whenever we talk to people in the Prem, whether they're execs or club owners or people at Twickenham who work for the Prem, they're absolutely convinced that they must franchise, they must close the door.

36:59And as you said earlier, it's Armageddon if they go down, all those big phrases. And Rob Kooler the other day, the head of growth for Premership Rugby, Prem Rugby, was talking to The Guardian and said, it's a Victorian concept, promotion and relegation, old school. and they see it as a mechanism for killing off clubs and they use that as a sort of stick to beat the whole process with, don't they? I'm not sure that the Victorians invented promotion and relegation. No, maybe not, maybe not. And their vision, as you well know, is that they would like to almost play God a bit and cherry-pick clubs rather than it being a pure sporting promotion.

37:34But if they did that, that would be asset stripping and that wouldn't be a good idea to reduce the quality of the champ in order to cherry pick the two best clubs. That wouldn't benefit anybody long term. That's tactical. It's not strategic. I absolutely know that that's the case. I have a couple of prem club owners who phone me on a regular basis and I see you smiling so you know who they are. And, but there you are. We can, you know, as on that famous podcast, we can disagree agreeably. At the moment, that's the case. I genuinely believe, and I'm sorry to repeat myself, but I genuinely believe, and the board believes, that long-term aspiration and jeopardy, provided that you bring everyone up, are the right things to do.

38:30I don't know the answer to your question, how do we get there? because we haven't all sat around the table together to say how we do get there. But I think that if we close off the league, we will actually do a huge disservice to English rugby. So we are at a critical time at the moment, absolutely critical. We'll go into the specifics of this season in a sec, but one of the questions that fascinates me about creating a seamless entity between a private company, effectively, the Prem Rugby and the Champ is that any Champ club that wants to get promoted and ends up being promoted is not a shareholder in the top league and therefore has access to less funding which therefore makes it harder to bridge that gap that's a massive question that needs to be solved isn't it?

39:23Should you get automatic shareholding status if you get promoted? I don't know. No you have to buy You do have to buy it but should you have to buy it because it's another barrier to entry um well i think that if you if you if you keep it as a private company you're going to have to invest in that company if you come into that company i mean you know i've been in the corporate environment for years and and that's how life is um but on the other hand i think there are mechanisms mechanisms excuse me to help people to go up and also mechanisms to accompany people who come down uh which is another thing that we could borrow from our French colleagues, that happens.

40:02And so none of these things are insoluble. It's just that you've you know phrases come to mind like sawing the branch that you're sitting on or Turkey's voting for Christmas. But unfortunately we've got to step back from self-interest. And it's easy for me to say I don't have my financial skin in the game here in England and I am a co-owner in France so I know about putting money into clubs but I none of these are insoluble but it's going to take time and that's why I really I really hope that at the council they allow us to spend the next few months on working on the best solution for the Prem and for the Champ.

40:49Right well let's explain what you mean by that so the Prem season started last weekend the The champ season starts this weekend and within the competition regulations at the moment, the winners of the champ will face the bottom team in the Prem in a promotion relegation playoff. But there is a proposal on the table to suspend relegation from the Prem and allow the winners of the champ to go up this season and the following season so the Prem expands to 12. but there's also a huge debate I understand about what happens beyond those two years and a discussion as to whether that detail has to be um agreed before you can agree on suspending relegation there is a there was a meeting that there was an informal rfv meeting last week there's an official rfv council meeting on friday you're very well informed in which this well i read it in the times um so that's the background to what you mean about allowing time to work on this so so there is there is then a council meeting on friday which this will be discussed so can you just flesh out what you mean by what kind of work are you looking to Okay, well, hopefully it'll be approved that the NPRB can work on over the next few months exactly what we mean by what's going to happen after those first two years.

42:21And that's really the nitty-gritty that needs to be thrashed out and worked out. And do you mean by, is that funding? Is that the criteria for? Yes, it's the criteria for, what are the criteria for sanctioning lack of sporting success? Failure. And what are the criteria for rewarding success? And those are not clear at all at the moment. So, you know, and if you speak to the champ clubs, they'll say, well, all we want is promotion and relegation. If you speak to the prem clubs, the prem clubs at the moment don't want automatic promotion and relegation. And that is the issue that needs to be solved.

43:09The others as well, financial structure, minimum operating standards, academies, the list is endless. But the one hard stop for everybody is that one. so we could have a situation at some point in the coming months where the end of this season is not decided by a promotion relegation playoff but we could have a situation where the winners of the champ playoff system go straight into the Prem providing they pass the minimum standards and there will be an 11 team Prem next season that's another thing that needs to be discussed as well and thank you for saying that because one of the reservations is an odd number is not a good number because you always have a fallow weekend which fallow suggests that it's good but it's not well we had that with 13 didn't we and it was a bit awkward with bye weekends and not finishing all on the same day so you know I mean that's one of the things that needs to be thrashed out in the next few months yeah just I know it's all related but with purely the champ hat on how can it be reimagined or supercharged over the next couple of years to be what it should be?

44:27What work are you doing to make it this awesome tier two league basically? Well firstly one of the things we're working on really hard is attracting new sponsors and I think that the changes we made and the new dynamic will attract sponsors. I think that also we're working very hard on stadium comfort and making our stadia nice places to come to with proper toilets and proper facilities for people who come as a family. That's really, really important. But I think more than anything, I think that the playoffs and playdowns are going to add a level of jeopardy. I went to a Chinner London Scottish game last year, which was just a dead rubber, and people were more interested in the play park next to the thing than the game itself.

45:20Well, if they were both fighting not to go down, that would be a full house and everybody would be screaming. And how much are Worcester changing the dynamic? I mean, the fact that they're back is really positive, isn't it? It wasn't universally popular. No, definitely not. There's lots of sides to the Worcester thing, aren't there? Yeah, I mean, let's just talk about Worcester for a moment. So they came in, there was a huge, huge backlash. I was visiting clubs in December, January, February. I was going, how can they be allowed back in? So the most important thing was them to pay back the people they owed money.

46:00Not pay back, pay, because it wasn't them before. One has to remember that wasn't Chris Holland and his team before. And they've done that. And despite, I read a piece, I think in your newspaper recently. I don't think they have fully done it. No, they haven't fully done it. I have an ex-Worster player at Breve, and I know. Yeah. Okay? But they're doing it in very good faith, and they're being followed very closely by two beats, one from the RFU and one from the champ board, and we are satisfied that they're making all their best efforts to do it. And just on that front, the RFU have said there isn't a hard deadline, but does it kind of need to be sourced?

46:39There will be a moment when we will say, that's it. Yeah. But it takes two to tango. And Worcester was sort of portrayed as the bad boy in that. And I think that article, I would actually look at some of the claimants on the other side and look at exactly what they're asking for. And I say that absolutely neutrally. Again, I keep saying I don't have any skin in the game. Worcester is so exciting because financially we've been absolutely rigorous they've got a great team together they've got a full house the people in Worcester I can't remember the number of season ticket holders, it's phenomenal nearly a record isn't it?

47:26I think it is a record it's a bit like the Oasis comeback everybody's so excited about it whereas if Oasis had just carried on playing no one would be going to see their concerts They're playing the same old songs. There's a no-galaguer in that. But seriously, Warriors, I'm so excited they're back. They're working incredibly hard to do it. And I'm so excited that Richmond are up. Because Richmond, coming back to your point, they're a completely different model from Worcester. Worcester are fully professional. The Richmond boys all work in jobs in London. And Richmond are a great club, our second oldest club in England after Blackheath.

48:08And I think that's equally exciting and great for them. So also, I think this might be a scoop, we've started conversations with London Irish. That was my next question. And that would, would, would, would, would be exciting if it were able to happen. And there's so much work to do, and so many bridges to cross before one could get there. But that can only be good for rugby. And again, provided creditors are paid back. What's changed there? What do they see in the champ that they didn't initially? Because my understanding is they have looked at URC, they've looked at Major League Rugby in America.

49:00almost everywhere apart from coming back into the English system and into the champ. But if you're now talking to London Irish, they must view Tier 2 and the English system in a way that they hadn't initially. I think they've seen the attractiveness of the champ and we will continue to talk. However, we will be incredibly rigorous and we will be very demanding of them and there need to be other criteria. There needs to be a place in the champ, which comes back to my point earlier. There may be some clubs that decide that the minimum operating standards are not for them. So there are very many parameters to the problem, but there is the beginnings of a discussion with London Irish.

49:52London Irish are fascinating because they've got an enormous brand within rugby, but no stadium, no training ground. So in terms of minimum standards, I guess you see the possibilities but there's quite a lot. Yeah, but they could play at another ground which has all the minimum operating standards and I think they're looking at that at the moment. Great brand, you know, like the Ireland rugby team is a romantic brand. London Irish is a very romantic brand. Everyone loves the Irish or doesn't like the Irish which is still good because you fill the stadium. No, I think it's brilliant if it were to happen and again please, this is very, very conditional we're right at the beginning between 0 and 10 we're at about 1 but yeah, I think that would be really exciting And Wasps are in the same boat as a famous club entity but with no stadium but some grand plans under Chris Holland At some stage that's going to be an issue ownership of two clubs so that would be an issue but again you know wasps need to be on a path which which fulfills all the criteria and one of those will be paying back the people who lost money because of you because of the previous entity but they have also looked pretty much everywhere apart from the champ might wasps join that conversation at some point i no one from wasps call me so uh whereas somebody busy working for us that's the thing but you know that this is why we plea you know a plea to the rugby community let's not get bogged down and we've got to do this now because it's a constantly evolving picture you know r360 no one had heard of like six months ago a year ago and you know and i think r360 are a force to be reckoned with and we need to bring them into the conversations as opposed to blocking them out.

51:52You're all too young to remember Kerry Packer, but Kerry Packer changed the whole face of cricket because he basically did what R360 did, and he got it through. And the one-day game today can thank Kerry Packer at the time and people playing in different clothes at the time. It was absolute heresy. So to end where we started, if R360 come knocking for Courtney, what's the response from the co-owner of Vice President of Brief? Are you going to use one of his swear words to tell them where to go? I think Courtney's big enough and ugly enough to make his own decisions. I think it was on another podcast that somebody said to me, oh, so you're Courtney's boss.

52:33I said, no, no one's Courtney's boss. Courtney's his own boss. I think the one thing I'd love to say about Courtney is, I think apart from his rugby achievement in Breathe, which I think is brilliant, and the crowd love him, the brief public absolutely love him um is that his four children are bilingual now and i promise you they are uh i don't know if courtney's going to like me for telling this story but last week i was we had a family day and i was chatting to his 12 year old daughter in french and chatting away to her there's not the trace of an english accent really she's french and i said very quick there's a year and a bit well the kids are always the same they're just the sponges and And I said, oh, do you speak French with your dad?

53:18And she went, no.

53:22She said his French is awful. And it was so sweet. I told him the story. Anyway, God, he's going to kill me for that one. So you're going to stay in London. Well, look, I'm heading to France, actually, this weekend. I'm going to watch Toulon against Poe. Oh, wow. And the Mail. Me and a couple of mates have decided to become section Palois fans. So I apologise we didn't become brief fans. but they nicked one of your players, didn't they? Aaron Didier Nkenang, the sevens guy. Yeah, from Bromley. Yeah, Bromley boy. Yeah, they did, but he's a lovely chap. He's a perfect example of role models in rugby.

53:56He's a DJ, he dances, he's amazing. He's an amazing character. Makes for DuPont because they won gold together in the sevens. Yeah, that's right. Well, look, Simon, you've got plenty of meetings to get to but I really appreciate all that time you spent with us on the Ruck and lots of exciting things to come and probably lots of arguments as well. No better man, I think. Disagreeing agreeably, that's what we have to do. Thank you so much because it really is important, all this stuff. So thank you. Thank you very much. Thanks, Simon.

54:24Okay, Alex, it's a funny one, isn't it? Because we had Simon Massey-Taylor on our pod last week and then we've had Simon Gillum this week and I don't necessarily think they're too divergent in their opinions on the future of the game but I came out of the chat with Simon Massey-Taylor and when you chat to other Prem execs going, yeah, I think I agree on this whole franchising idea and as Rob Calder put it, the Victorian concept of promotion and relegation and do see their vision. And then you talk to Simon for half an hour and you go, oh, maybe I'm changing my mind. How do you come out of it all?

54:59It's fascinating listening to them both because I can see where they're both coming from and I don't think they're miles apart. The big difference is at the moment, the Prem clubs cannot stomach the idea of relegation because the second tier isn't professional or commercial enough. But where Simon Gillum wants the champ to get to is that it becomes its own professional league. And so if you go back to what he was saying about Richmond and the romance of them being in the champ, they don't survive in the fully pro vision that the tier two board and Simon Gillum has for the future. and I think clearly the best thing for the English club game is that there are two leagues both of which are fully pro with movement in between and I don't think you'd find that the Prem clubs necessarily disagreeing with that providing the league that they drop into it's basically like a county championship system Div 1, Div 2 Div 1, Div 2 dropping from one to the other doesn't mean you can't have players playing for England doesn't mean you go out of business.

56:10And I think that's what, ultimately, that is exactly the right thing for the English game. In rugby, it's just how do you get there? And the Prem's view is you can't make achievements on the field determine this. So it can't be the sole decision-making thing. Well, I don't think they would quite happily, how no not you know if london irish created a business case that met what the prem wanted the prem would have and have one season in the champ finish seventh quite happily have them in they would cherry pick them and say thanks come into the prem they would yeah they would because they want for them it's about the business case the commercials the the reach that you know all of And a sustainable business model and all that.

56:55Exactly. By having pure promotion, they could end up with teams in the prem who don't fit their vision for... Or they feel when that owner gets fatigued, like one czar getting in the premiership, they will die, essentially. Right. So the prem want to be able to grow to, as Massey Taylor was saying last week, maybe 16, by cherry-picking the best geographically and business-wise the best clubs to come in. The champ absolutely disagree with that approach. But they agree on the idea of having probably more than 16, but having that number of fully professional clubs. It's just they want to retain an element of promotion and relegation on the way to getting to that point.

57:52And that's really where they disagree. But I don't think anyone could argue that if you ended up with a situation, an English version of the top 14 and the pro leader, that wouldn't be the best thing for English rugby. Because if you had that, then by definition, the 16th team or the 20th team is fully professional, is a standalone entity that works within that league because the league has a TV deal and it has commercials and backing and they work as two strong professional leagues. And they can invest in good facilities and it being a good experience to go to, as you were saying. Exactly. The reality is that the champ is a long way from achieving that.

58:39This isn't, to go back to where we very started the pod about, this isn't about Newcastle, this isn't going to be fixed tomorrow. it's a it's a you know it's a it's a destination that they want to get to it's a direction of travel as we talked to simon about that they have to build but i don't think they're miles apart in in what they want it's just that they are miles apart in the best way to get there yeah well look fascinating to hear from simon really appreciate all his time because he's not always in the uk because he's often in in brief running that club but yeah i'm sure plenty of you will have views on what he said and what we've said so email us the ruck at the times.co.uk couple of last bits to finish off rugby championship finishing at twickenham this weekend what an occasion sold out argentina south africa on saturday i mean else feels gonna empty for a start could be a second trophy lift at twickenham in two weeks yeah well i was just looking at the table it's likely yeah likely to produce the winner i.e south africa isn't it because south africa currently top on 15 points new zealand second on 14 Australia technically can still win it on 11 points.

59:47Argentina now out of it on nine, having been smashed by South Africa on the weekend. One little thing here, we won't go through the results and everything else, but is it totally mad to just be carpeting the rugby championship after this year? Because this has been one of the best rugby championships we've had forever. Actually interesting, not a procession, some brilliant games, everyone beating each other. And then we're kind of not going to see it in this form for years, are we? Because if people don't know, there's going to be more news on this soon, I think. But the world's greatest rivalry ever since sliced bread is coming, which is going to be a, it's actually going to be called rugby's greatest rivalry.

1:00:28I've just messed that up on purpose. But in next year, basically, New Zealand are going to tour South Africa. And I think there's going to be four test matches. So the rugby championship won't exist. Not sure what Argentina and Australia are going to do. and then there'll be versions of tours or sort of three match series in other years coming. The Nations Championship slash Cup, if that ever actually gets established, is going to get in the way too. So we finally had a good rugby championship and then it's basically ending for about four years. Yes, I mean, it's a bit like what Simon was saying earlier.

1:01:05It's self-interest in rugby is rife and the commercial value of this tour, of New Zealand going to South Africa for these tests, for this tour, because there'll be midweek matches too, and then a reciprocal arrangement down the line. Four years after that, yeah. It's basically their version of the Lions. Yeah, it's huge, and it's going to generate them a lot of money. I think it will obviously mean the end of the Rugby Champ, because I guess it shows the commercial strength of Australia and Argentina in this conversation that the other two have just gone, well let's just go and do our own thing it's a shame obviously um where at a time when because of the nation's cup you think well maybe the rugby champ could become six teams with japan and fiji involved and it takes on a whole nother always has felt logical but when you talk to people on in new zealand south africa they just go they're not ready for it commercially and all that sort of stuff but again you go self-interest isn't it why don't you help them grow the japan commercial argument doesn't stack up because as someone said to me yesterday world rugby took the took the world cup to japan and it was seen as a risk and now look at how many japanese sponsors yeah are in rugby their beer was japanese and they back uh the all blacks and they and the aside you know it's generated commercial interest in rugby from japan so i didn't quite buy that um but what i do find interesting as I guess a slight tangent from it is it's also a bit of a reaction to the end of tours yeah so the Nations Cup will come in and England for example will play Fiji somewhere in Europe we think possibly South Africa but somewhere in Europe is the first idea don't think at Twickenham but I don't think it's all been final this is next July this is next summer so when England would normally go and play three three test series against africa for example they will play fiji on neutral territory somewhere they'll play south africa in south africa and they'll play argentina in argentina and then those results will go into the table and then in november they will host the other three countries japan australia new zealand and then on the final weekend there will be rider cup singles type finals day top team in europe the top team from the rest of the world 2v2 3v3 to create what um the marketeers and the broadcasters are telling us is a a concept that will be much more commercially valuable um but by doing that you remove what it sounds like the southern hemisphere have recognized that they're going to sorely miss which is the value of a three test series that builds now we we were in uh new zealand um last year for the three tests England played two tests down there should have been three really it would have been would have been a great third one yeah a great third test England played three tests in Australia before that and they've sort of recognised having signed up to the Nations Cup having been told that you need all games need to count towards something bigger a league table yeah I think they've now come to realise that actually people quite like a series people like something that builds and we saw that with the Lions this summer so yeah the landscape is changing and then you throw in the the pressure for the southern hemisphere international window to move in line with the six nations to come to february and march yeah february and march so that south africa don't have to straddle both hemispheres seasons and it becomes much more of a global calendar you throw that into that window as well that has another dynamic of the global calendar that has yet to be solved.

1:04:54There's a lot of moving parts going on. And you chuck in R360, which needs... It's the massive bomb on the top of it. That needs the Southern Hemisphere international window to be February, March. There's a lot going on in the game. There's a lot of people striving to earn a dollar here to feather their own nest there. And I guess it brings back to the conversation that Simon Gillum was just having with us. these things can all be wonderful for the game, but they need to be dealt with together, jointly. Because if you just keep striking out on your own, then you, as New Zealand and South Africa are doing, then you're brushing aside Australia and Argentina.

1:05:34What does that do for the global game? They've just beaten you. They've just beaten you, yeah. Yeah. Anyway, well, look, there you go. That's been a fairly rugby politics-y heavy pod, but that's all good. We quite enjoy some of those sometimes, don't we, rather than telling you what you've already seen on the weekend. I think we do if you have conversations like we've had with Simon where it's not just about point scoring, but it's about here's a vision, here's what we stand for, we understand what they stand for, but instead of just fighting all the time, let's try and reach a point that ultimately we will all benefit from and we will all agree with the challenge is how you get there.

1:06:09Yeah, absolutely. Well, as we said earlier, lots of you are going to have lots of thoughts on lots of things that have come up on this pod, so email us theruckatthetimes.co.uk this has been The Ruck from The Times and The Sunday Times please follow subscribe tell your mates we're here all season we've basically never stopped Women's World Cup is over but the Prem the Champ and everything else in between kicks off until what July next year with Nations Cup which we don't know where we're going to be but we'll be somewhere should get more info on that in October yes okay thanks for listening everyone that's all we've got for this week from Alex and me bye