The China Mail - Wales rugby turmoil here to stay as nostalgia battles financial reality

Welsh rugby woes come with an under-pressure national federation, the Welsh Rugby Union (WRU), bent on scrapping one of the four regional teams.

While most fans and pundits agree Welsh rugby is underfunded and ill-performing at all levels, there certainly seems to be no miracle cure to resolve the outstanding issues.

The prospect of a return to the success of 2021, when Wales last won the Six Nations title, feels like a distant prospect.

The golden era of the 1970's when the Welsh won three Five Nations Grand Slams -- and five Triple Crowns -- with the likes of Gareth Edwards and the late JPR Williams playing flamboyant rugby is a dim memory now.

The financial reality is that one region -- at the very least -- has to go, but the WRU has not yet decided which one should be axed.

Then comes the task of trying to align supporters, many of whom were angered by the mergers that helped create the regions in the first place, to the three teams that will remain.

"The bottom line is, and I think there's no denying this, Wales simply cannot afford four full-time professional rugby union regions," veteran Cardiff-based rugby journalist Peter Jackson told AFP.

"And of course, people haven't bought into the franchise system.

"Welsh rugby has gone from having the most competitive, most popular club rugby, from 16 clubs to nine, post-professionalism, then down to five with the advent of regions, and now there's been talk of them going down as low as two."

Parochialism is still rife, but the paradox is that those nine clubs that emerged after the game went professional in 1996 would be financially unviable in today's climate.

Something had to change. Regions were the option and nostalgia counts for nothing.

"Frankly, I don't care who beat the All Blacks 40 years ago," said Dave Reddin, the WRU's bullish new director of rugby, in reference to Welsh clubs having beaten touring international sides back in the 1960s and 70s.

- Contentious merger -

The WRU plans to grant three licences for men's clubs -- one for Cardiff, one in the east of Wales and one in the west.

That would appear to mean Swansea-based Ospreys and Llanelli's Scarlets are in a battle for funding, with the WRU's announcement also reviving talk of a merger between the two clubs.

"I don't think there's ever a good time for decisions to be made," current Wales coach Steve Tandy said.

"But we've got to talk about it. You can't avoid the elephant in the room."

Many still believe the biggest error Welsh rugby made was to refuse an offer to have five clubs sign up to the English league at the start of the professional era.

"The horse bolted from that particular stable a long, long time ago. Now it's very different," Jackson said.

Welsh regions now compete in the United Rugby Championship (URC), a competition in which not one of those four has finished in the top seven since 2018.

At international level, Wales punched far above its weight when Warren Gatland was first in charge, making two World Cup semi-finals and winning three Six Nations Grand Slams.

Gatland's influence over the WRU saw 'Team Wales' emerge as a fifth region in all but name, but the success of the national side masked failings at regional level.

"There was a failure among those running the WRU at the time to recognise that if we don't water the vine, it's going to wither," said Jackson.

"And if that happens, then where's our next generation of players coming from?"

Gatland's return for a second spell, in which he was forced to blood a raft of untested players, saw Wales endure a losing streak of 18 matches, finally broken in July with victory over Japan.

A tough outing against the All Blacks on Saturday followed by a clash against the Springboks in a fixture outside the international window will cap a fraught year for Wales.

"I would love to think everything will be fine in a couple of years, but I can't say that because right now I don't see that happening," said Jackson.

"The game is still crucial to the Welsh psyche, the Welsh culture, because it's been the one sport internationally that Wales has consistently been able to, with the exception of the All Blacks, beat everybody.

"But I really don't know where it's going to be in five years' time."

J.Thompson--ThChM