Supa Iberica de Rugby 2010

Netrug I was reading that they had planned to expand it to a 14 team Championship in the near future. Interestingly enough if you look at the German Rugby Bundeliga there are quite a number of foriegners playing. Hopefully soon they decide to take the leap from quasi semi-pro to Professional. Brad There is a big budget Hollywood movie based entirely around the 1995 RWC. Morgan Freeman plays the role of Nelson Mandela, Matt Damon as Francios Pienaar and I'm not overly sure of the accuracy of this but Dwayne 'The Rock' Johnson as big Jonah Lomu. Its official title 'Invictus'. Due out late this year/ early next.

The IRB need to sponser hollywood rugby movies and get some of the hollywood stars to appear at internationals and heineken cup games (not the boring british games but rather Stade vs Tolouse etc). Get rugby in the news.

The Russian professional league looks likely to expand soon. It is now split into eastern and western divisions and have some developmental clubs. Two, it seems in St Petersburg, where Rugby does not have any real presence at all. Players from Ukraine, Moldova, Georgia and Romania are turning out for Russian clubs. The two clubs inominated for the new Ukraine competition from Moldova are from the city of Tiraspol. Tiraspol is in fact capital of the breakaway Transnistria province. This is why the clubs are not part of the Molvova Rugby Union but aligned with Ukraine whose government supports the breakaway province.

Netrug The Ukrainian Rugby Federation President expects to secure two teams from Kiev to participate in the coming weeks. From what I have been able to gather much of this move is to counteract the Russian Professional Rugby League (RU). They seem to see it as a threat. They have said they already have 6 teams but yeah they have only named 5. ?.

It is very interesting in the Ukraine situation. The Ukraine Rugby Union president has said that unless Rugby in the Ukraine went professional, then it would die. There is to be a six team competition but only five have been named. Two of those are not from Ukraine but from the neighbouring country of Moldova. The other three are from provincial Ukraine. Not one from the capital, Kiev, which will be necessary for the league to survive.

Yes. Hopefully these guys have their heads screwed on right. IF you look at the way the French have gone with their foreign influence its only a matter of time before their national team becomes extinct. Ironically Toulouse, argubly the most succesfull french team in the proffesional era has a policy of 1/3 foreigners 1/3 frenchman not from tolouse and 1/3 frenchman from tolouse. That model is perfect for the development of the game. 1/3 foreigners is still a bit high though but at least you have a majority of french players in a french club!

Sharminator The SIR is by no means perfect. It will take tinkering. But it is a positive move. The more time Spanish and Portugese Rugby players get to concentrate on their Rugby the better they will get. The 6 foundation teams may not remain the same or ideally will be joined by more teams in the future. You were refering the the Dvision de Honor right. It has 12 teams last I checked. The SIR was established by several clubs from within that championship because they beleived the FER weren't doing enough the develop the game and raise awareness via media attention.

Sheek The IRB can never do enough. No matter how much they spend they could always spend more, create more development pathways etc. Even if the had a bilion dolars to spend annually the job would never be done. What I'd like to see is the regional bodies like SANZAR, CAR, CONSUR and NAWIRA do more within there regions with IRB support and direction. You'll notice that I left out FIRA. I actually believe they have been very effective in their role in Europe and to a lesser extent Meditterean Africa. The 6NB as a division is a very competitve tier within its self. Germany are finding the step challenging but they'll get to grips with it in due time. The ENC is a very good marker on the increase in competitiveness of many of these nations. I honestly believe that the 6 Nations B should become a closed Championship alongside the RBS 6 NAtions. Considering the six countryies with the Championship are on the top of the IRB's priorities in Europe.

I'm not up to speed on the strength of second string nations in Europe but I see that a 2nd tier 6N is (Division 1) - Romania, Georgia, Portugal, Spain, Russia & Germany. Division 2A comprises Ukraine, Czech Rep, Poland, Moldavia & Belgium. Division 2B comprises Netherlands, Croatia, Latvia, Sweden & Malta. I note that the FIRA European Cup held between 1966-97 saw France win 20 times, followed by Romania 5 & Italy once (1995/97). The Romanian team of about 1977-84 was probably the strongest in their history, including a narrow 6-14 loss to the All Blacks in 1981. There was great hopes for Russian rugby also in the 1980s. They were runners-up in 4 successive comps 1984-90. But like Romania, both countries suffered greatly from the collapse of communism in the late 1980s. While France rarely played their strongest XV in these FIRA tournaments, they usually ensued about half the team were regular first choices. And when playing Romania in the late 70s & early 80s, often found they needed their best available team on the field to ensure victory. There are certainly promising signs for the development of rugby worldwide. But is the IRB doing all it possibly can?

I used to play for Rugby La Vila (La Vila Mariners) and actually I think the Super Liga Iberica is all a bit silly. The point is that historically there has always been a regional championship in Spain. It is usually played around Christmas/New Year when all the Spanish rugby competitions have about 2 months off. But people always cared more about their club so it never really meant anything. Div Honor 1 in Spain is a semi decent standard but there are too many teams .. diminishing the skill level .. and for example when the eternal spanish champions El Salvador went in the European Challenge cup, they got beaten by 100 points (although they did beat an Italian team once). So the idea of the Super Liga was to form a higher leve. BUT ... what the Super Liga did was instead of forming regional teams, existing local teams got the right to bid for franchises. And this was the start of all the problems. In the case of Valencia .. the area of south eastern Spain, my old club, La Vila got the franchise. The problem is that La Vila is a small fishing village of 30 000. Valencia is the third biggest city in Spain witha few million inhabitants. The other strong teams from Valencia are Las Abbelles and CAU Valencia, and Tecnidex Valencia .. all Divison Honor 1 or 2 (the top two tiers of Spanish rugby). These 3 teams are all from the city of Valencia, and they all see La Vila as an upstart (because it only recently got to Divison Honor and has a lot of British and Foreign players). Consequently their players didnt play for the La Vila Mariners in the Super Liga. The same problem happened in other areas .. for example in Vallodalid .. a traditional rugby stronghold ... El Salvador got the franchise .. so the players from VRAC the other Div Honor club .... decided not to play. Consequently the league isnt really a Super League of the best players ... it is a super league of the clubs that won the right to franchises ... plus a few other players .... and minus many of the best players who play for other clubs in Division 1 of Spanish rugby. 85% of the La Vila Mariners team which made the final were also La Vila rugby club players ... this highlights the problem. The other problem is the timing of the league .. the Spanish off season is the summer ... May-July .. and this is exactly when the Super Liga was held ... so as not to clash with the normal FER (spanish rugby federation) season. After a 10 month regular season (with 2 months off at xmas) ... the players in the SIR have an extra 3 months of rugby ... in 30 degree heat ... from a player welfare point of view ... I dont think it is ideal. The idea of any Super League should be to be a league at a higher level than anything that already exists .. the SIR didnt do this. For it to really work, and develop rugby .. you need new, regional franchises ... independent of the clubs. They select/sign the best players from each region ... you have a higher level competition and something that can develop rugby .. Shorten the normal Spanish league season ... have a real Super League of independent teams of the best players at the end of the season .. and select the best players in that league in the national team ... just my personal idea ...

Yes. Hopefully these guys have their heads screwed on right. IF you look at the way the French have gone with their foreign influence its only a matter of time before their national team becomes extinct. Ironically Toulouse, argubly the most succesfull french team in the proffesional era has a policy of 1/3 foreigners 1/3 frenchman not from tolouse and 1/3 frenchman from tolouse. That model is perfect for the development of the game. 1/3 foreigners is still a bit high though but at least you have a majority of french players in a french club!

Perhaps then the SIR should look at an exchange program with not only Southern Hemisphere nations but other European nations too. Thier has been an influx of foreign player's into the German Rugby Bundesliga. And the overall level of that championship has risen. So it could help in the establishemnt period in the coming 5 tpo 10 years.

Basically they need "amateur" players from SA, NZ and Aus. IT would help in the way that returning league players accelerated proffesionalism in union in the UK. The last thing we need is the blind leading the blind doen in spain and portugal. Didi you know that back in the ameteur era the south african rugby union had apartnership with argentina to improve their coaching setups etc. Rugby is a complex sport and the IRB must hold these guys hands. But I say again the spanish and portuguese must apply their own brand in order to spice things up.

Brad Would be an interesting idea. Thoug I'd like to see the SIR used to improve both Spanish and Portugese players first. But down the track. With a little luck, the SIR could become another visable option for players to ply their trade.

The IRB should try to arrange exchange programmes. ie some of the younger players and coaches to swap with some of our uni students and coaches for a season. I remmeber when I was at Uni alot of young players would go to italy to play rugby and holiday. Portugal and spain seems like a nice enough place. They just need to be carefull not to flood the comp with foreigners though

That's an interesting point in terms of the language barrier. Don't know. Sure they will sort something out. Romania was at a time the lead candidate for promotion to the then 5 Nations tournament ahead of Italy up until the fall of communism. But they are coming back with the IRB investing rather heavily in the development. Georgia are set to become more competitve in the coming years. With their President releasing plans to build what he calls 'Georgia's City of Rugby'. They are in the planning process to build a Rugby facility spanning 30 hectares. Joining a professional league and gaining more experience for their players is the first step to elevating their 15's to a higher competitive level. It has already begun paying off for Spain with a much improved performance in the recent Hannover 7's, reaching the Semi-Finals. Give it 5 or so years and both nations will be far more competitve.

Good stuff Working - But what happens in the Moldavian contests if the ref only speaks Romanian? As I'm sure you know, the Romanian teams had wins over Wales, Scotland and came very close to the ABs and would have got closer but for the ref. But when the Soviets pulled out, they took their military with them and that was all she wrote for top-flight Romanian rugby. Re Portugal, I guess the big question is can they get a 15 together which will have as much success as their 7?

Thanks WCR - I enjoy reading your contributions from the Rugby outposts of the world.