“Rugby has become one of the most narrow-minded sports”
WHERE WILL we be on 1 January 2030? Hopefully, still on this planet and all fit and well. Where will rugby be? That is incredibly hard to predict.
The popular view is that rugby changes at such an incredible rate that it is difficult to keep up. It does not. On the field it changes shape but often for the worse as coaches and players find new ways of circumnavigating any new law.
Off the field, what’s happened? In the past 20 to 30 years, absolutely nothing. Across the world, the same teams are in the same events, the same people are in charge (or succeeded by people with the same narrow outlook).
It has become more bloated, the World Cup has become a monster that seems to gobble up large tracts of the rest of the sport. All the bodies that sit in authority, be it World Rugby, the RFU, the WRU, Premiership Rugby, other unions and the administration of other competitions – and indeed, the way that the whole sport is set
