It's no real surprise that the knives are out once again. Every time England have a slight dip in form the calls come for central contracts, regionalism, caps on non-EQPs, ring-fencing, conference system, etc. Strangely when it goes well, like the 2 years before this month, there's not much in the way of praise for the club system. Generally because NZ are the best loads of people seem to think their set-up must be the best system for every other country.
The Premiership supplies the national squad with an absolute **** ton of qualified players (more than any other league?) getting good quality game time, it's up to the RFU to properly utilise this. The current problem is the backrow, but you can look at pretty much every single Prem team and see English qualified backrow talent throughout, it's not their fault if Jones fails to identify and select them. As was spoken about on the other thread, Chiefs alone could supply at least 3 better backrows than the ones Eddie has gone for this 6N.
If you ask rugby fans around the world to give you one positive about English rugby I bet the vast majority would say strength in depth. If you asked for a weakness they'd probably say selection or tactics. Looks to me like the league is doing its job and the national set-up isn't. I understand that the English Lions have played a lot of rugby, but almost all of them could be replaced by equally good players, which is probably why we have so many arguments about selection.
Also the players' role in the large amount of game time is almost always ignored. When you have most players sending their agents into negotiations with the instructions of getting the highest amount of money possible it's likely to have an effect on the depth that the club has. Have the players, collectively through their union, ever suggested some kind of cap on salaries in exchange for a cap on game time?
