I don't follow the Premiership closely enough to know which players are being overlooked by the current regions. Two big clubs being overlooked, from what I understand, are Ponty and Neath. How many players there would be capable of stepping up to regional rugby?
I don't see how they'd find a full squad of 32 players of a high enough quality to compete in the Rabo12.
This is also the completely wrong time to be setting up a new region. The WRU already have Rygbi Gogledd Cymru on the go in North Wales, I can't see them wanting to start another development region, especially considering how much trouble the regional game as a whole is already in Wales. If we had 3 or 4 strong regions, each getting good crowds and genuinely challenging for the HC, then I'd say go for it, but that simply isn't the case.
The only way I could see a Valley's region going ahead now would be alongside a complete restructuring of the regional game, especially in the East. If Cardiff and Newport merged to form one region (about as likely as me shi**ing on the moon), there could be scope for a new Valleys region, with the players being shared + Ponty and Neath players getting a fair chance with Valleys rugby.
This could leave four regions + the development region in North Wales with a more even spread of the traditional rugby heartlands in Wales. But I can't see anyone agreeing to something like that, so ultimately I can't see any way forward for the Valleys region.
I don't buy the 'not enough players' argument. Regardless of how successful they are, there
are enough players, and players being professional = a team that can be competitive even if they lose all the time.
The question is money, and that is gained from popularity.
I cannot understand how Swansea FC can fill Liberty full when, in a supposed 'rugby area', the Ospreys can't. So until the WRU and the regions sit down and sort out how to get attendances up (like in Ireland, a country of similar size but with even more distractions from rugby), I'd shelve any ideas of more regions. They need to look at their model and how it works for Ireland but not for Wales.
[FONT=Verdana, Arial, Tahoma, Calibri, Geneva, sans-serif]I can't profess to be an expert but it must help that Munster/ Connacht etc. are historical regions, meaning people feel naturally inclined to support them anyway. Welsh rugby was always based on a club system like England's, since they have no historical provinces. Could Wales operate a licensing system like Super League whereby it would give x amount of RaboDirect licenses to teams like Bridgend, Neath, Swansea, etc? Or would this simply not work?
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[FONT=Verdana, Arial, Tahoma, Calibri, Geneva, sans-serif]I can't see the Super League system working, and tbh nothing would change. The only cities with sufficient facilities (stadia, training facilities etc.), are the locations of the current regions (Llanelli, Swansea, Cardiff and Newport), so it would be those four clubs basically, except they'd lose a substantial amount of their players back to the other clubs.[/FONT]
[FONT=Verdana, Arial, Tahoma, Calibri, Geneva, sans-serif]Despite people always saying that Wales' national game is rugby, the reality is that it simply isn't. Football is by far the most popular game, and this is reflected in crowd attendances. Poeple will watch successful teams, and this was briefly evident when Cardiff Blues won the EDF and Amlin, when they moved to the new stadium they briefly had week in week out crowds of ~ 18,000. The provinces in Ireland took a long time to get going, and this was despite there already being existing provinces in place. For a long time crowds were poor, but winning teams have changed that. Ulster, Munster and Leinster have all been HC champions, and they are consistently challenging, this draws in the punters. Ireland's population is also much bigger to begin with, especially in Dublin, where Leinster is the only top sports team, and there is a population of over 1 million.
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