DAVID FINN,
Madam,- It was very gratifying to see your Editorial of January 11th come out in whole-hearted support of the campaign to maintain a professional rugby structure in Connacht. I hope the passion shown by the capacity crowd in Athlone last Saturday evening and the burgeoning groundswell of discontent provoked by the leak will concentrate minds at the IRFU.
Cutting off one of the four limbs of the game in Ireland is not the antidote to short-term cash difficulties. The IRFU may have to run a spending deficit next year, but is rich in assets, given its prime real estate in Dublin 4 and the 90-acre site at Newlands Cross. Its predicament cannot be compared to the Welsh Union with its current deficit of about €58 million. Fomenting public and political discontent in one of its four constituent provinces is not clever behaviour for an organisation seeking public funding to finance a new stadium.
Has Philip Browne, chief executive of the IRFU, truly thought through the implications of this decision? Not alone will the professional game die west of the Shannon, but the club game too will wither. Players will have no incentive to improve, and clubs no incentive to invest. Quite apart from the 30 professionals who are to be thrown on the scrap-heap by the decision to cull Connacht, where are young players from west of the Shannon to play the game trade in future? It's not too late for all concerned to see the folly of this decision. - Yours, etc.,
DAVID FINN,
Foxfield,
Lucan,
Co Dublin.
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Madam, - As a very old Connacht schoolboy interprovincial player I decry the efforts of the IRFU to bring down the curtain on professional rugby in that province.
In my view such a move will kill off the game in a province which through the years has produced many fine internationals; and where I am sure there are presently many young up and coming players who would be honoured to represent the West by wearing the coveted green jersey.
Our country is divided into four provinces. Let its rugby representation remain as such. Ulster, Munster, Leinster and the IRFU just doesn't make sense. - Yours, etc.,
W. ARTHUR DUTHIE,
Shanganagh Vale,
Loughlinstown,
Dublin 18.