Through the years successive committees of the IRFU have made mistakes - what committee has not - and on occasions decisions with which many of us have disagreed - and we stated so in no uncertain terms. No doubt more decisions of this sort will be made in the future, that is the nature of human fallibility. Never in the history of the game has an IRFU committee carried a greater workload than in the current era of change and challenge. They are not a self-perpetuating body. They are elected representatives from the different strands of the game.

What are the credentials of the current 24-man committee, what level of rugby experience and business expertise do they bring to their task and what contributions have they made on and off the field? Those are pertinent questions in the current climate.

Some of those men are among the most substantial figures ever to have graced the game in this country on and off the field. Some see them as fair game for derision and castigation. They have given their professional expertise free to rugby, they have never sought nor received a penny for their services. Their reward is a profound love of a great game. These men and their predecessors have sustained rugby in this country for over 120 years.

Any organisation that can survive and expand over that period of time must have done some things right. The men at the top have stayed with it when things were tough, as is certainly the case in the current climate. They have not quit on or off the field in the heavy going - unlike one or two of their critics.

IRFU president Niall Brophy, an accountant by profession, is one of eight former internationals on the 24-man body. Along with Brophy, Tom Kiernan, Noel Murphy, who is the current senior vice president, Syd Millar and Trevor Ringland have nearly 200 caps between them, and all have played for the Lions. Their playing careers need no elaboration from me. Dion Glass, Barry O'Driscoll and Jim Stevenson are also former internationals. Three of the eight are former Ireland coaches: Murphy, Millar and Kiernan. Both Millar and Murphy coached Lions teams and Millar, who also managed the 1980 Lions, was coach to the most successful Lions team this century.

Brophy, Kiernan, Millar and Murphy have all been presidents of their clubs and of their branches, and Kiernan and Millar are both former IRFU presidents. Millar and Murphy have managed the Ireland national senior team, and Murphy has also managed the Ireland under-21 team. Stan Waldron, Eddie Coleman and Dan Daly, three more of the committee, were final triallists for the Irish team.

Billy Lavery, the junior vice president of the union, is one of the most respected figures in the game. He has rendered outstanding service at club and branch levels. A solicitor, he rewrote the laws of the IRFU to bring them into line with needs of the professional era, and as chairman of the IRFU contracts sub-committee he has worked tirelessly in a most demanding role.

Kiernan is currently chairman of European Rugby Cup, honorary treasurer of the International Board and he and Millar have done a superb job, not just for Ireland but for the game in general.

These are just some of the men deemed incapable of making a correct decision by a former Ireland second row forward, The Kitty Kelley of Irish rugby.

All the committee members I have mentioned have served rugby with immense dedication on and off the field. The same can be said for the other members of that committee, John Lyons, Michael Wallace, Andy Crawford, Roy Loughead, Bobby Deacy - an outstanding president last season - Peter Boyle, Malcolm Little, John Quilligan, John Hussey, Barry Keogh and Don Crowley.

Just about every profession is represented in that line-up. To catergorise them as a collection of gin-swilling roisterers is truly shameful and grossly unfair. At least four of them, to my certain knowledge, are teetotallers.

Now let us take a look at a vital limb of the IRFU, the commercial sub-committee. Who is on that? Tony O'Reilly - now he knows a thing or two about running a successful business - Paddy Madigan, a former IRFU president, Mick Cuddy, another in that category, the chairman of Bord Failte Mark Mortell, Kiernan, Deacy, Keogh, Lyons, and Padraig Slattery, the managing director of Slattery PR. There is a fair bit of business and rugby achievement in that body.

Criticism is something we must all take, and some can take it better than others, however unfair and ill-informed it may be, and do not run whingeing to the lawyers.

One of the tasks that faces rugby legislators in Ireland is to raise money by sponsorship. Here the commercial sub-committee has a vital role. Two years ago, the IRFU did a very good deal with Irish Permanent to sponsor the national team and the home matches. It was a deal that reflected well on both union and sponsor. Central to that deal was that the Irish players must wear gear which carried the company logo.

So what happened? The ink was not dry on the contract when the agreement was broken by one player, our man the second row, who dismisses the IRFU as a collection of incompetents. He appeared at the first Ireland training session after the deal was announced wearing a tee shirt that carried the logo of a building firm from which he bought a house. A deliberate transgression of the agreement for further financial reward. By their deeds we shall know them. Not so much the neck of old Nick, but the neck of old Neil.

Last season he "informed" the readers of the newspaper to which he contributes that the money taken at the gate for rugby internationals did not pay the players but provided the revenue to buy the drink for the committee. Sky television, he told his readers, were providing the money to pay the players. The IRFU did not get a penny from Sky. Nor would they indulge in separate negotiations with Sky for this season on a point of principle and to honour an agreement with their fellow competitors in the five nations championship. Last season the income the IRFU got from television was £224,675. Last season the costs for the players and coaches to the Ireland team came to £1,998,634. The expenses for squad sessions amounted to £184,490. Next week I will look at where the IRFU money comes from and how it is spent. It will be a revealing exercise. For instance, it cost over £9 million to run the game in Ireland last season; it will cost over £10 million this season.

The IRFU committee can get on with the job of raising the £10 million per annum it now takes to run the game in this country.

Giving credit where it is due is not a weakness, it is a responsibility, and everyone needs an appreciation of difficulties and the encouragement to surmount them, not constant negativity. The game in this country has many problems to overcome. There is an honesty of purpose to do that. That is the crucial issue. Not all the decisions taken will be correct and when they are not commentators are fully entitled to criticise, as most fortunately do, in a constructive and honest manner.

The game is above us all, whether we are professional commentators or those who supplement `the day job' earnings by snide and ill-informed comment. Truly do I feel astonished at my own moderation about the Kitty Kelleys of the Irish rugby scene. They do the game and a lot of very good people in it a great disservice.