ON RUGBY: When future IRFU committee members reflect on their treatment of Roly Meates they'll surely do so with a degree of embarrassment, or perhaps even a hint of shame. At the very least, Meates' case history in Irish rugby will not provide one of the union's most glorious chapters.
Throughout the saga of recent times over whether the Irish team was in need of specialist scrum coaching, it had been presumed that if it came to pass Meates was the man for the job. He has long since been regarded as the foremost expert in this aspect of the game within these shores, and his involvement in the last couple of seasons with Leinster had seemingly reaffirmed his standing in that regard.
Thus the recent co-opting of Ballymena's Australian coach Tony D'Arcy on to the Irish team's management ticket as a scrum specialist coach rather than Meates would have come as a surprise. But then again perhaps not.
The IRFU would no doubt argue otherwise, but the latest snub to Meates certainly smacks of a vendetta. Not that he would be the first to be cold-shouldered by the union for daring to disagree with them, though the irony is that after a few hiccups initially the IRFU have managed the professional era very well.
Meates' primary sin dates back to the early 1990s and an interview he granted former Irish coach turned pundit and columnist Mick Doyle. Aside from his various other voluntary contributions to the game he loves, Meates had served on the IRFU's rugby committee for the best part of two decades, from 1972 to 1984, and then again for another four years from 1988 after briefly stepping down when becoming Trinity's nomination as Leinster Branch president.
Meates was a member of the Union's Amateur Status Sub-Committee, which was essentially a precursor for the inevitable advent of professionalism. Being one of the more progressive members of this sub-committee, and certainly one who was more supportive of professionalism than some of his counterparts, it is believed that Meates regularly had run-ins with those committee members who were staunchly opposed to professionalism.
Clearly growing frustrated with the resistance to his proposals, when Meates granted an interview to Doyle in 1992 he duly conveyed his views on a host of issues, not least in terms of the union's need to become professional in its workings and outlook, even to the point of employing professional expertise. He had committed the cardinal sin of breaking rank and disagreeing with the more conservative elements on the committee.
The union have never been ones to encourage open and frank debate, and have tended to be deeply wary of the media as well as hostile to any form of criticism. They maintained that Meates should only have expressed his views at committee level, which of course he already had done, and demanded that he give a full apology for having broken rank.
Meates declined, as they would surely have expected, for that would have been to rescind everything he had said up until then. The committee passed a vote of no-confidence in him and when he sought re-election Meates was beaten by 34 votes to 25, the branches having been mandated to vote against him.
He has basically been left out in the cold ever since, never being asked by the union to do anything subsequently. To Meates' credit, he has maintained a dignified silence ever since, refusing to become involved in a slanging match with the IRFU.
Scrum specialists of Meates' renown aren't exactly a dime a dozen in the modern game and most countries would be doing bellyflips to have someone in their ranks with his expertise. When Gary Halpin was looking forward to retirement last season he spoke of his desire to one day become a specialist in the art of scrum coaching and thus assuming the mantle of Meates, whom the former Irish prop regarded as the best in the business. It is a view widely held by front-rowers who've been tutored by Meates over the years.
Thankfully at least Leinster saw the light and Matt Williams had the good sense to bring Meates on board, with the result that Leinster's scrum has been one of the bedrocks of their rejuvenation. In light of that, Meates would seem to have been better placed than ever to help Ireland, for in the last couple of years he's coached Paul Wallace, Emmet Byrne, Shane Byrne and Reggie Corrigan, while it is believed that others have come to him for personal coaching, such as Peter Bracken and Justin Fitzpatrick.
By comparison, D'Arcy has had no involvement with any of the Irish front-rowers up to now. None of this is meant as a critique of D'Arcy, who by all accounts is a well respected coach and yet another eminently likeable Aussie. And good luck to him.
Yet viewed in the context of Meates' renowned expertise and recent experience of coaching Irish front-rowers, there is no obvious logic to not even sounding him out, unless of course a grudge is still held against him. Thus, despite the employment of Eddie O'Sullivan, Declan Kidney and Niall O'Donovan as the main Irish coaches, that will seem a little cosmetic when set against the decision not to seek out Meates' help, for this is yet another rebuff to an indigenous coach.
Along with Ronnie Dawson at Wanderers, Meates was the first real club coach when assuming the position at Trinity. In all, he coached there for 29 years, at a time when the colleges were a vital cog in the Irish game, and players such as Brendan Mullin, the Springs, John Robbie, Hugo MacNeill, Johnny Sexton and Fergus Dunlea all went on to play for Ireland.
It also seems a shoddy way to treat someone who coached Ireland in the mid-1970s, who coached Leinster from 1978 to '83 and was a Leinster selector.
Gentlemen, was his crime really that awful? Is there not a case for letting bygones be bygones 10 years later, and besides, doing what's best for Irish rugby? Shouldn't that be the ultimate criterion? No, not the most glorious chapter in the IRFU's history.
