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GPR - Rochester View Drop Down
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    Posted: 12 May 2023 at 9:03am
Listened to a chat by the four coaches of the semi finalists in the Gallagher Premiership & read an interesting account from Ioan Rhys Davies a 23 year old ex Wales 20's player released a couple of seasons ago by Cardiff now playing in the 4th level in France but still at pro level. 

The clear failings within both the Welsh & English systems are pretty evident with Mark McCall hitting the nail on the head saying how we develop the 18-21 year olds is dire. They do not play anywhere near enough games. Ioan Rhys Davies is full of praise for the French system saying he had played 48 games over the past two years and felt he had improved significantly. 

With both the English & Welsh development systems struggling with meaningful fixtures surely it would be a feasible option to look at some sort of cross border under 23 league. It may not be feasible for instance for each region to put forward a team but maybe a West & East select; similarly perhaps regional in England - combinations of say Bath/Exeter, Bristol/Gloucester etc with matches taking place in midweek.
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Kentexile View Drop Down
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Points: 520 		Post Options Post Options   Thanks (0) Thanks(0)   Quote Kentexile Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: 12 May 2023 at 9:41am
The reason the WRU pulled out  of the Anglo- Welsh cup was to set up a new regional U23 competition. It was due to start I think  in the 2019/20 season but didn’t and then Covid came along and like so many WRU plans has been discreetly shelved. Welsh rugby is great at reviewing but useless at implementing. A couple of links 
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Points: 4207 		Post Options Post Options   Thanks (0) Thanks(0)   Quote scarletabroad Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: 12 May 2023 at 10:15am
Originally posted by Kentexile Kentexile wrote:

The reason the WRU pulled out  of the Anglo- Welsh cup was to set up a new regional U23 competition. It was due to start I think  in the 2019/20 season but didn’t and then Covid came along and like so many WRU plans has been discreetly shelved. Welsh rugby is great at reviewing but useless at implementing. A couple of links 

The U20's are driven to the BUCS league by the regions wherever possible it appears to me, its is a very good standard plus Anglo/Welsh and supports the players through their education at the same time. It can be restrictive for some in what course they can do and if they can achieve the results to get there. Perhaps this is why the U20 age group struggle for numbers. After that I would expect most players would be playing top flight rugby by then.
This I imagine is where they see this super 8 league sitting incorporating the premiership teams and the U20's who do get to Uni and the older academy players.
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Points: 14874 		Post Options Post Options   Thanks (0) Thanks(0)   Quote Gate12 Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: 12 May 2023 at 11:00am
Surprisingly hard to find the answer to this but does anyone know what percentage of Welsh students go from comp to college and from college to uni?

The Welsh premiership and championship feel like ready made solutions that just need to be ran and monitored properly rather than coming up with new leagues.
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Realwest View Drop Down
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Points: 771 		Post Options Post Options   Thanks (0) Thanks(0)   Quote Realwest Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: 12 May 2023 at 2:24pm
The problem of pushing players to the BUCS rugby is that not everybody wants to go to university, lots of people need to go and get a job at the first opportunity. As we all know Wales is poor and people are struggling. 

The academy’s stop players playing for their home clubs when not selected taking away valuable game time.

The key like this lad who’s playing in France is getting as much game time as possible. And we in Wales aren’t doing that.
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scarletabroad View Drop Down
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Points: 4207 		Post Options Post Options   Thanks (0) Thanks(0)   Quote scarletabroad Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: 14 May 2023 at 12:34pm
BUCS league is an 18 game season add to that Scarlets games plus the training that’s pretty much a full season. If players are in the academy system there is a lot of support from Swansea Uni and scarlets.
You are correct in that not all wish or are able to go to Uni and this is where local players benefit more than say the exile programme boys as they have local knowledge/access to apprenticeships and or work. As for play time I know the exile players are sent to clubs and I assumed that local recruited boys would stay with their clubs if they were a good enough level
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Points: 870 		Post Options Post Options   Thanks (0) Thanks(0)   Quote tigerburnie Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: 18 May 2023 at 4:53pm
My old club Leicester Lions often have young players out of the Leicester and Northampton academies play in the National leagues, to give them a taste of adult rugby. I don't quite know what McCall is talking about, the English Championship and the National leagues have loads of 18-21 year old players playing most weeks.
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