Club struggles in a shifting financial landscape mean it is harder to attract top overseas players to the English domestic gameStarter for 10: has the Premiership ever seen a more naturally-gifted player than Charles Piutau? Others have scored more tries, made more tackles or influenced their team’s fortunes more significantly, but has there ever been anyone to match Piutau’s capacity to thrill, to produce those moments that stir the senses?On Saturday he makes his last appearance for Bristol against Gloucester after five years at the club. He arrived to great fanfare, the first £1m player and as the totem of the Premiership’s marquee player policy, but the ledger will show only a qualified success. He was injured at the start...
Financial woes and player welfare concerns abound but rugby union remains a compelling spectacle when everything clicksEvery now and again on social media a video clip will emerge of a lonely surfer trying to catch a skyscraper-high wave off the coast of Portugal. Time it right and the long ride down is truly epic. Get it slightly wrong and the consequences of that misjudgment do not bear thinking about.In many ways the 2022-23 Premiership season feels broadly similar. Increasingly there are jagged financial rocks everywhere and the game’s physicality continues to make it unsuitable for the faint of heart. Continue reading...
History shows that the Premiership’s top two usually make the final but this year’s springtime run-in may be differentEven without the assistance of Covid-19 this would have been a unique season. Never before has a domestic campaign in England held its final at the end of June, while the inaugural Rainbow Cup, which commences this week, also involves a relative leap into the unknown. People talk about the potential benefits of summer rugby but, in truth, it is already here.With barely any rain in the forecast for the immediate future and surfaces already firming up, it is another reason to suspect the closing furlongs of the Premiership will be played at a cracking gallop. This will suit certain sides more...
Piers O’Conor and Mat Protheroe step up for Bristol, Newcastle left down and out while leaky Leicester require urgent repairsA third Premiership try of the season for Charles Piutau against Sale on Friday night, in what was his ninth league start of the campaign, was not enough to secure the win for Bristol. He has been blighted by injury throughout the season, and is obviously not alone in that, but while Bristol will have hoped for more game-time from their marquee signing, it is to their credit that they have enjoyed such a prosperous return to the Premiership having been denied his services for long parts of the campaign. In his place the youngsters Piers O’Conor and Mat Protheroe stepped...
Billy Vunipola needs Farrell’s ruthless focus, Cipriani’s patience boosts Gloucester and Saints reaping rewards of faith in youthOne topic did rather dominate the conversation at Ashton Gate. And the booing. This looks as if it will be a new reality for Billy Vunipola, which may or may not come to affect his game over the coming weeks. He has always come across as something of a happy-go-lucky guy but the No 8 will need the ruthless focus of his England teammate Owen Farrell if recent events and any future repercussions are not to distract him from his day job. One other point did muscle its way into the talking – and that was the kicking. As if chastened by their...