Great Britain confirmed yesterday that they have scrapped their full-time programmes.
THE IRELAND MEN’s sevens team were scheduled to play Czechia, Belgium and Georgia in the beautiful seaside town of Makarska in Croatia in a few weeks.
It’s only eight days since confirmation of that landed from the IRFU. The players and staff who are losing their jobs are still reeling. There were separate England, Wales, and Scotland sevens teams up until 2023 when they combined as Great Britain due to funding issues. Now, the RFU, WRU, and Scottish Rugby are cutting back again due to “continuing financial pressures associated with the sevens game and ongoing explorations as to the role the format can continue to play in player development systems.”It’s not just sevens where unions are feeling the pinch. The 15s game faces big financial challenges.
It’s understood that the IRFU will save more than €500,000 per season by taking this measure. It might not seem like a transformative amount in the grand scheme of things, but the union has taken a long-term view that this can be better used elsewhere. Advertisement Plotting for long-term success in sevens could have included implementing some sort of sevens pathway underneath the national teams, but that wasn’t the case.
The calls from ex-Ireland players to reverse the decision have fallen on deaf ears, while a group of parents of those ex-players and some current players haven’t heard back from the IRFU after they expressed their frustrations in a letter addressed to Humphreys. “The removal of a high performance programme from the Irish Olympic team that has received significant tax payers investment through Sport Ireland and enjoyed good success is something that the OFI is disappointed in,” said an OFI spokesperson.
It’s why there will be another change to the national player contracting model, meaning the provinces must contribute 40% of ‘central contracts’ from their provincial salary budget from next year. This will mainly come from Leinster, who have the bulk of nationally-contracted players, and the money will be redirected into the Munster, Connacht, and Ulster player development pathways.
“For example, to accelerate our women’s game and to ensure that our national men’s team is competing at the very highest level.”IRFU performance director David Humphreys. Ben Brady / INPHO Ben Brady / INPHO / INPHO2021 was when the IRFU came under intense scrutiny after a large group of women’s players wrote to the Irish government to highlight “multiple cycles of substandard commitment from the union.
However, the increased focus on the 15s team in this World Cup year means the women’s sevens team also endured a miserable season as key players went on 15s duty. The Ireland women’s sevens were relegated from the SVNS Series, so will have to start again down a couple of levels. That, in turn, means players in the sevens team won’t be exposed to as high a standard of competition as before.
The way the IRFU sees it, there have been very few players picked up by the Ireland sevens programme having been off their 15s radar, and then ended up progressing into the 15s game. It is jarring that the IRFU seem to have shut down all possibility of the men’s sevens team being brought back together to make a late run at the 2028 Games in LA. Ireland could restart in 2027 and qualify for the Olympics through Rugby Europe competitions. This is something that the current players asked Humphreys about at their meeting.
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