Premiership academies set for radical shake-up with NFL-style draft

[Neils]

Premiership academies set for radical shake-up with NFL-style draft

Exclusive: Under new system, each team would be allowed to keep a certain number of players from each year group of their own academy intake
By Daniel Schofield, Deputy Rugby Union Correspondent, in Paris 24 October 2023 ? 4:11pm

Premiership academies are set for a radical shake-up with the introduction of an NFL-style draft system as part of the new Professional Game Agreement, Telegraph Sport can reveal.

Improving the development of talent has been seen as a key priority by both the Rugby Football Union and Premiership Rugby with a collective recognition that young English players are not getting enough game time.

During their Under-20 Six Nations match this year, France?s squad had made 102 starts in the Top 14 versus England?s eight starts in the Premiership. England Under-20s lost the match 42-7.

With the Premiership losing three teams to insolvency over the past 12 months, there will be a significant redrawing of the academy boundaries as well as the introduction of a draft-style system to ensure a more equitable distribution of the best young players around the 10 teams and in future to clubs in the proposed second tier Premiership 2.

Each team would be allowed to keep a certain number of players from each year group of their own academy intake and the remainder would be allocated via a form of draft, although the precise mechanism has yet to be decided. In the NFL, the worst team from the previous season gets the first pick of that year?s best college players and it has grown into one of the biggest spectacles of the American sporting calendar.

The RFU would also have a more direct role in individual players? development programmes and although Premiership clubs would still retain control of all playing decisions.

Part of the issue within the current model is in the inequitable distribution of talent among the clubs, who are only allowed to recruit players to their academy from within set geographical boundaries. As Pat Lam, the Bristol Bears director of rugby, has repeatedly pointed out, their patch only includes just two of the 100 leading rugby schools while Harlequins have more than 20 within their catchment area.

?I can tell you now that I?ve been here nearly six years, the system is flawed for young players,? Lam said. ?When you look and you ask the question, and I used to always say this when I was back in New Zealand and coaching in Ireland, ?how is the country that has the most resources, financially and player-wise, not the No1 rugby nation in the world?? And the problem that you?ve got is that it?s the only country that has a system that has boundaries on young players which is, to me, the biggest problem you?ve got.?

Under the new system, if a club had three promising locks on their books they may only be able to retain two and the third would be allocated to a team short of cover in the second row to provide greater playing opportunities. The Rugby Players? Association are also lobbying to ensure there is a minimum wage for academy players and they would be compensated for moving across the country.

?We can?t just continue with clubs having 40 academy players and teams just hoovering up anyone they can, hoping they find a gem,? a source close to the negotiations said. ?We need to make it more elite than that. At the same time, we don?t want teams just hoarding the best talent for the sake of it.?

[baldpaul101]

This seems like another idea being put out there without enough detail to make a sensible judgement on.
Rugby needs less vague suggestions & more details of when, where & how.

I can't see how sharing round Academy talent around the clubs is, by itself, going to mean more academy players getting premiership game time. With less teams & less International games being played on prem weekends you could argue its going to be harder than every for them to get starts.....

[Trevs Big Tackle]

NFL teams have an enforced maximum squad size so are the RFU/PRL planning to introduce a similar restriction? It would certainly stop clubs from trying to hoard academy players.

Of course, the RFU/PRL would then have to *cough* enforce it...

[NellyWellyWaspy]

I wonder if the draftees will get the same money as the NFL give to theirs?

[Neils]

I wonder if the draftees will get the same money as the NFL give to theirs?

Ha!

[Lwasp]

I wonder if they'll get any help uprooting and moving across the country?

[Garuda]

I wonder if they'll be allowed to appeal if drafted to a team they don't want to play for.

[NellyWellyWaspy]

I wonder if they'll be allowed to appeal if drafted to a team they don't want to play for.

You see, that's the thing, isn't it? The people running the game see it is only a business, to achieve revenue streams from media deals.

You and I, and the kids out there, we see it as a game, enjoyable, fun and to be played with passion.

Now, NFL is simply a business, a career that will set you up for life. With the relative peanuts that rugby pays, there has to be more than (than the paltry) money and contracts (on offer), otherwise you won't want to do it. Telling a kid from Cornwall that they have to rock up to Newcastle for peanuts isn't going to be enough.

[Brandnewtorugby]

It's the 'for peanuts' bit that once again comes from the thinking that rugby is equivalent to football and NFL. When an entire squad in the top level rugby club collectively receives the same as one average top league footballer, you need different solutions.