World rugby's changes make me fear the day TV screens take over stands

There are days when I brood nostalgically on the SRU of old, on the days when as one former president – perhaps Alf Wilson of Dunfermline? – said that the union’s response to any new proposal was to say “no”, then think about it, and say “no” again.

Scotland's win over Romania at the World Cup was enjoyable - but hardly beneficial for the development of the sport.

Those were the days, I mutter, not always silently. So it’s no surprise that my immediate response to the future plans for international rugby announced by the game’s ruling body, World Rugby, was to say “Oh for an new Alf Wilson” (if it was Alf).

Of course, World Rugby’s stated aim is laudable: it’s to “grow the game”, “provide more international opportunities for Tier 2 countries”, and then, doubtless, by extension to Tier 3 ones. It’s also, I think, to create a round-the-year competitive structure. Well we would most of us be happy to see a World Cup with fewer very one-sided matches. There have been too many of these this time. It was agreeable of course to see Scotland players enjoying themselves in the match against Romania, but it was hardly what one looks for in an international; and this, let us remember was a game in which Gregor Townsend fielded what was close to a Second XV.

In any case aren’t there already too many internationals? Good news for the TV companies of course, but internationals are in danger of becoming routine, no longer the special occasions they used to be? It’s getting like the old joke about American tourists in Europe: “If it’s friday, then I guess this must be Naples.”

There are fears about the sustainability of the grass-roots game.

The likely effect of World Rugby’s ambitious proposals will damage the domestic game in the Six Nations anyway. The club game looks like holding up in France where club loyalties are intense and clubs often get support from municipal authorities. The English Premiership is already in difficulties and and these are likely to get worse. Three of the 12 clubs in the Premiership a couple of years ago have gone bust, leaving now only ten. How will support hold up if there are fewer home matches and – importantly – many fewer in which star players are not made available to the clubs because of more international fixtures.? Will it become like English cricket where central contracts mean that Test match players almost never feature in the County Championship, with a knock-on effect on county membership?

We can hardly claim to have a professional game here in Scotland, since we have only two clubs. The situation is not much better in Wales. Things are better in Ireland, but for how long? Even there Leinster and Munster supporters are lucky if they see their international players turn out in half their home matches.

Rugby was developed from the ground up, from schools and clubs. Professionalism and the increase in the number of internationals did not take long to damage the club game severely. There has admittedly been an expansion in Scotland with clubs in parts of the country where 50 or 60 years ago there was no rugby, Yet there s much less interest in the club game: newspapers and TV take little notice of it. Local support isn’t what it was. There are fewer players. Clubs that used to field three or four XVs do longer do soo. The club game attracts fewer spectators. Why go to stand on the touchline on a chilly November saturday when you can always find a professional match on some TV channel. Yet the intensity of club rugby – though not the skills – can still match anything you see in the pro game – and may often be more fun.

Well, it’s the way of the world. Times change, not always for the better. When one looks at the attendances in football’s lower divisions, one wonders how these clubs survive. The same may be said of English county cricket.

In rugby, the gulf between the professional game and what is now termed the recreational game (that is, the game from which modern rugby grew) is wide and deep, and getting wider and deeper. World Rugby is eager to spread the game and extent its popularity. It now schemes and proposals may well succeed in doing this. Meanwhile the amateur game and even the professional club game are withering. Money rules regardless of the old warning – radix malorum est cupiditas – greed for money is the root of evil. I fear the day may come when the playing fields are deserted on a Saturday afternoon while those who used to sit in the stand or line the touchline are sitting in front of the TV.