I cannot remember when Gloucester last lost five on the bounce. Losing to London Irish and Gwent Dragons was particularly difficult. With three games left against teams above us in the table it’s difficult to see us win another game this season.
Potentially Gloucester are looking at a run of 8 losses on the bounce, a totally unacceptable situation, particularly when you consider what happened at Castle Grim on March 5th.
The team sheets weren’t vastly different. Sharples & Purdy replaced by Cook & McColl. Twelvetrees & Meakes by Atkinson & Trinder. Hook & Laidlaw at Half Back and Morgan & Galarza in for Moriarty & Thrush. It could actually be argued that the back line was stronger as Cook & McColl had a combined 10 tries as against Purdy & Sharples 6. Even the Atkinson/Trinder pairing beats Twelvetrees/Meakes by an additional try, 5 to 4.
So what has gone so sour after that famous Wasps victory? On 15th February Gloucester announced that Martin St Quinton took full ownership at Gloucester. For the next few weeks things carried on as normal with mixed results. A loss to Sarries away, a decent win against Falcons and a moral boosting win against Wasps.
And then the rot set in. It’s difficult to note any other change within the organisation that could account for such a precipitous decline. St Quinton appears to be a reasonably successful businessman given his history and ability to finance a take over at Gloucester. One wonders then if he is looking at the bottom line rather than the rugby.
The English Qualifying Player bonus was born of good intent and pays a bonus to every premiership team that fulfills a percentage quota of English Qualified Players in their match day squads for the whole season of around £300,000.
Gloucester’s indifferent season has seen home crowds for Aviva Prem games around the 13,200 mark. Following the game against Wasps the booking office was overwhelmed and the following home match, against Bath, sold out. Over 16,000. 3000 tickets at around £20 each…..or £60,000. Times that by 11 home games and you more than double the EQP bonus. that’s without on site sales, more televised games (TV likes to show winning teams), increased income through advertising. Those additional tickets are sold through winning games.
It’s seems clear that certain players (Meakes, Thrush, Moriarty) were missing from the 1/4 final against NGD without good cause. Considering our weakened situation with injuries that has to be examined. If someone is pulling the strings for the sake of £300k they need to explain themselves…..if not, let the man in charge pick the strongest team on the day.
winnyssite 