Lions, MyPlayers respond to drama over leaked survey: 'We will now dive deeper'

The Lions and MyPlayers have issued a joint statement after a player survey done by the Johannesburg franchise was leaked.

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Reports surfaced earlier in the week of discontent between Lions players and management.

A leaked MyPlayers survey revealed that Lions players had apparently given "very low" ratings of the coaches and administrative staff. Coach Ivan van Rooyen reportedly only received 4 out of 10 from the players.

This prompted the Lions, along with the players' organisation, to release a statement late on Saturday night.

The statement read: "MyPlayers - The Rugby Players' Organisation and the Lions Rugby Company recently met to discuss the roll-out and subsequent feedback process of their provincial Sport Psychological Fitness (SPF) assessment initiative conducted by MyPlayers at the Johannesburg-based franchise.

"These follows a series of media reports in the last week where certain aspects of the survey were made public."  

Lions Rugby Company CEO Rudolf Straeuli and MyPlayers CEO Eugene Henning also commented in the statement.

Straeuli said: "First of all, I would like state that we trust in the work MyPlayers is doing for professional players in South Africa. They form an integral part of our ecosystem within our rugby landscape.

"I have had the opportunity to go through the results of the group survey presented to me by MyPlayers and I am comfortable with the process. We both agreed that perhaps the feedback process could have been more consultative, but those are learnings which MyPlayers will take note of for similar exercises of this nature.

"It is unfortunate however that contents of the survey were maliciously leaked and has somewhat