World Rugby changes open pathways for smaller nations

PARIS: It has been a long time coming, and it will be a long time until its benefits are felt, but rugby's administrators seem to have finally found a way to untie the Gordian Knot that has seen the game forever hopelessly biased towards its traditional powers.

On Tuesday (Oct 24) the governing body World Rugby (WR) proudly announced a series of radical changes they hailed as the "most significant development in the sport since the game went professional".

That happened in 1995 but in the 28 years since, the biggest nations have become even more dominant, while paying endless lip service to "growing the game."

WR chairman Sir Bill Beaumont told journalists how he remembered administrators wrestling with the dreaded "calendar" after the 2007 World Cup in France, and failing hopelessly to make any progress.

At the heart of the matter is self-interest. The bigger unions such as England's RFU rely on the stupendous profits - more than £12 million (US$14.59 million) per game - made from Twickenham internationals to finance their entire operation.

They need it filled, and playing the likes of Fiji, as they discovered with a sea of empty seats in August, may be great for the development of the game but it leaves a huge hole in funding.

The same applies to all the big nations, who routinely play each other home and away in June and November with only the token occasional diversion against a Tier Two nation.

The Six Nations, having allowed Italy in 2000, has dismissed any and all suggestions of potential promotion and relegation to give encouragement to the likes of Georgia.

And so, when each World Cup comes around, coaches and players of beaten Tier Two teams use their four-yearly moment in the spotlight to plead for more meaningful