APV1 says...

Oh, cry me a river.

Play better than the opposition and you win. It's Saracens here, not the Local Park 3rd XV!

Posted 11:04 10th April 2012

melkdave says...

The defeat has nothing to do with the salary cap imo.Saracens made to many mistakes and gave away penalties .Stevens was found out again at the scrum ,and Saracens need to be more dynamic behind the pack and score more tries end of rant lol .It does mean that Lienster now have a much harder SF imo Clermont at home is going to be a very big ask ,that place is a fortress

Posted 16:20 09th April 2012

kybone says...

The point with Edinburgh is that, good a result as it was on saturday, they very rarely compete at this level. Add to that the fact that they are near the bottom of a league with no relegation and therefore have had nothing but the HC to play for since about january. yamahakiwi your point stands when refering to edinburgh but the vast majority of players at Leinster and Munster are centrally contracted so budget doesn't really come into it for those and the other Irish clubs. Id agree with Mark Mccall to a point as, in my opinion, what the salary cap does is create a very even spread of talent in the prem. This is good in terms of creating a great competition where all the teams can beat each other but soem of the negative side effects are:

1. Every game is tough and intense because there's always something to play for i.e. the title, HC qualification, or to avoid relegation. And, like it or not, the prem takes priority over everything else for the clubs in the prem.

2. Due to the even spread of wealth there is also a fairly even spread of talent which, like ive said, creates a compelling competition but means that there are no truly outstanding sides

The t14 also has these issues but they also have a lot more money to play with and whatever anyone says, more money means more and better quality players. I suppose the question is, would we rather prem clubs have more money and probably spend it on foreign players or would we rather things stay as they are and prem clubs (hopefully) bring through more of their own players. Id prefer the latter but what that means is you're always gonna struggle against teams who just spend £xx on the Jonny Wilkinsons, Gethin Jenkins and Dan Carters etc

Posted 10:20 09th April 2012

Ramage says...

I have no knowledge if this is true or not but suffice to say is if it is what a sad state of affairs. Money talks but then that is the capitalist system we have adopted in our system. A system that allows greedy bankers to almost bring their system and every other one crashing down. Note how they are on the march back with the help of taxpayers money. However having said this I think there is more to it than that.

Posted 04:55 09th April 2012

gauca says...

So he's saying the only way to improve a team is to pay them more?

Interesting philosophy,

In reality French based players get paid more because thats what our market forces dictate (just like english football), there's nothing more to it, if anything higher salary caps can cause a lot more problems than it solves such as staying solvent, remenber SFrancais recent history?

Also the greater risk of relegation and being the toughest league in Eur to qualify for HC places means clubs have to gamble on spending more to avoid being outgunned by thos that do spend more which creates a spiral of spending vast sums to out do each other.

This does not mean though that the t14 are somehow hoovering up all the talent, quite the opposite in many instances. There are huge numbers of well paid journeyman players in France. The Sarries 1st 15 on paper is excellent in terms of personnel, just seemed to lack a plan B today.

The t14 budgets have also allowed many Argentines, Gerorgians, Pacific Islanders etc etc to earn a great living overseas doing what they love and playing at a high level of competition which can only serve to strengthern their national squads.

Posted 01:23 09th April 2012

saintssteve15 says...

All the talk about changing thr HC so it is fair for French and Engilish clubs to complete.However Saints went all the way to the final playing intence Rugby that is required for this competition and as everyone Knows they ran out of energy.

For English Clubs the salary cap does need to be altered only to allow more money to be spent on the whole squad excluding English Acadamy players which would let the clubs hang on to young players and with more money to spend to expand the first team squad allowing them the luxury of bringing off the bench good replacements. Irish Celitic teams have the advantage it would apear of keeping up the intensity required after resting key players and having a good squad to hold their own in the league even when 6 or 7 plyers are being rested.

The next match for Saints is Tigers at home but you can bet this will be an intense physical game and both teams wil take weeks that they havnt got to try and get in the play offs and avoid not qualifying for the HC or a play off semi final.

I think the English and French Clubs should try and organise their leagues better and the HC should drop the seedings and maybe Lensiter and Munster may meet and Knock seven bells out of each other in the group stages. Cardiff how do they get to be seeded as the weekends results proves and there poor showing against Saints last year.

Posted 22:11 08th April 2012

J_Hdk says...

essentially he is saying his team would have won if they could afford better players.... Ouch that is a fairly nasty thing to say.

But I have a funny feeling Edinburgh have anywhere near the size of Budget as Saracens...Explain that one

Posted 21:48 08th April 2012