Changes needed At Cardiff
By Lestyn - 28/12/03
September 2 2004
Cardiff's regional side yet again failed to turn up on Saturday, going down with barely a whimper at the hands of the Celtic Warriors. Dai Young's ability as a coach was not for the first time this season called into question.
As the Capital's stand alone region, the Blues should be well above the tenth place in the Celtic League they find themselves in. Saturday's one sided defeat by a Warriors side still very much in the early stages of development was their sixth straight defeat. Overall this season the Blues have only tasted victory three times and startlingly lost ten times already.
However it is not solely the number of losses incurred so far that has been disappointing, the nature of their performances for a side crammed full of internationals have been very poor. In particular the front five has failed miserably, in particular the gambles on Andy Moore and Craig Quinnell in the second row have so far back fired miserably.
Other summer acquisitions in the pack Gareth Williams and Nathan Thomas have also failed to live up to their billing. Dan Baugh looks only a shadow of the player he was before his knee injury. Yet Young has chosen to persist and ignore the prospects Dan MacShane and James Malpas.
On Saturday the back line did not function again. How long will it be before Young realises that Iestyn Harris is not an outside half? More concerning was the poor handling demonstrated by backs and the paper thin defence that allowed Gareth Thomas through time after time.
To me it all boils down to a lack of leadership from the top. There was no direction or purpose from Cardiff and at this level that is completely unacceptable. I admired Dai Young as a player and have tried hard to remain patience with him as a coach, but it is very evident that he is simply not up to it at this level. He has to motivate his players, but so far this season in the majority of games they have hardly looked up for it.
The blame does not solely lie at Young's door, there needs to be drastic changes at the Arms Park if the Blues are to stop their downward spiral. Cardiff RFC made a small profit last year, however the Cardiff Blues are around three million pounds in debt, the backers are clearly not pulling their weight. The money which needed to spent on making the Blues squad competitive in transition from the Cardiff RFC side which failed the season before, has not been there to attract the caliber of player in they needed.
Rather than just appointing a new coach, a director of rugby like figure is also needed to oversee things. I doubt they will find they man in Wales, possibly someone from either Australia or New Zealand could freshen things up with a new approach they so desperately need at the moment. Cardiff RFC's 3-0 loss at the hands of Brynmawr in the cup this afternoon highlighted just how low Cardiff rugby in general has fallen.