Almost everyone derides the Carling Cup in football as being a competition used by the big clubs to field their reserves and youth team players, but they don't deliberately play Carling Cup ties at the same time as a round of international matches, do they?
Not so with Rugby's Anglo-Welsh Cup. Already saddled with a silly (and etymologically wrong) name, the authorities have deliberately scheduled the group matches (this week and next) opposite the autumn internationals, so virtually every player that anyone might have wanted to turn up at a provincial club ground to watch will instead be at Twickenham, or the Millennium Stadium. As will, in spirit if not in body, just about every Rugby fan, too.
It's very hard to think of a more pointless trophy to play for in any sport anywhere, except maybe that Channel Island where they only have 2 teams who play each other 24 times a year in the league and then have a League Cup as well.
Not so with Rugby's Anglo-Welsh Cup. Already saddled with a silly (and etymologically wrong) name, the authorities have deliberately scheduled the group matches (this week and next) opposite the autumn internationals, so virtually every player that anyone might have wanted to turn up at a provincial club ground to watch will instead be at Twickenham, or the Millennium Stadium. As will, in spirit if not in body, just about every Rugby fan, too.
It's very hard to think of a more pointless trophy to play for in any sport anywhere, except maybe that Channel Island where they only have 2 teams who play each other 24 times a year in the league and then have a League Cup as well.
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