Naturally, when the proposal for a region to be cut came out this week as part of the Oakwell report, little else made headlines beyond it.
That’s unsurprising, given the drastic nature of losing one of the four professional sides and the consequences that would have for hard-working people involved. You’d hardly notice where the cues were in the Billiard Room if you’d just walked in to see Colonel Mustard with a dagger in his back.
Of course, it’s just the most drastic proposal put forward in a report commissioned for the Professional Rugby Board - all of which will be discussed when they meet with the Welsh Rugby Union this month. However, while culling one quarter of Wales' professional sides may get pushed back against by the PRB, the onus will still be on them to come up with some strategy to present to the WRU board which improves matters in a season when Welsh rugby has continually redefined its nadir.
Change - drastic change to be precise - has been widely accepted as being desperately needed to somehow change the fortunes of a failing sport in this country. But, for all their struggles, the regions can't be the only point of change.
The rot has been setting in for some time in Welsh rugby, with the cracks having been papered over by the success of the men's national team. That blissful ignorance is now gone.
Any report looking into the issues of Welsh rugby and determining where change ought to start presumably should begin with the following line: ‘Welsh rugby’s governance structure is archaic and not fit for purpose. The professional game is ultimately dictated by amateurs. Maybe try changing that before you start wielding the axe.’
Splitting the professional and community game adequately has been a must for an awfully long time now and it's hard to see how the professional sides - four or three - thrive without that change from the very top.
As things stand, the way Welsh rugby runs is such that the phrase 'tail wagging the dog' seems like a glib understatement. The professional game, which generates almost all of the revenue, is governed by the 300-plus community clubs.
They elect the chairman of the WRU, hold the majority of seats on the board, which elects the CEO and ultimately decides how much money should be spent and where it should be spent. "With all respect, a £100m business can’t be run by well-meaning local WRU Council members,” said former WRU chairman Gareth Davies.
Of course, he was voted out and replaced by Rob Butcher, an individual who is perceived as very much a grassroots man. Throw in the fact the WRU board sits above the Professional Rugby Board in the unwieldy structure of the WRU - with the added curveball of only 10% of clubs needed to call for an EGM - and change is frustratingly glacial in its speed.
Cutting a team without addressing the above issues in Welsh rugby's governance is like amputating a toe from a gangrenous foot and hoping that fixes the entire limb.
Naturally, the Oakwell report didn’t say the above. There was a line about Welsh rugby governance procedures and responsibilities needing reviewing and realigning, but it’s hard to shake the feeling that is some fairly vague PR jargon.
Notably, the report produced six key findings including stating the WRU commercial performance is in line with its peers, investment into the pro game, regions and community is in line with other unions. That’s simply staggering.
Because what other professional sides have been cursed with the repayment of a £20m loan that was taken out to compensate the regions for their services. Team Wales still benefitted from those services, but it's still the regions that are footing the bill.
Granted, without that loan, the clubs might have gone to the wall, but being saddled with it - hindering them even more at a time when budgets for next season have been shrouded in mystery - isn't exactly conducive to setting them up to succeed.
The news that WRU chief executive Steve Phillips, who served as the union's head of finance under Roger Lewis, will put forward a long-term funding model which would see the professional sides' payments cut from £23.5million between them to £18million in the 2023-24 season is another concern. Whether it's four teams or three, that only serves to push the regions further behind their rivals in the United Rugby Championship and across the border in England.
Phillips has spoken in the past about creating a two-tiered funding system which would see some regions backed heavily to succeed in Europe, while others would become development sides. The suggestion that he believes there's not enough money in Welsh rugby to sustain four sides is implicit, along with the reported reduction in payment in the coming years.
The regions would be forgiven for feeling a lack of empathy from the very top of the WRU in that sense, given money has gone into a hotel on Westgate Street when they're paying off the CBILS loan. It's hard to justify soul-searching of your own when you're lumbered with burdens not of your own making by a governing body which isn't exactly keen on funding you. Especially when those placing the burden on you are also the ones you're relying on to instigate the changes you want.
There are a lot of fires burning in Welsh rugby right now. Some, like losing to Italy at home in each of the men's, women's and U20s Six Nations matches, are unwelcome novelties - a new blaze for the game to deal with. That is what has caused much of the panic in Welsh rugby in recent months.
Others are a little more familiar. We've been here before, with proposals for cuts and mergers having been on the table in the past. Those fires have burned, been extinguished and then reignited all over again.
Welsh rugby needs drastic change. Would professionalising the governance with a clear and proper split of the pro and community game be too drastic for Phillips and Butcher?
Perhaps, but how can we know for certain if three teams would be better than four if the system they're working in isn't fit for purpose? Anything decided before that would feel like the professional sides paying the price for the union's archaic failings.
Former chairman Davies has pointed out definitive change is not really possible unless the constitution of the WRU is rewritten. For that to happen, the clubs would have to vote for it.
And so we come to these pertinent words from Davies back in March: "The constitution is broken, there are things that should be quickly repaired. Every other week when I was at the union, if you wanted to change anything you were almost threatened by an EGM. 10 per cent of the clubs - 30 clubs - could call an EGM. So you're always up against the threat of an EGM that's going to get rid of the chief executive or chairman or whatever. Until the constitution is repaired or ripped up I think we're going to continually face these squabbles of 'my little patch' and that's the problem we have in Welsh rugby. It's 'my little patch', not what's right for the game."
In basic terms, the current situation sees one set of turkeys being asked to vote for Christmas because another set simply won't. That is the reality with the grassroots' grip on the professional game, with the regions now the ones being made to consider jumping in the oven with some sage and onion stuffing.
Ultimately, if nothing changes this time at the very top of the WRU, you know it won't be long before questions over the number of regions is circled back to once again. That fire is rarely extinguished for long.
