Act I: Isengard
Uglúk Farrell: Hail, Saruman the White! Rejoice, for I have brought unto you the head of Grishnákh Read, the leader of the Black Uruk-hai of Mordor.
Saruman Jones: It is well done, my servant, but have you also brought unto me the halflings?
Uglúk (pouting, and looking for all the world like a bog brush): The halflings disappeared during the scrummage with the Black Uruk-hai, my lord.
Saruman: How do you mean, disappeared?! The halflings are always lurking around the back of the scrummage, instructing the referee.
Uglúk: My lord, I believe they used some TMO enchantment to escape. But why concern yourself with mere halflings when there are mighty but cuddly Green Uruk-hai to face?
Saruman: You fool! To think that I have wasted years breeding White Uruk-hai only to produce morons who can’t capture halflings, and don’t know what a ruck is!
Uglúk (pouting again): That wasn’t me, that was Uruk-Dylan and Uruk-DOMINATOR.
Saruman: Get out of my sight!
[Exit Uglúk]
Saruman (pacing): Verily, it is a strange thing to have the head of Grishnákh and yet not the Ring. I fear there are some dark-green plots afoot.
Act II: The Forest of Fangorn
Treebeard: Hmm hoom, are you young halflings awake yet?
Merry Handré (bouncing up): Yes, Treebeard, we are full of the beans of life following your magic energy drink! Can we have some more, please?
Pippin Faf: Ooh, yes, please!
Gandalf Rassie: I would not advise drinking too deeply of Fangorn’s potions. Indeed, your skin is already taking on a greenish tinge, as if the moss grew upon it.
Halflings (in unison): Oh, don’t be ridiculous, Gandalf! We will be fine.
Gandalf: Do not then stumble at the end of the 22.
Act III: Dol Baran; night
[Merry and Pippin are huddled in their camp.]
Pippin: That ovally ball that old Gandalf’s got. He seemed mighty pleased with it. He knows or guesses something about it. But does he tell us what? No, not a word. Yet I picked it up, and I saved us from rolling out at the pool stages.
Merry: Do not meddle in the affairs of Wizards, for they are subtle and quick to anger. Go to sleep!
[Pippin waits for Merry to fall asleep, then sneaks out to look at the special ovally ball.
He bends low over it, looking like a greedy child stooping over a bowl of food, in a corner away from others. He gazes at it. The air seems still and tense about him. At first the oval is dark, black as an All-Black jersey, with the moonlight gleaming on its surface. Then there comes a faint glow and stir in the heart of it, and it holds his eyes, so that now he can not look away. Soon all the inside seems on fire; the ball is spinning, or the lights within are revolving. Suddenly it does one of those awkward ovally-ball bounces, and the lights go out. He gives a gasp and struggles; but he regains the ball and remains bent, clasping the ball with both hands like any sensible player approaching a tackle. Closer and closer he bends, and then becomes rigid; his lips move soundlessly for a while. Then with a strangled cry he falls back and lies still (with one eye on the referee).
The cry is piercing. The fatties leap (ungracefully) down from the banks. All the camp is soon astir.]
Gandalf: So this is the thief.
[Hastily he casts his cloak over the ovally ball where it lies.]
Gandalf: But you, Pippin! This is a grievous turn to things! The devilry! What mischief has he done to himself, and to all of us?
[The halfling shudders, his eyes closed. He cries out and sits up, staring in bewilderment at all the faces around him, pale in the moonlight.]
Pippin: It is not for you, Saruman!
Gandalf (sternly): What did you see, and what did you say?
Pippin: I saw a dark sky, and tall rugby posts. Then the lights went in and out. They were cut off by winger-like things. Very big, I think, really; but in the ovally ball they looked like white bats wheeling round the try-line. I thought there were fifteen of them.
Gandalf: Nazgûl! The storm is coming. The Nazgûl are coming! Run, run! Wait not for the whistle, and never mind the offside law! Let not the swift wait for the slow! Run!
Further reading
Yosoy philosophising on Wales’ performance with a depleted team.
TomPirracas’ touching tale of a young rugby fan’s decision on whom to support.
On the telly this week
Friday 1st November
| Wales v New Zealand | 09:00 | S4C / ITV |
| Ulster v Zebre | 19:35 | Premier Sports 2 |
| Glasgow v Kings | 19:35 | Premier Sports 1 |
| Saints v Quins | 19:45 | BT Sport 1 |
Saturday 2nd November
| England v S Africa | 09:00 | ITV / S4C |
| Leicester v Gloucester | 15:00 | BT Sport 2 |
| Scarlets v Cheetahs | 15:00 | Premier Sports 2 |
| Ospreys v Connacht | 17:15 | S4C / TG4 / PS1 |
| Treviso v Edinburgh | 17:15 | Premier Sports 2 |
| Cardiff v Munster | 19:35 | TG4 / Premier Sports 1 |
Sunday 3rd November
| Worcester v Exeter | 15:00 | BT Sport 2 |
Ovally Balls 
Tomp – but what if you are barf and someone offers underhill a tattoo parlour with an E4 tattooist in tow that also does piercings but because of the wage cap you can only offer him one that does standard mermaid or koi carp tattoos, ‘fuck’ and ‘shit’ onna knuckles and people’s names and birth dates?
Shirley you should be able to offer him a TV cover up specialist tattoo artist?
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I think we need a more nuanced cap. And a definition of remuneration that goes beyond normal wages.
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“more nuanced”
More loopholes you say?
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I thought ‘remuneration’ was the word used to embrace all payments and value of benefit in kind as a basis for, say, taxation.
It’s very easy to evaluate and survey, especially at this level – as all these ‘creative’ club chairmen know.
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A friend of mine played for a certain North London side in the amateur days/early years of professionalism. When we were still students I told him about getting my train fare paid to travel to play in Dorset&Wiltshire Under 19 games. He told me that he got very generous petrol money to train and play for his club. And as he was a great one for fairness what he liked most about this is his team-mate who actually did he driving got a slightly better deal.
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Slade, Aye, Sale have a fine looking squad. The back row is stacked with good players. I hope they’re paying in Rand for the SA boys.
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Tomp – less actually. The current system appears to have its unfair share.
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Slade – exactly. Who do you think the shareholders / directors of Vuniprop Ltd (or whatever) are?
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@craigs
“I also think that they’ll successfully appeal”
Background info I read said that they can ask for a review – rather than an appeal. Legalistically, that has (AIUI) a different implication – in that the process is looked at rather than Saracens being able to introduce new evidence that says “we never did nuffink”.
That’s just what I read ..somewhere….
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I’m definitely one eyed here as a Sarries fan but will just say I disagree with the level of punishment – if there is a loophole (as it sounds like there was) the onus is on PRL to close it. If Sarries then breach the redefined rules then throw the book at them but even from PRLs own statements it sounds like they were ‘technically’ within the rules.
On that basis I’m not sure how they can penalise them – it’s like Amazon and UK tax, is it in the spirit of the regulation, no, but that doesn’t mean the government can necessarily punish them.
Also surprised at how quick the other owners and directors of rugby have been to come out and shoot their mouths off – if Sarries do win the appeal they’re going to look pretty silly (also, they better be whiter than white, those in glasshouses etc.)
As I say, I’m very biased so can see why supporters of other clubs would feel different but I think the fault here lies with PRL ultimately.
Either way, its been a fucking shit week for me from a rugby perspective!
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Also – would be interested to see if Sarries had a route of appeal along the lines of restraint of trade/business, given these are standalone companies and you’re potentially restricting someone from making legitimate investments for their career?
Either way, I can see this one dragging on for a while. Who actually decides the appeal? Presumably not PRL as that would be a case of Judge, Jury and Executioner no?
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World Rugby can knob off.
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FFB,
These are the regulations: https://d2cx26qpfwuhvu.cloudfront.net/premier/wp-content/uploads/2016/05/03161651/Salary-Cap-Regulations-2018-19.pdf
Unfortunately, Saracens did sign up for them.
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@craigs
“Been thinking about sarries. I do find some weight to the argument that they’ve developed great players which they would then struggle to retain based on how much they could get elsewhere and the salary cap.”
Don’t have any actual evidence obvs but I thought their much vaunted player development strategy meant lifting other team’s academy players either just before they were ready for first team action or a little bit afterwards.
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@FFB feel for you as a Sarries fan but I don’t think this is a restraint of trade issue. They are welcome to spend £500m on their squad but not then able to function or play within the rules of the PRL.
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Beadle,
Of the 4 players mentioned in the original reports – Farrell, Wigglesworth and the Vunipolas – I think only one came through the Sarries academy. Itoje, Academy product, has a company with Wray, apparently, as well.
Here are Maro’s companies: https://beta.companieshouse.gov.uk/officers/-cQDKn9aqMcpR6hXuX3dRYV-XOM/appointments
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Have drive a fork lift in a previous life / job. It is fun.
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Driven, even.
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@TomP
Interesting bit in there is
“each Club agrees during the operation of the Regulations to notify in writing to the Salary Cap
Manager details of:
(i) any potential or actual loopholes, lacunae or errors in the Regulations;”
So if you see a loophole – you’re supposed to point it out, not make use of it
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I’m with Robshaw on this whole thing.
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“A Japanese city just took out a full page newspaper advert to thank the Wales rugby team for being so lovely”
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Going backwards in contact?
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That was for AVS, not the Japanese city or Wales.
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@trisk yes I think this has been the ?third iteration of these rules slowly trying to place the onus back on the clubs to be transparent about their spending.
There have been multiple rumours in the past about clubs breaching, e.g. Barf in the recent past, Glaws in the Dean Ryan era and a sense that all the clubs maybe had something to hide or some other reluctance to chase these breaches. The overall impression after the last Sarries/Barf sweeping under the carpet process was drawing a line and then saying No More from that point.
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@trisk
Problem with that is that there is no legally defendable definition of loophole. Something is either permitted or it isn’t. If a club is supposed to report a loophole it has to report everything possible in the universe that is permitted.
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@ourterry
Would there not be a consideration of reasonableness in these terms? For example Nigel Wray would not be reasonably expected to declare opening a door for the Vunipolae but pouring cash into a joint business enterprise might be more of an action that could reasonably be considered to be reportable.
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ROG going for the full French National Coaching job evil genius role here:
https://www.rugbypass.com/news/ogara-the-call-eddie-jones-didnt-make-that-may-have-cost-england-rwc/
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@OT
Oh, it;s certainly wide-ranging
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Tomp – what’s the relevant information in that document though? I don’t think sarries signed that and then deliberately broke those rules. Merely tried to operate to the letter rather than the spirit. Which is wrong. But as a technicality they could be safe.
My thinking was that if sarries arguments are correct then there should be something to accommodate this.
I also don’t want English rugby to be affected.
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They could just be given shares in company and then paid dividends. This is outside of ‘salary payments’ and not a loophole.
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Dragons (v Edinburgh Rugby): Jordan Williams, Owen Jenkins, Adam Warren, Jack Dixon, Ashton Hewitt, Sam Davies, Rhodri Williams (c); Brok Harris, Richard Hibbard, Leon Brown, Joe Davies, Matthew Screech, Huw Taylor, Taine Basham, Harrison Keddie
Replacements: Ellis Shipp, Josh Reynolds, Lloyd Fairbrother, Max Williams, James Benjamin, Luke Baldwin, Arwel Robson, Tyler Morgan
In astonishing news, future Wales Legend Ollie Griffiths is injured again after pulling up with a calf-strain during the warm up for last weeks debacle at Leinster.
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@beadle
Is that a loophole or permitted activity? Legally it is identical. If it falls into permitted activity then they can’t be found in breach of anything. If it is not permitted they’re guilty. It would be a very shaky legal case that said “the activity falls into permitted activity, but it’s a loophole that they should have told us about”.
Where’s blindsideflanker when you need him? He’ll be able to comment on this in a more informed way…..
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Trisk – I can only find reports that sarries have appealed the decision.
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I’ve also seen quite a lot of crap from quins players. Really? Why is that ironic I wonder?
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Either ROG is full of shite and a bit dim, or trolling, or handing out his hire-me card like a twat. Cole is as good a scrummager as Sinks, and I bet the scrum would have been no different whichever prop was on the field.
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No iks, we would have won easily. Shaft of all shafts.
*cough*
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should have been Harry Williams…………………………
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Ten-minute warning….
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