Review of November Tour, 18th Ranking and Men's National XVs Program

What we did learn was there is a massive gap beneath Canada’s top 30 players

In the six years Kieran Crowley’s been in charge, there’s little doubt that Canada has improved greatly in the skill department

He’s brought a focus and a standard to this group which has been vital

Some are pondering the coach. It’s not clear what that will accomplish

Warning signs for Canadian rugby

Bright spots

posted November 24 2014[ed. comments below]The November tour is over and the new rankings are out, Canada are down to 18th now, 17th in the summer was a new low, this is now beyond a new low. I’ve just calmed down enough to be trusted in front of the keyboard. Where to start? Maybe a good place is Patrick Johnston’s article in the Province , a good overview but comes to a few faulty conclusions in my opinion. We’ll start there. Here are the four statements we'll take a look at.1. What we did learn was there is a massive gap beneath Canada’s top 30 players.2. In the six years Kieran Crowley’s been in charge, there’s little doubt that Canada has improved greatly in the skill department.3. He’s brought a focus and a standard to this group which has been vital.4. Some are pondering the coach. It’s not clear what that will accomplish.I didn't learn that based on the Canada 'A' performance at the ARC. What it meant to me is that selecting strictly through the CRC competition is flawed. It's excluding a lot of equally talented players in leagues and universities across Canada. This was a CRC all-star team as much as anything else. From the BC perspective it excluded a lot of talented players who didn't play CRC. If we look at the teams above us and below us in the new rankings, I would say Canada could put together a number of club, university, provincial, regional sides that could battle Russia and Uruguay to close games and win many of them. Yet we can't find 15 players from around the world to beat Romania. It's a myth that there are 30 top players and then a massive gap.This seems along the lines of reasoning, "the operation was a success but the patient died". It also begs the question of what skill are we talking about. Did you see a greatly improved display of skill this November? The skill department must have been closed that month. Crowley did bring a different brand of rugby that was entertaining when it worked, but painful when it didn't work, and it's not working now. So I'll change the status on this from "little doubt" up to "a huge amount of doubt".So what standard is this, the 18th in the world standard? And what is the focus, sending players over to Europe focus, or the CRC is "the pathway" focus. It isn't a winning focus, or let's be top 10 focus, so I suppose the key word here is the indefinite article "a", a focus, a standard, but not the right ones.Then we should spend some time to try and make it clearer. Changing coaches does have an effect for various reasons, a current example is Vern Cotter, a kiwi, who seems to be turning Scotland around. Systems stagnate, it takes energy to keep them working at current levels, it takes even more energy to improve them. The iRB rankings don't lie, the men's XVs program is in a state of stagnation. A new coach can change that. Then there's the culture, has it become poisoned? Culture is a hard thing to measure, but it can have an impact on performance. There are four main groups on the men's national team, top level professionals, 2nd tier professionals, national 7s players, domestic players. Is each group being managed properly? Crowley's continuous mention of professional players and backhand put downs of domestic rugby can't be helping. It's certainly not inspiring the local club rugby, a major source of energy that feeds the national team. The first thing a foreign coach coming in should do is see what's in place and how it can best serve his needs, enhancing it where possible. David Clark did that when he came from Australia to start the Pacific Pride U23 development program, he put the team into the BC Premier and enhanced the league, a win-win situation for BC and Canada. Crowley has turned his back on the BC Premier and that branch in the road has long been passed. He won't admit it was a mistake, there's pride on the line, it's CRC only - even if it means Canada going down the drain in rankings. A new coach will start fresh, new ideas, new energy, new attitude. The system is in a state of stagnation, change is needed. There's little point in doing it before the World Cup next year however, Canada are likely stuck with the status quo until the next world cup cycle. Crowley deserves a fully professional job, it's what he's meant for, he's a fish out of water in this hybrid situation. Hopefully he'll get a few offers for a post world cup job in a fully professional environment.- Crowley brought in two kiwi assistant coaches, 0 Canadian coaches for November tour- Mike Shelley was brought in as scrum coach although leaving Rugby Canada with unsatisfactory results at U20- Crowley continues to make remarks before each game about number of professionals on other team, even Romania- American national XV coaching staff are more connected to BC leagues than Canadian national XV coaching staff- Mike Chu will continue to use the CRC model going forward as the only pathway- BCRU CEO, Jim Dixon, is following Rugby Canada’s lead, no high level advocacy for BC Premier at national level- BC Premier planning to water down product even more with 10 team league- No solid plan to bring back residential U23 program, aka Pacific Pride- Canada has dropped to 18th, worst in history and there’s very little noise about it. Apathy seems to be in play.- High potential domestic coaches have told me they won’t get involved with national program until they “clean house”- Ben Herring is taking over U20 program but wasn’t present at BC U20 championship game in Vancouver- Canada ‘A’ (CRC all star team) have come 3rd out of 4 in last 2 ARC tournaments- Current best practice model for national union/academy/club cooperation is south of the border in Seattle- Next hiring in Langford will likely be a Canadian and focused on knowing the Canadian systems- Women’s programs with John Tait (former Canada player, Pacific Pride graduate) and Francois Ratier (spent 10 years coaching in Canada at club/university level before national team) running them are doing well- Men’s 7s program last year with Geraint John as coach did well (too early to call this season with coaching flux)- UBC and UVic university programs flourishing (using Canadian coaching staff)- Women’s University programs through CIS are strong- BC youth programs through Dave Brown (now UBC) were strong (wait and see with Dean Murtens now in charge)- Canadians are resilient, innovative and patient. We'll eventually get the right people in the right positions, it may take a while.