Speak to most players in the Greene King IPA Championship and they will tell you that they are living the dream as professional rugby players. The problem is how suddenly that dream can disappear and how little support there is to break their fall when it does end.

Many are professional rugby players in name only with a significant proportion earning less than £10,000 a year. By contrast, England players receive a £22,000 match fee per international. Unlike their brethren in the Gallagher Premiership, medical insurance and union representation, through the Rugby Players Association, are not automatically provided in the Championship. Nor is cardiac screening. These are what Richard Bryan, the RPA’s rugby director, describes as the “basic rocks of welfare provision” within professional rugby.

When things go wrong in English rugby’s second tier, they tend to go very wrong very quickly whether that is through the omnipresent risk of injury, docked wages or a contract being ripped up. Players, such as Richmond back-row Eddie Milne, have no choice but to accept these risks.

“If you came to a job interview and I told you that you could possibly get fired at any time if you don’t turn up, I am going to pay you £12k, you have to pay for your own insurance, food, accommodation and travel, and you will get injured doing it then you would look at me like I am mad,” Milne said.