Global season must happen to make rugby a world sport

Q&A ALAN SOLOMONS ON THE RECORD

- ALAN SOLOMONS

Vastly experienced Worcester director of rugby and former World Rugby consultant Alan Solomons offers NEALE HARVEY strong opinions on the need for a truly global game.

Are you confident Worcester can survive coronavirus financially?

Absolutely confident. We’ve got great owners in Colin Goldring and Jason Whittingham and they’re on top of things. Everyone needs to be safe, that’s the most important thing and at Worcester, we’ve been able to give our players a programme to keep them in good condition. It’s difficult because they can’t attend Sixways or any gyms, but they’re ticking over.

How’s your recruitment and retention being affected?

Fortunately, we were ahead of the game and I’ve been able to look ahead to next season and how we will approach playing again, whenever that may be. We’re pretty far down the road with recruitment and retention, with just two or three things to be wrapped up, and I’m happy we went early because it’s been a retention cycle for us and the key was to keep all of our young players, which we’ve done.

Led by re-signing Ted Hill, I presume?

Yes, Ted’s a headline guy who’s resigned along with another headliner in Ollie Lawrence, but I’m equally pleased that guys like Will Butler, Kai Owen, James Scott, Justin Clegg, Nick David, Beck Cutting, Joe Morris, Tom Dodd and all our other younger guys have resigned. I’m totally wedded to the idea of bringing homegrown players through and I think we’ve got the makings of a really good team. I’m chuffed to bits that we’ve retained them and we’ll have 14 of them in our first-team squad next season. Key to Worcester’s future is a vibrant, flowing academy.