Welsh rugby is on the brink of collapse

Rugby is a gladiatorial game – as Wales’s Six Nations match today against Ireland will surely prove. But even the greatest commentators in the sport, such as the late Eddie Butler and Cliff Morgan, would wince reading the script of Welsh rugby’s spiralling decline. 

Wales has been more reliant on rugby to form the guardrails of national identity than almost any other country. Now the sport faces an ‘existential crisis’ in Wales. If anything those words, from the new head of the Welsh Rugby Union (WRU), are an understatement. They follow a BBC Wales investigation into the WRU last month which unearthed serious allegations of misogyny, sexism and racism inside the governing body. The former head of women’s rugby in Wales, Charlotte Wathan, has slammed the union’s ‘toxic culture’ of sexism, telling the BBC that she considered committing suicide after her experiences. She recalled a WRU male colleague joking in front of others that he wanted to ‘rape’ her.