Difficult to compare as rugby players have a much greater choice of countries to ply their trade. Ireland seemed to have a good model to keep their international players with their regions but that looks to be falling apart. The HC is seen as the top competition in Europe so players aspire to play in that competition. Difficult to say that they should be stay at Warriors but nothing is ever simple!

Mr P, your posts are always lucid and interesting to read, but I will reply to one point in your first post on this thread and then ask you a question.
You say that "The least (leaving players) owe us is a candid and very detailed explanation of why they left the club that had brought them on board when bigger clubs wouldn't". No player is going to burn his boats by criticizing his former club because (a) he may find himself working with some of the staff at another club in the future and (b) You don't step on people on the way up because you may meet them again on the way down.
Please regard my second point as a genuine question, not as a criticism. What exactly would you do to remedy the situation? It's surely not sufficient to bemoan the worship of Mammon (and isn't that the situation in the NFL?) without offering a solution.

The NFL does worship Mammon but it is careful not to allow any one of its members who are rich and successful to keep Mammon to itself as the Man Us and Leicesters are bent on doing.

I believe the solution is for the authorities and owners to first recognise the disfunctionality and failure of the current system. As happened and continues to happen in the NFL, the solution will have to come from those in authority together with the owners of the league's teams sitting down together with the objective of rebuilding professional rugby into a competitive, popular, fairly-based business where the success and growth of the league and of all its members is the principal objective. One objective would have to be that individual teams are prevented from buying and luring the top talent and depriving their competitors by the use of their wealth or prestige. Top class players would achieve top class remuneration from any team they play for in the league which would be competing for success on the field on a level playing field. Within that business model individual teams work to achieve their own success both on the field and financially while drawing increasingly large crowds and TV audiences, which means revenue, to the business of rugby nationwide.

Clearly, the NFL's model is not appropriate for adoption by rugby lock stock and barrel. However, with the right intent and purpose there is no reason why rugby cannot develop an equally successful and workable business model or its own.

Thank you for answering my question. All we need now is for someone to knock the club owners' heads together....

Don't the RFU sack anyone they appoint who suggests change is needed, even if that person was employed to suggest change? Everyone knows rugby needs changing, even the RFU. The problem is the guys at the top have their own personal agendas which would suffer if sense were allowed to prevail.

....don't Warriors owe some of the players? From talking to a few players Warriors n(the Club / Company) have been offering just 12 month contracts on less money etc. and a few players haven't even been spoken to about their soon to end contracts so have taken it into their own hands to secure their future (and their families) by signing elsewhere often for less money but for 2 - 3 years. Please don't just think it is the players - our Club (or is it a Company now?) from what I have been told is far from acting in a professional business like manner (and here we are not talking Hilly but above him in the Office Suites, the suits at the Company!).

A business run by money men whereas before it was CD's baby. In five years time it will be very successful and standing on it's own two feet, or will be the biggest corporate hospitality facility in the midlands with rugby being played over the road in front of the faithful

Sadly I think the latter Tony. As stated previously the opinion of some, including myself is that as long as 7000 people are willing to come to Six Ways no matter the dross or the weather, they are happy.

The NFL can have a draft system as the players go to college then get picked up by the sides. In rugby the players attend the club from 16 years old in the academy. The college sports in the USA are vastly superior to what is offered in the UK and sports persons are accepted at college in the US on lower grades at good sporting colleges to boost the sports teams, however in the UK Loughborough would be the best sporting university but you have to get top grades to get there.

The US sporting model is based around the draft system which also influences educational matters and while it is a fine system it is not one that could be adapted in the UK due to the sheer numbers of changes that would have to take place both in sporting terms and additionally university terms for it to be used. A UK draft system would also have to include other sports as univercitys and colleges will not change their set ups for one sport.

I had a read of the academy part of the website. Looks like quite an investment on behalf of the club. If I ran the club I would be very keen to see a return on all that expenditure.

I think 10 of our current senior squad are ex academy. Not sure how this compares with other clubs but a return on investment?

The whole thread seems really to be based on Matt Kvesic leaving us as he is only 20 years old. Matt Mullen is now 25 so you can say he has done his time with the senior squad. MK seems to be one of our biggest prospects and that really is what the academy is about. You train up a group of players in the hope that one or two of them will be big time players. Otherwise an academy is an expensive way to get regular squad players.

If it is the club that invests the money, then it should be the club that dictates the level of return. It is the big time players that end up paying back the investment, not the squad players. By letting the best players go at a young age seems contrary to the principal of setting up an academy. You could just run youth teams instead at a vastly lower cost.

The RFU currently supports clubs with acadamies to the tune of 2.5m per year. Even assuming every club had an investable academy (which they don't, but which Worcester do) that's a considerable offset against the costs associated with running one.

You cannot assume every club will produce with any regularity a player of Kvesics talent (because acadamies can't "produce" talent they can only nurture what's already there), therefore you cannot place any value against what may be produced.

The only other option is to start selling players which is an abhorrent idea in my opinion.

There's nothing wrong with the 'system' as that is not why we're losing players. We're losing players because we have a substandard and part time coaching and club management set up interested only in statistical (on the field) and financial (off the field) analysis and book balancing.

Once the players move from the one on one interactions of the academy development pitch to the mindless clipboard management and coaching aporoach of our senior squad the door looks a very attractive prospect to these guys who want, need & deserve some personal attention. A far cry from the 'like it or lump it' attitude of Richard Hill which seems to be accepted by many.

to be fair guys,its the same at the scarlets now.we have business men at the top who are all about reducing our debt.ok thats great but until we have a successful team, whose going to come and watch while all the best players are snatched by the money teams in england and france.you only have to look at the recents.dai lyons went to stade and rearly plays,same as regan king at clermont.regan i think is on 25k a month but doesnt get a game. we brought ben morgan from obscurity at merthyr and moulded him into an england international.what did we get? 150k from glaws as a payout!! im sorry but for a 23 year old current international i believe we should have been looking at 350-500k for his transfer. i also have a scary feeling we will lose the likes of george north,jon davies and the likes when their contracts run out for free,and these are top internaional players who will command huge wages in france i would expect.