WHEN the Scottish Rugby Union pulled the plug on the Border Reivers professional side in 2007, chief executive Gordon McKie insisted that the union was not turning its back on the rugby-playing region.
However, there are growing concerns that the SRU has done exactly that with confirmation that it is to persist with last year's policy of staging no major representative fixtures in the Borders in 2009, despite continuing to plough funds into one of
the country's best pitches, at Netherdale in Galashiels. At the heart of that approach appears to lie a contract to maintain the Gala pitch.
On the re-introduction of the Border Reivers in 2002, the union requested tenders from clubs interested in hosting the pro team. Gala beat off a rival bid from Hawick with plans for a new state-of-the-art stadium to be built over the next decade.
The SRU put in place a 20-year agreement to maintain the new international-quality pitch with undersoil heating they insisted must be installed for Gala to host the Reivers. When the team was closed by the SRU five years later due to a lack of finance, McKie insisted that the agreement would be terminated. Nearly two years on and it remains in place, much to the SRU's frustration.
What makes the issue particularly odd is the union's reluctance to make use of the facility they continue to maintain.
More than 4,000 people watched the last under-21 international played at Netherdale and before that the ground was famous for attracting five-figure capacity crowds for representative matches.
However, the SRU has kept under-20, Scotland A and women's internationals in the central belt, Falkirk and Perth, with Aberdeen handed a first full international in November, costing the SRU in rent.
The Scotsman understands that one of the Dundee football clubs is in the running to host an international match this year, but McKie confirmed that Netherdale remains out of the picture.
Even an Edinburgh back-up game with Georgia agreed for Netherdale in November was played instead, under SRU instruction, at Meggetland, Boroughmuir's home ground. It was abandoned after 20 minutes due to floodlight failure and while the Edinburgh and Scotland squads continue to flit between capital facilities owned by private schools, football clubs and Edinburgh City Council, as the Murrayfield works continue, Netherdale remains unused through the week and pro players grow more alien to Borders rugby supporters.
While Gala were reluctant to discuss the issue, a club official confirmed that angry comments from the SRU's finance director Eamon Hegarty, in which he is alleged to have stated that he would personally visit Netherdale and "rip the pitch up," have heightened the belief that the SRU is both shunning the Borders due to the row over the 20-year agreement and the backlash over the closure of the pro team.
McKie insisted: "That is not true. We have taken the view that the under-20 team should play in enhanced facilities, with undersoil heating and floodlights, of the football stadium variety. That has been supported by John Jeffrey (Scotland U20 manager] and this year we will play at two football stadiums.
"The Scotland A team has a history of playing at McDiarmid Park in Perth and we are keen to return there and continue developing our positive relationship with the football club and council. We will look at 2009-10 season, and maybe age-grade and A team games could be played there in future."
Despite his leadership being keenly finance-driven, McKie was similarly unconcerned at paying for one pitch, but ignoring it while paying to use others. He added that the SRU did not invest in facilities in Glasgow anymore than it did in the Borders, which is, in itself, raises questions over the union's investment in rugby facilities as a whole. The cost of new 3G and grass pitches at Murrayfield was borne by the City of Edinburgh Council through tram-line and Water of Leith flood defence compensation.
It should be viewed positively that matches are being staged in Caledonia, the other significant part of Scotland neglected by the SRU in its professional development, but what benefit is there to Scottish rugby in ignoring the Borders?
It is understood that Gala RFC have offered to terminate the contract at the centre of the dispute, on receipt of a one-off payment, rumoured to be less than £200,000. The SRU put a figure of £1.7million in its accounts as their remaining liability under the contract over a year ago, but has refused any pay-out, insisting that that would have to be taken from already stretched payments to club rugby. But McKie insisted that the contract was not causing him undue concern, even with some claims that the SRU was stopping rugby from taking place at Netherdale.
He said: "There is a written contract, an agreement between Gala and the SRU, that amounts to a 20-year lease for the Border Reivers. We continue to honour the terms of that agreement fully.
"It would be nice to set it aside without having to pay out the remaining (13] years of rent, but the reality is that discussions continue – there is no dispute. The terms of the lease were that the only teams that can play on it are the Border Reivers and Gala RFC and it's important that we stick to that because we have to ensure we're not being sent bills or invoices willy-nilly for maintenance to the pitch necessary because other teams have been playing on it."
In fact, the responsibility for who uses the pitch does not lie with the SRU nor Gala RFC, but the Netherdale Sports Club – a five-man body of two representatives each from the SRU and Gala RFC and chairman Drew Tulley, a former leader of Scottish Borders Council, formed in 2002 to manage the sports ground. While there does not appear to be a solution on the horizon, it would seem the SRU is cutting off its nose to spite its face in failing to make more of a facility it is maintaining.
