'Appalling, shameful' - Cardiff slammed in open letter from fan group

A significant portion of Cardiff’s supporter base have slammed the management of the team, branding its performance against local rivals Scarlets as ‘appalling’ and ‘shameful’ in a statement.

Soon to be Cardiff player Liam Williams scored two tries as Scarlets completed the double over the capital region, bagging a 49-14 victory on the road. Coming after Cardiff’s 35-20 defeat the weekend prior at Parc y Scarlets, it rounded off the latest humiliation for the struggling side.

Yet, it’s the nature of recent results that have angered fans. CF10 Rugby Trust, a Cardiff supporters’ trust, have slammed the team in a lengthy open letter.

Mike Brown | Rugby Roots

Mike Brown | Rugby Roots

“CF10’s position has always been that it wishes to be seen as a “critical friend” by the club. Criticising when necessary and telling home truths when the club needs to be told some home truths. Because we want the club to succeed. Our criticism comes from a place of love.

“This intention needs to be kept in mind, because there is about to be a lot of criticism.

“On Saturday, despite recent performances, the Arms Park was packed, perhaps more out of hope than expectation. After the game, not many of the paying public will have still felt proud to associate themselves with the club. It will be very difficult to persuade many to return if we continue to be served up appalling, shameful displays like the one we witnessed on the weekend. Asking people to continue handing over money for performances like that is an insult.”

The letter criticises the region’s apparent legacy decision to award lengthy contracts during the pandemic to players they feel should not have been kept on by the club.

“In the week prior to Saturday’s capitulation Dai finally went public with his frustration. Some of the language used (“nobody has got a job for life”) is very telling in the light of the performance that followed.

“Why were so many long-term contracts handed out?

“The contract extensions, which limit Dai’s ability to overhaul his squad, were put in place due to COVID. Players accepted 25 per cent pay cuts and were rewarded with extended contracts.

“Because these extended contracts are now casting a dark cloud over the club and, with wholesale changes still unlikely, how much unintended damage has been done by this decision?

“It’s true that Dai Young may have made a bad situation worse. If he has been telling players that in the long run he doesn’t see them having a future at the club and has been actively trying to move them to other clubs, it cannot be a recipe for positive squad cohesion. The low morale plain for all to see may well be a result of Dai Young’s poor man management.

“But the COVID contract mess seems to be an extension of a problem that has been part and parcel of Cardiff rugby club for too long.”

“Sometimes it feels like it’s harder to get out of the 40-50 strong Cardiff squad than it is to get into it.”

“How many times over the years have we seen players come into the squad, establish themselves as a 2nd or 3rd choice and then remain year on year, not pushing on and seemingly happy to make occasional appearances of average standard, only to keep getting a new contract?

“We’ve been told many times over the years that Cardiff is a friendly club where players and staff all get on well, are good mates outside work and look out for one another. Something of a family. That’s nice. But is it really the recipe for a thriving sporting environment?”

The group then harks back to Cardiff’s plucky losses to Toulouse and Harlequins earlier in the season in the Heineken Champions Cup pool stages, when fielding teams made up of aspiring players after a raft of positive tests for the regulars meant a rag-team was cobbled together.

“The joy of Cardiff’s quarantine enforced “misfit” squad’s matches against Toulouse and Harlequins was that players were getting a completely unexpected chance to play at that level and thriving in it. Some were too young to think that the chance might be around the corner. Some were older and had long given up any thought of playing on such a stage. They responded with commitment and rugby played with a smile on it’s face. After the match, the players talked about the matches in terms of a dream come true. It painted the club in a wonderful light and was in stark contrast to recent performances by the supposed senior team.”

The trust claim that there’s a sense of complacency from the senior side, which it claims is stocked with players happy just to have contracts.

“Why then should we tolerate players who appear to feel entitled to keep picking up easy contracts? Who is this serving? You start to wonder who the club is being run for.

“Ultimately, professional sports teams need to be run for the fans. They need to be a source of pride for the people of the city they’re based in and beyond. People should be proud to associate themselves with the club. Running a professional sports club for any other purpose will not end well.”

The group says that the fans are more important then giving professional players cosy contracts that they don’t deserve.

“The second or third choice player in his fourth year as a professional may feel that he’s part of the furniture and enjoy coming to work every day. But he is nowhere near as important as the guy who began supporting the club twenty years ago and is now bringing his son and daughter along. The 70 year old who has stood on the terraces since he was a child, through good and bad years is far more important than any superstar on an elite 38 deal.”

“Those are the people who put their hands in their pockets and who really do bleed blue and black when you cut them. The club has to be about making those people proud. Not about keeping under performing players and staff in jobs.

“When the club makes those people proud, the terraces will be full, the jerseys will be sold and the rest will fall into place.”

The group don’t believe that replacing Young will fix the problem. “Criticism of Dai Young and his coaching staff is perfectly legitimate. But there is little sense in seeking to replace Dai at this point, even though his recent interview hinted very strongly that he has lost the support of at least part of the changing room: “The last 12 months has been trying to raise the bar and improve players. Some have got behind it, some still need a bit of convincing.”

CF10 then suggests that a root and branch overhaul of the playing squad and radical change in culture is undertaken, with players that are unwilling to toe the line taken to account.

“Doing nothing is not an option. Recent weeks have to be a watershed moment when finally, a much needed change of culture happens at the Arms Park.

“And if anyone at the club disagrees that there needs to be a change of culture? Perhaps they need to ask themselves if they are in fact part of the problem.”