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The salty six-word Ted Hill reaction to Prem boss Massie-Taylor
By
Liam Heagney
Frustrated Ted Hill quickly fired back a six-word reply on social media following the publication of a statement on the Worcester crisis by Simon Massie-Taylor, the chief executive of Premiership Rugby. Warriors boss Steve Diamond described Wednesday as the darkest day in English rugby after it was decided at an Insolvency and Companies Court hearing to make an order winding up WRFC Players Ltd, the company that held player and some staff contracts at the club.
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With players not paid for September, all of them were set to be able to leave on October 14 but the midweek liquidation brought their departure forward by nine days.
Club captain Ted Hill, Ollie Lawrence, Fergus Lee-Warner and Valeriy Morozov had already joined Bath on loan on Monday and the first player to permanently exit Worcester following Wednesday’s court hearing was Scotland winger Duhan van der Merwe, who has rejoined Edinburgh.
An RFU statement added to the gloom, the governing body of English rugby stating: “In relation to the men’s team playing in the Premiership this season, while the RFU continues to work with the administrators and potential buyers, due to the complexity of the situation, this currently appears unlikely.
“We expect to be able to make a definitive statement on this in the coming days and will work with Premier Rugby Limited to reshape the fixtures for the Gallagher Premiership if necessary.
Your “thoughts” aren’t what was needed. https://t.co/BcbkD84ah3
— Ted Hill (@Ted_Hill26) October 5, 2022
“In the event a buyer can be secured for the club as a whole, because of the insolvency event suffered by the club, the men’s team suffer automatic relegation into the Championship. The administrators, on behalf of the club, have applied to have this relegation disapplied and this will be determined in due course.”
Amid it all, a short statement also emerged from Massie-Taylor, the Premiership Rugby CEO, who warned at the tournament’s launch how Worcester weren’t out of the woods despite getting permission at the time to start their campaign.
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He said: “The thoughts of everyone at Premiership Rugby are with the players, staff and fans of the Warriors on what is another distressing day for everyone involved with the club. This is a sad day for rugby – the Warriors have been a huge part of the Premiership since Cecil Duckworth CBE led them to their first promotion in 2004. We will continue to work with the RFU, DCMS and the administrators to see if a long-term solution can be found.”
This statement from the Premiership boss drew an annoyed six-word response from Hill, who tweeted: “Your ‘thoughts’ aren’t what was needed.” Hill’s reply was warmly praised by Worcester fans, including Mike Wennen who wrote: “Great leader, you’ve said what many others think.”
Bit disingenuous to call his tweet 'salty' - he has every right to demand more than thoughts
At this point, all I want from SMT is confirmation that expansion to 14 clubs was an asinine idea and that's it's forever off the table.
I think it would be unfair to re-instate performance based relegation this season now that it's begun. So unless Wasps follow Worcs down, I do think they hold off on bringing someone up from the Championship for one more season so that the league remains at 12 clubs. Then from next season, go back to how it was, 12 clubs, 1 up, 1 down.
Truthfully, I'd like the see the league split into 2 groups, double round robin in group and single round robin outside the group to reduce the fixture list to 16. I think it'd be good for player safety, it'll raise the stakes of each match, and Premiership matches won't need to compete with England matches in the Autumn window or Six Nations. But I seriously doubt that'll happen. So at the very least, a return to the set up pre-covid, 12 clubs, 22 matches, 1 up, 1 down would be welcome.