Arabian Gulf still aim to lord it over rugby in region

The Arabian Gulf Rugby Football Union (AGRFU) which has been the torch-bearer of the sport in the region for four decades would cease to exist by December 31 but its chairman Andy Cole feels they still have a major role to play to ensure smooth governance of rugby in the Olympic region of West Asia.

In the first part of an exclusive interview with Emirates 24|7, the former Arabian Gulf front row forward who has spent almost two decades in the UAE, spoke extensively on the future of the sport in the region and how they are coping with the transitional process.

“Obviously it’s been one of the most difficult times to be chairman because of the changes being made by the IRB (International Rugby Board). The difficult task is to engage different parties such as the UAERA (UAE Rugby Association), IRB and ARFU (Asian Rugby Football Union), and with all the individual countries and the clubs within those countries. Countries like Bahrain are now moving to get their own federation or association, Qatar already has a federation but it’s pretty dormant, so they are trying to get that going again. It’s been quite a challenge and of course helping with UAE guys to become fully recognised and sanctioned,” said Cole.

The Dubai-based AGRFU may be delisted as a full member of the IRB but will not disappear altogether from the region. “We have already formed a company called Gulf Rugby. It makes AGRFU legal. It has been there for quite a few years. AGRFU will disappear but Gulf Rugby will continue. It’s a corporate company formed about five years ago. We’ll probably move to a free zone. Gulf Rugby will continue to offer our services to all the clubs in the Middle East who could be a member of Gulf Rugby as an Associate. It is a club of associations if you like or an association of clubs,” he said.

Cole’s other main concern was the $25,000 policy they had drawn to insure match officials during the season. “We have an indemnity policy for coaches and referees from last season and the season before because the officials will not referee unless they are insured. My concern was what happens if we disband. Without a policy it would mean a referee would not go to Kuwait or Muscat if he is not insured. Teams might not go there if their officials are not insured. Anyone to do with rugby, apart from players are all covered by this policy. The reason we are keeping this policy is because we can have an umbrella policy for all the clubs that can be covered. It may be in future when UAE has money, that they will pay for a policy and that will cover all the UAE clubs but we will still keep a policy for clubs outside until they have enough money,” explained Cole who has been a referee himself.

“What we are doing at the moment is holding our funds in a Trust which we can use to carry on paying for an administrator, club officials to go travel to referee matches, insurance policies, etc. We will keep the money from the Dubai Sevens this year to do that. IRB have given approval that they will give a certain amount of money that will continue to come in post 2012 that will go into the Secretariat that will administer rugby,” he said.

The AGRFU is concerned with the longer term strategic plan of the region as well. “Fortunately I was asked to sit on the ARFU Strategic Planning Committee. It was a meeting which we looked at next 10 years of rugby in Asia from Japan right across to Middle East, Sri Lanka to Kazakshtan. It was interesting to be involved in that as well, how the region will look like in the future.”

What will be the status of existing AGRFU clubs? “We would encourage them to become members of the UAERA. One of the major concerns of clubs is whether expatriate rugby can continue, the tradition of cross border rugby could continue. That’s been one of the areas we had to work on.”

How are they going to ensure a smooth transition? “It’s like a mini United Nations really not just two bodies. We are dealing with other bodies and other countries and other concerns. So we have to try and move forward with UAERA but at the same time think about how rugby is played in Oman, Kuwait and then what happens in the future with Lebanon coming into the scene again,” said Cole.

The former Abu Dhabi stalwart who won the Gulf League both as captain and chairman of the club, believe they have a stake in the future course of rugby in the region.
“Certainly the people that are involved in rugby today have a role in the future in the short term, definitely in the long term surely as well. What you find now is you got people who are in their own countries like Bahrain, Qatar, Saudi, Kuwait and Oman. They are now working with government bodies to help them establish rugby,” he said.

Cole wanted other nations to take UAE as an example. “If they look to somewhere like UAE, I hope they can see the integration between the rugby playing community and the local community is the way forward. So they can see this work and see that the MoU (Memorandum of Understanding) we got works and the rugby continues to flourish. I think that becomes a template for other countries to follow,” he said.

“The other side is dealing with the emotional aspect as well for clubs and everything else. I think we are getting there. There is light at the end of the tunnel. We had a meeting with UAERA with regards to A5N (Asian Five Nations) next year,” he said.

The AGRFU claims some credit for retaining their Premiership position in the Asian showpiece next season. “We have lobbied the ARFU to allow the UAE to take the AGRFU slot rather than start from the bottom. Our reasoning behind that was 75% of the players came from the UAE anyway, so why penalise the guys who have worked so hard to stay up. We’ve also got quite a number of players who will be eligible under the three-year (residency) rule. So we got a quite a few players coming in. So the UAE should be fine and they should be competitive,” he said.

How does it feel handing over the reins to a new entity when the Arabian Gulf have just reached a peak at international level? “It’s mixed emotionally obviously because probably we are playing at the higher level than we’ve ever played before. It’s certainly the highest ranking we’ve ever been in the IRB,” he said on their success over Hong Kong and South Korea in the A5N.

“We just broke the 40 barrier, we are 39 which is pretty remarkable really. To be competitive against teams ranked 22nd in the world and 24th in the world and beat them. Even Japan struggled against us although they ended up winning 60-5. They didn’t score for 20 minutes and they threw everything at us you know. It was good to see for the guys,” said Cole who took part in two World Cup campaigns and was capped 15 times for Arabian Gulf.

The AGRFU chairman had a difficult task making member clubs accept the reality that the governance of rugby in the region was changing. “There has been lot of conflicts. It’s been very heated and very difficult. We’ve had our ups and down in the last 18 months. We had a situation over a year ago it nearly or completely collapsed. At one point of time, there was one chairman of some club saying let’s stop the league now and all clubs disband,” he said.

The biggest issue, he said, for the clubs was being told what to do and how to do after continuing a 40-year tradition. “My own opinion is unless you have management experience in a corporate world, I don’t think you could have managed or done what has just happened. I think may be with different people in different positions this could have collapsed,” said Cole.

Follow Emirates 24|7 on Google News.