HOW WALES DELETED A PRO RUGBY TEAM | The Rise and Fall of Celtic Warriors
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- čas přidán 22. 10. 2022
- It's a rugby story that captures the very debate of rugby in Wales. Unlike England and France, Wales doesn't have a professional club scene - but uses a regional system as it's top flight... although there are 4 sides, there used to be a fifth - The Celtic Warriors.
I remember how heartbroken we were in school when the team went under. Mates kept wearing the CW jersey in training until they got too big for it. I wonder how the branding would've changed if it still existed today?
It was an iconic shirt around Wales at the time! Might have stumbled across one in a charity shop a few years back!
They were already going to change it for the 2nd season, with the previous logo becoming a shield held by a clipart warrior. You can see it here:
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Celtic_warriors_badge.png#/media/File:Celtic_warriors_badge.png
@@RatzaChewy that's legit terrible 😂 would have received a swift rebrand the season after if I had anything to say about it!
@@catch22rugby oh dear I bought a Celtic Warriors shirt from the Wru shop around Christmas 2003 when visiting Cardiff - is it not a Priceless collectors item yet???
Looks great! Love to support Celtic Warriors today! I'm sure we could find supporters and businesses willing to put money into such venture. Create a development region.
Great video Benny! Very informative for someone like myself who's a bit too young to the know the full story with the Celtic Warriors
Thanks Andrew - was quite young at the time myself but remember everyone wearing those jerseys to rugby training. Was an interesting one to dive deeper into!
Really sharp work team. I learnt a lot watching this, fascinating stuff. Reminds a little of an MMA on-point vid. Really good stuff.
Thanks! In fairness, the likes of MMA On Point, Cultaholic and WhatCulture were inspirations... wanted to adapt their styles to rugby 👍
An important piece of context that you sort of skip over: Wales isn't just small, it's also poor, predominantly rural and sparsely populated outside the urban centres, with the Celtic Warriors own former region being one of the worst off.
You are right. Geography is also a significant contributor - especially in the valley communities. On a map, places like Pontypridd, Cardiff and Caerphilly are only a few miles apart but thanks to valleys and mountains, they are isolated from each other. And thanks to poor investment in transport links historically, these communities looked inward for their sporting support. Tribalism became rife.
Appreciate the feedback! We try to make these videos as bite sized as possible for viewer digestion - so we felt the phrasing around limited finances and infrastructure was adequate without getting too in depth around Wales’ socioeconomic history. We like to keep our content around rugby where we can 😂
Great video mate!
Thanks!
Great video, and nice to see some of the players from the MARI’s
Just come across your channel. This video is quality content. Well done. More of the same please
Great video guys
Fantastic movie! Your channel is full of interesting content. 👌🏻
Thanks so much! Really appreciate the kind words
@@catch22rugby I appreciate your work and it's great that you respond to comments.
Good video man.
As a kid, I started going to Caledonia reds games who were one of the, at the time, 4 Scottish pro teams.
I think a similar situation happened with them and border Reivers.
BR may have been more to do with loyalty to the clubs tho.
It would be interesting to see what happens with caley reds as there's always been quiet rumblings of a return, maybe based in Aberdeen
Thanks Kenny. With the rugby landscape forever changing - who knows! Is there a big rugby audience in Aberdeen?
@@catch22rugby I'm in the south West now so a bit away from it, so people will have a better idea than me.
It's difficult to say, the odd international was being played up there at pittodrie, and was well attended, but the club game in Scotland is so poorly attended (way less than Welsh for instance) it would be a massive jump from the few hundred that Aberdeen grammar and Highland (Inverness based) get, to the 6/7k, that Edinburgh are only now seeing, to make them viable.
As the WRU know, it's an expensive thing to get wrong!
@@kenny4141 love the idea... but then again I love the idea of 10 pro Welsh teams! Would never happen 😅
@@catch22rugby 😂 Aberavon Vs Stirling County in the Heineken Cup final 2032!!
At the 80,000 full capacity Allianz Sardis Road 😂
Followed the Warriors for the whole of that season they were the only side representing the South Wales Valleys at the time. Never had the same look on Welsh rugby since they closed the door.
Great video
Thank you for the video. I'm from Australia so I don't know any of this. Really interesting.
Thanks! Glad it was helpful 👍
More videos on the shambles that is Welsh regional rugby please!!
Maybe one day we'll take a stab at the whole regional process... if we ever have the courage to tackle the whole history 😅
Exactly I would like the existential dread to be explained to me if a comforting Welsh accent.
They even changed the venue for games on the Thursday after we had booked coaches to get to the games. Several times we had to re arrange getting to the game and each time more supporters gave up
It was never allowed to be established as it would have been the south wales region not the capitol.
Look at the names in that region and the names in the national side.
I feel like someone could come along with a vision and launch the English and Welsh Premiership that every rugby fan in England and Wales wants to see.
The vision already exists - it’s just stubborn stakeholders in boardrooms are unwilling to come together and make it happen. The game needs it but some are content just to let things stumble on…
@@catch22rugby it’s so frustrating. It is so obvious that an Anglo-Welsh Premiership would be really popular and would be great for growing attendances and viewership. Even an existential threat will not overcome the wall of complacency.
It would mean accepting the loss of Wasps. The RFU are not ready for that.
@@BiscuitGeoff It doesn't have to mean that. The idea is to have a Premiership D1 and a Premiership D2. A reformed club like Wasps (if that ever happens) could join D2 without having to start at the bottom of the league pyramid. Having Welsh teams in the new Premiership actually helps because there aren't enough professional English teams for two divisions.
@@chesterdonnelly1212 The RFU are trying to rig a new second division right now to get Wasps back in and the current second tier are absolutely tamping. To get Wasps in, they have to kick someone else out.
Still bitter about it 20 years on. Didnt realise the attendances were so low mind!
The Catch 22 Rugby team were only about 10-12 years old when the Warriors were up and running... we remember the hype but often people forget how small those crowds actually were!
@@catch22rugby I was 13 myself. Huge hype. Cold truth is crazy considering the squad.
Terry Cobner first thought of the regional rugby, his version was players would be equally spread out to the regions , and would be run by the WRU what we got was a mish mash relying on the sugar daddies to fund it, who had no interest in the bigger picture ie developing welsh players they put their money in and would get any player they wanted no matter where they came from in the world in other words Wales panicked when others were going professional
The biggest problem with Regional Rugby in Wales is the distance between them is 60 miles from Newport to Llanelli. That area, truly has the ability to support two teams well. Talking English Premier League level well. But the rivalries that exist from 100 years ago are so bad that you can't really have good support somehow. Then let's put on the simple fact that there is no region in North Wales. Llanelli is not North Wales.
The word tribal has been mentioned when describing Welsh Rugby. My valley is bigger than your valley etc
Pontypridd RFC has supporters from RCT, Merthyr and Caerphilly boroughs that is a huge catchment area of population. Sardis road needed investment a larger stadium. Building a new stadium in Treforest Industrial Estate would make sense for supporters from Bridgend, Caerphilly, RCT and Merthyr
Had not has
@@williamtraep2984 would love to see a new stadium in the area! Only problem is who would pay for it. Would need around £20m for a decent one I imagine! No investors have been found and the council can't justify it! Especially with a cost of living crisis 😔
The RCT valleys out of all the regional areas was a rugby region. Every child rugby was their first sport.
The Grand slam era players from RCT kevin Morgan, Garin Jenkins, Gethin Jenkins, Michael Owen, Matthew Rees, Neil Jenkins, Ceri Sweeney, etc
Feel sorry for today RCT players Cory Hill, Dillon Lewis, Jarod Evan's, Dane Blacker, Tomas Young, Ellis Jenkins, Tomas William's, Shane Lewis Hughes etc that will never experience playing for their home region.
Hope Owen Robins and Geraint Powell have watched this. They need educating
Feel free to send it to them - would be curious to see if they note any errors in our account!
@@catch22rugby 🤣🤣
I went to watch the warriors so frustrating finished the highest out all the regions and got removed. I don’t support any of the 4 as I find it difficult to support Ospreys or another team after my own. So go to watch Bridgend ravens at semi professional level.
How was the atmosphere? Actually Scarlets and Dragons finished above the Warriors with Scarlets actually winning the league in 2003. I might have a soft spot for the Ravens 🇭🇳
They finished 4th behind the Dragons and Scarlets.
crazy???? the best side was shut down???
Fans didn’t pay at the doors they were jumping over the fences and I do believe that region could been saved . Did thx the dragons
How much revenue do you think was lost from fans jumping the gate?
@@catch22rugby enough to delete the team from the Regional rugby system
Greatest Welsh region by far. With little backing, beat Wasps away and should have pipped them in Bridgend. (Was there) Could have won the European Cup with players they developed. Imagine that.
Challenge accepted. Gonna walk around ponty next week with a Cardiff top 😂. I’m from the area and I can kinda see why everyone here supports ospreys. People didn’t like that they were being forced to support Cardiff and didn’t like favoritism towards people from Cardiff
Send us a picture outside Sardis Road with a Blues top on 🤣
"... he said she said squabbles aside ..." is an unfortunate phrase to drop into an otherwise interesting video. Perhaps "... he said he said ..." it would have been a better way to say it?
Warriors Would have been a much stronger long term legacy than ‘dragons’
Best followed as well
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Reply…
Rgc needs to go pro Scarlets did nothing in North Walrs
The argument is - who is going to pay for RGC to go pro? The WRU have already said they can't afford the current 4 so adding a 5th region would be too expensive
@@catch22rugby if north wales got pro team would get bigger crowds than the dragons . To me dragons is wasted regiin . Its a non entity . As rugby is undrr threat giving the North a pro team woukd help it. Wru should of merged dragins with cardiff and funded a rgc region
@@jamesjones3371 the dragons region has over 80 feeder clubs - the largest of any region in Wales. North Wales has maybe 20? Tough sell going to all those 80 clubs saying their region is going.
Also with the Cardiff / Dragons merger while sticking team up North… imagine in Football if Man Utd were told to merger with Man City because the Prem wanted a new team in Cornwall… that’s kinda how the Newport and Gwent region would feel if they had to merge with Cardiff
I watched this. And within 2 minutes it was clear uv got all ur info from Cardiff based media.
It was manipulated to keep the Scarlets (Llanelli rfc) and cardiff. Pathetic
Thanks for your comment Julian - which points in particular do you feel are up debate?
Great video
Thanks JM