Games at a premium as insurance costs surge
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Your support makes all the difference.While professional rugby league players are jockeying for play-off positions or trying to edge away from relegation, thousands of amateur players are having a weekend of enforced idleness.
The British Amateur Rugby League Association (Barla) took the drastic step last week of calling off the entire programme, because its players would not have had insurance cover. The problem is one which threatens the game's grass-roots. Rugby league depends on protecting players through effective insurance and Barla's chief executive, Ian Cooper, says that the insurance industry "has become paranoid since September 11".
The cost of Barla's umbrella policy has risen so steeply that some clubs are having to pay a tenfold increase. Even so, that looked like being reluctantly absorbed until two youth leagues in Yorkshire decided to resign from Barla last week.
The loss of 300 teams further bumped up premiums. "In the end, the only responsible thing to do was to postpone the fixtures, because, if there had been a claim, the individual would not have been covered," said Cooper. He has an alternative proposal, which he believes provides an acceptable level of cover at an affordable price for clubs, and is confident fixtures will resume next weekend.
One event that goes ahead in the meantime is the TotalRL Conference Grand Final between Coventry and Hemel. Their insurance is arranged separately and the curtain-raiser, between Bedford and South London, provides a reminder of how the amateur game can turn lives around.
South London's Corey Simms was introduced to the code while serving time for armed robbery. At the end of a week when clubs and leagues have complained of daylight robbery, he is one of the few getting a game.
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