Continued doubts over the availability of their Hughenden home may force Glasgow Warriors into yet another flit ahead of next season.

Continued doubts over the availability of their Hughenden home may force Glasgow Warriors into yet another flit ahead of next season.

While it remains doubtful, in the face of local opposition, that proposals to build on the ground will get the go-ahead any time soon, its Hillhead-Jordanhill owners so far remain unprepared to give the professional team the necessary guarantees that will allow them to stay on.

"To go there we need certainty that we can stay there for the season and that's not forthcoming, so if they can't do that I'm not sure we can go there," Gordon McKie, the SRU's chief executive, said yesterday.

He said he was confident of identifying venues for both the short and long-term for a team who have had a nomadic existence in recent years, playing and training at a wide variety of venues around the city.

"We still have a number of options available to us, both short-term and perhaps a couple of seasons beyond, and we're still in discussion with a number of options regarding the longer-term final playing location," he said. Hughenden remains the favourite for next season and council-owned Scotstoun for the longer term, but West of Scotland RFC could provide the solutions to both problems.

They have ambitious plans for a future home if developers get the go-ahead to build on their current home Burnbrae, which in turn could be adapted for next season with the erection of temporary seating and McKie admitted it was under close consideration.

"It's a possibility, and if we have to invest we'll invest. A year ago we wouldn't have done that," he noted.

As for plans to strengthen Glasgow Warriors team, in line with the strategic decision to bolster them rather than continue fully to fund two sides that are struggling to be competitive he said he was hopeful of announcing new signings, including some from overseas, within the next week.

Advertisements for a chief executive who will have a strong commercial and marketing background and will be given the independent authority to run the club as such, have also been published.