Rugby Archive

Newcastle Falcons appear to have again dodged the relegation bullet after the Rugby Football Union's board of directors decreed that London Welsh, the only side still in the frame for promotion from the English Championship – the tier below the Aviva Premiership – had failed to meet the strict criteria that would allow them to move up to the top flight.

Denis Leamy has become the third Munster player this season to announce an early retirement due to injury.

It's not that long since media announcements from Edinburgh Rugby trumpeted the fact that all but one of the club's players – around 35 or so – were eligible to play for Scotland.

There will be a new look to next season's RFU Championship after a change of structure was agreed between the Rugby Football Union and the Championship Clubs Committee.

UNLIKELY Heineken Cup hero John Cooney could be one of the first targets for Sean Lineen, Scotland's new "super scout" after his controversial sacking as Glasgow Warriors coach.

Heriot's gave a glimpse of what they might have achieved had they opted for greater participation in the Kings of the Sevens competition, after winning the final round at Jed-Forest with an emphatic victory over Melrose.

Carl Hogg, the former Scotland internationalist, is being tageted by Edinburgh, if he fails to become head coach at Gloucester.

The door to the rugby Pantheon was always going to swing open if Leinster could secure a third Heineken Cup win in four seasons, but they hurried the process along by kicking the thing off its hinges with this emphatic victory at Twickenham.

What has seemed to be a protracted Borders Sevens Circuit – it started on the first Saturday in April at Gala –concludes at Riverside today when Jed-Forest stage their 111th event, the 10th and final round of the Kings of the Sevens title race.

Ruairidh Jackson, who earlier in the week was left out of Scotland's summer tour party, will be part of the Glasgow Warriors squad taking part in the NCS Glasgow City Sevens at Dumbreck tomorrow.

Tom Brown's rugby career has been in fast-forward mode for the past couple of months, and the young Edinburgh full-back has no intention of easing off as he prepares to take his place in the Scotland squad for next month's three-Test tour to Australia, Fiji and Samoa.

It is probably best not to speculate on the reasons behind Tim Visser's choice of Amsterdam as the venue for his recent stag weekend, but Scottish rugby supporters can be assured that the Dutch-born winger has no hankering for the canals and the tulip fields as far as his sporting affections are concerned.

Steven Shingler was yesterday coming to terms with that fact that his prospects of representing the land of his mother's birth had become even more remote after the sport's global governing body upheld their ruling that the 20-year-old fly-half/centre is eligible only for Wales.

The venture as a whole may have been diminished by a host of injury call-offs and the cancellation of one game, but Scotland's summer tour to Australia and the South Pacific is still an exciting prospect for those who relish the thought of seeing Tim Visser on the international stage.