{"id":774323,"date":"2026-07-02T13:12:09","date_gmt":"2026-07-02T13:12:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/774323\/"},"modified":"2026-07-02T13:12:09","modified_gmt":"2026-07-02T13:12:09","slug":"fiji-v-wales-head-coach-steve-tandy-happy-dispute-resolved-before-nations-championship-opener","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/774323\/","title":{"rendered":"Fiji v Wales: Head coach Steve Tandy happy dispute resolved before Nations Championship opener"},"content":{"rendered":"

In February 2023, then Wales captain Ken Owens stood at the training base of the national team and stated Welsh rugby was a laughing stock<\/a> and must not return to such days.<\/p>\n

The scenario then was a much-wider pay dispute with the WRU, with players threatening to strike for the Six Nations game against England in Cardiff.<\/p>\n

That situation was averted when a deal was struck before Owens and former director of rugby Nigel Walker infamously addressed the media in the gathering gloom.<\/p>\n

Fast forward three and a half years and this most recent dispute was not nearly as dramatic and has also been resolved.<\/p>\n

But you wonder if any lessons have been heeded as the issue was again sorted out just 72 hours before Wales were due to be running out in Cardiff, when the majority of this squad have been training together for a month.<\/p>\n

The WRU again decided not to put up a senior figure like chief executive Abi Tierney or director of rugby Dave Reddin to discuss the issue. The governing body insist it was resolved and had been addressed in a statement.<\/p>\n

This is Tandy’s third campaign in charge and it is the third occasion he has been left to field questions about off-the-field matters.<\/p>\n

He was previously forced to address matters such as regions being cut and fears about players’ jobs. <\/p>\n

The chaotic nature of Welsh rugby has again reared its head this week. Some would argue the chaos has never gone away. <\/p>\n

The WRU had already missed a deadline this week<\/a> in outlining a plan to reduce the amount of professional sides from four to three – something that was promised by the end of June.<\/p>\n

The governing body is set to be without a permanent chair for the next few months as they look to replace Richard Collier-Keywood<\/a>, already having an interim Professional Rugby Board (PRB) chair following the departure of Malcolm Wall.<\/a><\/p>\n

The WRU will hope this controversy will not further alienate the weary Welsh rugby public.<\/p>\n

Both national sides played in front of a pitiful crowd against the Barbarians last weekend at the 82,000 seater Allianz Stadium in south-west London.<\/p>\n

No attendance was given but it could not have been much more than 15,000 with two of the three Twickenham tiers closed.<\/p>\n

We await to see whether it will be a full house at the 33,000-capacity Cardiff City Stadium on Saturday against Fiji. If not, that alone would be an indictment on the state of Welsh rugby.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"In February 2023, then Wales captain Ken Owens stood at the training base of the national team and…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":774324,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[567],"tags":[64,63,760,85],"class_list":["post-774323","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-rugby","tag-au","tag-australia","tag-rugby","tag-sports"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/774323","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=774323"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/774323\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/774324"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=774323"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=774323"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=774323"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}