Saracens\u2019 Mark McCall is the latest Prem director of rugby to question player welfare regulations that he believes have left internationals undercooked for the season\u2019s start.<\/p>\n
Guidelines mandated by the Professional Rugby Board \u2013 established as part of the club-country agreement \u2013 dictate that England players who took part in summer tours of Argentina and the US have 10 weeks off. They were available for the first set of Prem games last weekend, but could not take part in the two rounds of Prem Cup matches before that.<\/p>\n
As a result, McCall believes that the England No 8 Tom Willis as well as the Scotland fly-half Fergus Burke \u2013 regulations apply to all internationals whose summer tours ended in mid-July \u2013 were not sufficiently prepared for the start of the club season, claiming they began the campaign cold. McCall pointed to how some clubs, such as Bath, arranged pre-season friendlies and fielded largely youth sides in the Prem Cup, but said it should not require loopholes to ensure players are battle-hardened.<\/p>\n
In the case of the British & Irish Lions, whose third Test against Australia was on 2 August, they are not available until the third round of the Prem season. Clubs can apply for dispensation, however, and Owen Farrell was allowed to start the season with Saracens having missed large spells with Racing 92 because of injury. It is understood he would have also been allowed to play in the Prem Cup.<\/p>\n
Maro Itoje exceeded the 30-match limit for players last season. Photograph: David Gray\/AFP\/Getty Images<\/p>\n
The 10-week stand-down period was agreed in March and is designed to ensure sufficient rest periods after a campaign. Numerous players \u2013 including the England and Lions captain, Maro Itoje, and his Saracens teammate Ben Earl \u2013 exceeded the 30-match limit.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe RFU and Premiership Rugby dictate that you have to serve a 10-week period before your next game,\u201d McCall said after his side\u2019s 39-17 victory against Newcastle<\/a> last Friday. \u201cFor me, people therefore come into Premiership Rugby unprepared for the demands of the game.<\/p>\n \u201cOwen came off with some tightness. Ferg [Burke] was tight, but we couldn\u2019t get him off. We need to look at that because if they had been able to play 20 or 30 minutes last weekend, you get ready for what a real match is like.<\/p>\n skip past newsletter promotion<\/a><\/p>\n The latest rugby union news and analysis, plus all the week’s action reviewed<\/p>\n Privacy Notice: Newsletters may contain information about charities, online ads, and content funded by outside parties. If you do not have an account, we will create a guest account for you on theguardian.com<\/a> to send you this newsletter. You can complete full registration at any time. For more information about how we use your data see our Privacy Policy<\/a>. We use Google reCaptcha to protect our website and the Google Privacy Policy<\/a> and Terms of Service<\/a> apply.<\/p>\n after newsletter promotion<\/p>\n \u201cSome of our people who hadn\u2019t played are really struggling towards the end of the game. We need to look at that.<\/p>\n \u201cWe could have got around it and had a friendly last weekend and played an under-18 team in the Prem Cup. A couple of clubs did. That\u2019s on me [but] I don\u2019t think you should have to do that. You can play an 80-minute friendly and it doesn\u2019t count as a match, but you can play 15 minutes in a Prem Cup [game] and it does count as a match.\u201d<\/p>\n