Easy to spot the fairer competition
BRENDAN Gallagher reports on Leinster's convincing win over Leicester Tigers in the European Champions Cup last 16.
The Leinster side is drawn from a variety of clubs of different standards in that Irish province, whereas Leicester is one of a ring fenced clique of Premiership clubs which wants nothing to with the rest – apart from hoovering up their best talent; and spitting them out if they don't measure up.
Gallagher writes about Saracens' thumping loss to Bordeaux in the same competition.
Saracens lie third in the Premiership, Bordeaux are mid-table in France's open-ended Top 14, with little or no chance of winning it. No prizes for spotting which of these domestic structures is fairer; and, judging by these two results, more efficient.
On the same subject, Nick Cain describes how Leicester have been heavily fined for their second serious salary cap breach in just four years. Yet unlike Saracens, Leicester for some reason escaped relegation.
Cain speaks for many when he asks how many more financial skeletons are in Leicester's closet; a club which, as he says, was in the vanguard of demanding that Saracens faced draconian punishment for their financial transgressions.
