Welcome to Inside Welsh Rugby
Join WalesOnline rugby correspondents Steffan Thomas and Ben James for the inside story
Welcome - and thanks for finding out more about Inside Welsh Rugby, a weekly newsletter which gets under the skin of the game in Wales and explores the root cause of its problems.
Co-authored by myself, Steffan Thomas, and my WalesOnline colleague Ben James, our newsletter will take readers deep into the heart of Welsh rugby, and shine a light on those problems which need to be fixed in order for the game to flourish.
There is no doubt, whether we like it or not, the game is evolving, and over the next few years we are likely to see significant change.
While Warren Gatland attempts to recapture the success of his first era in charge of Wales there are many aspects of the game which are in urgent need of improvement.
Let's not beat around the bush; the four regions remain in a critical state, and unless something drastic is done to save it, the professional arm of the game will simply collapse.
While the women's game has made significant strides over the past couple of years a lot of work still needs to be done if it is to continue to grow, and thrive. The community game is also suffering with numerous clubs struggling to field teams while the payment of players remains a problem, according to those involved.
With exclusive interviews and expert analysis this newsletter will give credit where it's due, but above all else will act as a watchdog over Welsh rugby by highlighting various threats to the health and wellbeing of the game in Wales.
There’s also the opportunity for you have your say. What would you like to see covered? What questions do you want answered? Who or what do you want held to account? If you have any suggestions let us know by joining our subscriber community.
There are three options for subscription:
The first is free. If you sign up for this you'll only get a taster of the newsletter.
The second is £5 a month. This gets you the entirety of every newsletter and you'll be able to comment.
An annual subscription costs £40 a year - saving you £10 on the monthly option.
Right now we have a special Six Nations launch offer where you can subscribe for just £10 for the year. Click here
We appreciate there is a cost of living crisis, and we also realise there are many websites which offer free rugby content but this newsletter isn't interested in toeing the line.
It really won't shy away from addressing the tough and often uncomfortable questions which need asking, while it will offer regular exclusive content and deep-dive analysis into teams and players.
Journalism costs money, and it takes time to produce. In terms of how we make the money to cover the cost of it, some of that money comes from the sale of newspapers, but online, most of that money comes from what we call programmatic advertising - they are the ads that appear on pages that allow us not to charge people to view our websites.
We know these annoy people and we want to find different ways to deliver quality rugby content that is sustainable. This newsletter, which will be packed full of insightful content for less than the price of a couple of cups of coffee, is one way of us doing that.
Thanks for reading,
Steffan