News of DMP’s withdrawal from Championship North, six weeks before the season was due to begin, is desperately sad news.
They had been in funding difficulties, but the current problem is playing numbers.
As has been the case with all four clubs to lose their place in the Premier15s/PWR, players have left in large numbers, their new destination depending on their standing in the game and the options open to them.
Just to show the extent of the loss, let’s look at the current 32 contracted Red Roses. They include no fewer than twelve players who belonged, at one time or another, to one of the outcast clubs:
Holly Aitchison (Waterloo), Sarah Beckett (Waterloo), Vickii Cornborough (Richmond), Abby Dow (Wasps), Megan Jones (Wasps), Sadia Kabeya (Richmond and Wasps), Ellie Kildunne (Wasps),
Alex Matthews (Richmond), Claudia MacDonald (DMP and Wasps), Maud Muir (Wasps), Cath O’Donnell (Waterloo) and Abbie Ward (DMP).
DMP’s Plans
As for DMP, the official news is that they will work with the RFU to re-establish themselves in Championship North in the 2024-25 season. While we wish them every success in their rebuilding, the RFU’s earlier attempt at helping them out proved a marked failure. Indeed news of the HQ’s success in conquering DMP’s underlying problems has been a wall of silence.
The club wasn’t helped by the decision to take over Darlington’s huge Northern Arena (it has gone under different names at different times). It claims to be the second largest stadium in England to be exclusively devoted to rugby. The costs of upkeep proved untenable.
For the time being the club will lay emphasis on pathways, hoping to strengthen its junior sides with an eye on an improved future.
Along with Sale Sharks, DMP were the leading examples of rugby’s long traditions in northern England. We must now watch the surviving Sharks’ progress with increased concern and sympathy.
One simple step the RFU might have taken – bearing in mind all it knew about troubles up north – was to offer one of the Canada matches to a ground in that region. Instead, it fell back on two well-cushioned alternatives, Exeter and Saracens.
I wrote recently of the lack of an Intensive Care Unit to look after clubs in distress. There is no safety net below the brave acrobats.
Between two seasons DMP have known both relegation and withdrawal from second-tier competition.
