Toulon president Mourad Boudjellal has come up with a plan to squeeze in the French club’s postponed Champions Cup tie against Bath, but it’s unlikely to go down well in the headquarters of the England and France unions.
The Pool 5 game was one of five European fixtures called off last weekend in the wake of the shocking terrorist attacks in Paris, but now organisers EPCR are struggling to find new dates for the games in a crowded post-World Cup rugby calendar.
Bath owner Bruce Craig yesterday insisted that there was no way his club could find a way to fit the extra game in, and while Boudjellal agreed that a midweek fixture was not an option, he did offer to play the game during the Six Nations, provided both clubs were free to select their international players.
“Playing on Wednesday isn’t possible,” Boudjellal told L’Equipe. “I can only see one solution… It would mean that the (national team) coaches would have to accept not being able to call up international players of Bath or Toulon in order for us to be able to play the match during a matchday of the Six Nations.”
Relationships between clubs and the unions in France and England have long been tense, so the RFU and FFR are hardly going to jump at the prospect of losing the likes of George Ford, Anthony Watson and Mathieu Bastereaud for a key Six Nations fixture.
