When John McGuigan became the new chair of Scottish Rugby in June some folk close to him wondered if he'd gone mad.
He'd had 40 years in senior executive roles in major companies, but had retired. And now, suddenly, he was back at the coalface in a place with more challenges than there are blades of grass, real or otherwise, on the Murrayfield estate.
In a wide-ranging interview on the BBC Scotland Rugby Podcast, McGuigan elaborates on the apology he issued last month to the family of Siobhan Cattigan, the Scotland player who died in November 2021.
He speaks about the deep fear for the future of the game among the clubs of Scotland, the challenge of getting rugby into more state schools, the chronic state of the underage system and how Glasgow and Edinburgh have too many non-Scottish qualified players.
'We will learn the lessons'
He begins with the tragedy of the former Scotland international and the criticism levelled at the SRU in the aftermath, multiple failings that McGuigan accepted and apologised wholeheartedly for after meeting the family.
He was the first person from the SRU to sit down with the Cattigans, who say undetected rugby-related brain damage caused decline in the 26-year-old's health and led to her death.
"Mr and Mrs Cattigan told their story with huge emotion and it was very, very important for me to hear it and I will always be thankful that they took the time to do that," says McGuigan.
"I gave assurances that there are certain things we would do. One that is important to me is that we are open, that we are an organisation that recognises we're a Scottish institution with responsibilities.
"There may be issues in the future of a legal nature [the family may still pursue a case through the courts] but that cannot stop us from showing empathy to a family who are grieving for their daughter.
"Maybe [SRU] people in the past had different interpretations of what could or couldn't be done. From one human being to another I thought it was important to offer my condolences and hear their perspective."
McGuigan gave the Cattigans a commitment that their daughter's memory will never be forgotten by Scottish Rugby.
"Under my stewardship we will learn the lessons. A number of people here will always want to do the right thing. And I will make sure it happens," he says.
"I couldn't underscore enough how committed we are to take the lessons from this and make sure we move on and are better for it. We'll make sure that anybody who visits this stadium can see Siobhan was one of our own, she was part of Scottish Rugby and we will celebrate that."
'People are worried - we need a new strategy'
The SRU is not always known for its openness - the corporate governance has been heavily criticised in the past - so McGuigan's views can be refreshingly blunt at times.
"As a sport we are under pressure and as a country we are small and we have to work hard to survive," he says.
In its most recent accounts, the SRU showed a loss of more than £10m, an alarming figure given there were three home Six Nations games as well as money-spinning concerts - Harry Styles, Beyonce and Bruce Springsteen.
"When I walk into a club at the moment what I find is lots of people fundamentally worried about the game and their general existence," says McGuigan.
"The first one I get is frustration at the SRU. 'Are they listening? How loud do we have to shout in order to be heard?'
"What I think sits below that is a genuine concern about what is happening at the local club. 'Ten years ago we had nine teams and now we have three. Ten years ago the clubhouse would be full on a Saturday night after games, the bar would be buzzing, but that's not happening any more.'
"What a lot of people communicate to me in various ways is that they're really worried about the future of our sport. Yet clubs are the absolute bedrock of everything that Scottish rugby is about. That's where it all starts.
"Yes, there's frustration at the SRU but also underlying that is a much deeper concern for the game itself. I walked into a club the other week and I was one of the youngest people in there.
"People recognise that when this generation goes, culturally, do we have another generation who think it is for them to come and fill those shoes? And if they don't, what are we going to do?"
The SRU is now in the midst of constructing a new strategy to cover the next decade, a piece of work that will include all aspects of the game.
McGuigan says that they need to put a foot on the ball and plan properly around revenue growth, increasing player numbers and developing young talent a lot better than they are currently doing.
"There has been a plan people have been following but it's reached the end of its usefulness," he explains. "So what we are doing now is writing a new strategy for the next 10 years, what we as a nation should be doing. Strategically, we need to be clear about where we are going.
"You build off momentum but you can never take it for granted. It can get switched off and then you find out the stadium is 5,000 less [full] than last season or 10,000 less. If we want to do all the things we feel we have to do to grow the game then we need to drive our revenues, so we can't be in a situation where this place [Murrayfield] is not full."
Talent development 'a huge issue'
Central to this is the state of underage rugby in Scotland. The national under-20s side has suffered one humiliation after another in recent years. The talent flow is little more than a trickle.
That's going to catch up with the performance of the senior team once the top players start retiring from the scene. Where's the cavalry?
"The first thing is to recognise that we have a problem. Everybody recognises that," says McGuigan.
"It's a huge issue and we need to address head-on the fact that other nations are doing different things around talent development that I think we need to adopt.
"We look quite small in our jerseys - two people said that to me. They said the physical development needs to be better, we're just being swept aside. We're in a habit of not winning and maybe it gets to the stage where they [under-20s players] say 'This is not for me, I don't need more of this. I'll go and find something else to do'. We can't allow that to happen.
"So, at 14 we need to start streaming the talent we have, we need to build them physically and they need to be playing, an obvious thing but when you look at the game-time players have at under-20s level it can be very small.
"The pro teams need to have more Scottish players. There will be a rationale from time to time for you to go out and find an Argentinian to play a position for a period, but our two pro teams should be populated with Scottish players.
"I get the fact that if you are coach of Glasgow or Edinburgh you are there to win and your job is dependent on you winning, so you are trying to get the players that give you the best chance to do that. We need to make sure that those coaches take the longer-term view for the benefit of our sport in Scotland."
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December 05, 2023 at 09:35PM
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John McGuigan: SRU chair on Siobhan Cattigan, club concerns & talent flow - BBC
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