Between the Ospreys and the Swans and the fact Cardiff could get promoted and the Scarlets have gone through, no bloody chance
Yup. They were far better on the pitch and had higher attendances when Neath/Swansea was in the name.
The turning point was when we sacked Lyn Jones after losing to Saracens at Watford. The region had never recovered.
But we cover Swansea to Bridgend. Players who come through are mainly from Swansea & Bridgend. I don't believe a re-brand is on the agenda - I will investigate
Under Lyn we won the Celtic League twice. We've won it twice since. Lyn had Galacticos - that strategy almost bankrupted the Region. Remind me of how well my good friend - and he is a good friend - did at the Dragons?
Don't get all this re-branding rubbish. If we want to be as poor as the Blues and as dire as the Dragons then this is the way to go. We've always taken pride from being the one and only TRUE region. The Scarlets, Blues and Dragons have always bee insular and wanted to be stand alone regions because of greed. For that same reason the Scarlets eventually became a region and look at them now. The Blues and Dragons continue to miss-represent themselves by pretending to represent a region without funding clubs outside of their catchment towns. Why would we want to turn our backs on the region that has served us so well and enriched the club. The Ospreys have been THE top Welsh team/club/region for so long, We've bolstered the Welsh International squad with the vast majority of players since we came into existence. I remember 13 Ospreys in Welsh jerseys playing England at Twickers and beating them. Initially we were the Neath Swansea Ospreys but, due to moronic WRU decision and complaints from the blues, the Celtic Warriors were disbanded. We offered a merger and lucky for us this brought Pontypridd RFC and Bridgend RFC to us and Ospreylia was born. The lousy Blues, who originally demanded stand alone status along with the ****ty little Newport Gwent dragons who threatened legal action, and still do, if the didn't get stand alone status both winged and objected to the WRU screaming foul. The weak WRU then split the Warriors region up and gave Pontypridd to the Blues and Pontypridd has been starved of financial support ever since. The blues and the filthy little dragons did not fund the clubs in their regions, only Cardiff, Newport and clubs in their pyramid system received direct financial support from the blues and dragons. Is this how we, the Ospreys, want to act through re-branding? No is the simple answer to that. The Ospreys are an open region which has thrived on the input of talent and players from Ospreylia. If we insulate ourselves from our region we'll lose far more than we'll ever gain imo. We are the Ospreys, we are Ospreylia and that is that. Players from Ospreylia, not from Neath or Swansea, include: Ryan Jones, Brent Cobain, Ian Evans, Mefin Davies, Sililo Martens, Sonny Parker, David Bishop, Andrew Bishop, Richard Mustoe, Lloyd Ashely, Scott Baldwin, Lee Byrne, Shaun Conner, Dan Evans..........there are hundreds, far too many to list here To get a feel of numbers, go to the Ospreys web-site, look up Ospreys who played for Bridgend Ravens, you'll see a list of 70 players who played for the Ravens then the Ospreys and that's just one club in Ospreylia.
