LONDON: Wales captain Sam Warburton is set to miss Cardiff Blues’ opening pre-season friendly at home to Exeter unless there is a ‘peace deal’ to end the long-running dispute between the Welsh Rugby Union and the country’s regional sides.
Instead he may well be reduced to sitting in the stands of Cardiff’s Arms Park ground as the flanker is not, technically, a Blues employee.
Warburton signed a controversial central contract with the WRU which he believed would enable him to stay with his home region.
But although now fully fit, the ongoing ‘civil war’ between the WRU and the four regions over funding and competition structures, means the British and Irish Lions back-row forward is set to be on the sidelines.
Cardiff’s difficulty in trying to play Warburton is two-fold -- they can’t get insurance for a player who isn’t on their payroll and they also signed an agreement with other regions not to field anyone on a WRU contract.
AFP
