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Major League Rugby has hit its first speed bump. Late Wednesday evening its Seattle franchise, the Seawolves, were forced to pull out of a scheduled preseason match against the Vancouver Island Crimson Tide. The match was due to take place at Westhills Stadium in Langford, BC, on Sunday afternoon. A social media update confirmed the decision though the post has since been removed.
Originally the issue was thought to be one of insurance. A representative of Major League Rugby, however, later confirmed that their insurance would have been sufficient. While the franchises themselves and their staff operate independent of each other, MLR players are contracted through the league itself.
A question was raised as to whether the match had been sanctioned by Rugby Canada. Currently Major League Rugby is not a sanctioned competition by USA Rugby, with PRO Rugby retaining exclusive rights to sanctioning until April despite having no season in 2017. Evidently this was not an issue.
All international touring matches must be sanctioned by the host union, with the application generally due two weeks prior to the tour. This is standard procedure and publicly available on the Rugby Canada website. However, the option to expedite sanctioning for a fee can allow teams to be approved a minimum of three days prior to departure.
Rugby Canada confirmed on Thursday that there had been no formal sanctioning application received from either the Seattle Seawolves or Crimson Tide. Rugby Canada Communications Manager Bryan Kelly called the cancellation unfortunate and also stated that there would have been no obstacles to approval beyond regular procedure.
“We’re supportive of these types of fixtures and would have been able to co-promote ‘Two Weeks of International Rugby at Westhills’ since Canada is playing against Brazil the following weekend.”
As it turns out, the sanctioning procedure was never initiated due to visa restrictions that would have prevented several players on the Seattle roster from leaving the USA. Seawolves co-founder Shane Skinner clarified the issue on Thursday afternoon.
“We are unable to travel for the match due to delays in obtaining visas for a number of our players. The visa application process has taken much longer than expected and the process is not within our control. Our international players are required to have visas to be eligible for employment by the league.
“We are sincerely upset that we are unable to make the trip. The Tide is a class rugby organization and our players and ownership know it would have been an outstanding day of rugby.”
The visa application process was due to be completed in late January but has still not been resolved. With the expedited sanctioning deadline fast approaching the decision was made to cancel the match.
Skinner did add that the Seawolves were still open to rescheduling the match once the visas were finalized. The option also remains for the Crimson Tide to travel to Seattle. In the meantime the Seawolves are left without a scheduled preseason fixture.
While the cancellation is certainly unfortunate, perhaps of greater concern is the lack of transparency from both the Seawolves and Major League Rugby. At the time of writing neither have released a public statement and they would be well advised to revisit their public relations strategies in this regard.
