Cardiff captain and Wales international Josh Turnbull quizzed Professional Rugby Board chair Malcolm Wall on the long-term strategy for the game in Wales after a turbulent week and the answer was far from satisfying.
The game is mired in uncertainty at the minute, with the potential threat of strike action leaving this week's Six Nations clash against England in danger.
It would appear that Welsh rugby bosses are ready to meet two of the players' demands in this contract dispute - with an announcement set to be made on the 60-cap rule and the WRPA expected to be offered a place on the PRB board.
However, the remaining sticking point is the fixed-variable contract set to be offered to players from next season - with only 80% of their wages guaranteed, with the remaining 20% based on bonuses.
Given the likely reduction of squad sizes and salaries expected once the new funding deal is signed, it's questionable just how competitive the four regions will be moving forward - a point that Turnbull put to Wall when the pair were guests on Scrum V on Sunday night.
"I've got a question," said Turnbull during a debate on the current situation in the Welsh game. "What is your long-term strategic plan to get a region to win something?
"Because the way we're talking, with funding being cut, it doesn't look too promising. You must have a long-term plan?"
Wall's answer didn't really appear to hint at a long-term plan for sporting success, though. The PRB chair acknowledged that there would be cuts in the short-term that could affect success in the coming years, but then suggested that growing the commercial aspect of the sides could help address that financial balance.
"In the short-term, we are talking about making some reductions in terms of squad sizes but the idea is to make sure we can live within our means and then focus particularly on growing our commercial activities in order to put more money back into the game," he said.
"The idea would be over time as we can afford, and hopefully not too far down the track, we'd start to reinvest in the game.
"Therefore, we could keep as many players as we can within Wales who are Welsh qualified, but also, where necessary, supplement the Welsh talent with quality overseas talent and be successful on the field."
Earlier in the show, Turnbull expressed just why players were so concerned about the standard fixed-variable contracts being proposed.
"It was only back in 2019 that they tried to put a banding structure in place to categorise every player," he said. "They didn't get that right, obviously.
"They didn't get the fact that the NS38 players take a larger proportion of the money that comes into the game. The PRB and the WRU value these players and put the values onto the players.
"Someone has clearly got their numbers wrong somewhere. I don't want to blame the players because they're going to take what they're offered.
"Going back to the fixed-variable, from a players' point of view, it doesn't sit well with us at all. On the one hand, you've got coaches telling you that the next couple of years is about survival and, at the moment, we can only just about compete with the squads we've got now. Squads are going to decrease.
"Yet on the other hand, you're telling us that the largest proportion of our bonus is by winning games. How do you expect us to do that when you're telling us we have to survive? It's a difficult situation to be in."
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