If Scottish Rugby Union officials thought the furore over "Budgegate" this week would be short-lived, they have been proved wrong.
Not for Budge Pountney a meek retreat from the storm over his abrupt retirement from Test rugby. Instead the Northampton flanker has warned the SRU it may face more player-led ructions in the near future.
Far from playing along with the Murrayfield line that one frustrated individual has simply exercised his prerogative and walked the plank, an unrepentant Pountney insisted last night the unrest runs much deeper. He also emphatically denied he had been guilty of an over-emotional outburst and hinted some of his former team-mates were keen to follow him over the top.
"It might have woken the SRU up a little bit, but the players who are still there have got to go for it and get a result, otherwise it will have been pointless and they'll forever be moaning," said Pountney.
"I wasn't speaking alone, I can tell you. It'll be interesting to see what comes out in the next couple of days."
On top of Pountney's grievances about facilities at training before Test matches are other contentious issues, including World Cup match payments and the treatment of "exiled" Scotland squad members and their families. Yesterday, though, the Hampshire- born forward was sticking to his core theme that the entire Scottish set-up is in need of refreshment.
"The fact is, they treat the home-based players and the exiles as badly as each other. You end up beating your head against a wall and thinking: 'What's that all about'?"
Any reciprocal sadness north of the border, however, was tinged with irritation. The SRU's chief executive Bill Watson, keen to deflect accusations of penny-pinching and small-minded officialdom, described some of Pountney's complaints as "silly" yesterday and once again floated the view that, after the removal of a damaged testicle, he was over-emotional and, as Watson put it, "knackered". The 29-year-old Pountney vehemently disagreed.
"I think they've missed the point throughout. Rest assured I'm not knackered, otherwise I'd have retired from the whole bloody game."
Others with inside knowledge of the Scottish camp insist Pountney was spot-on. "Whatever they're saying in the press, the SRU are miserably unprofessional at times," said one source who was keen to retain his anonymity.
"The SRU needs not a broom, it needs a stick of dynamite thrown in there. You need to blast out all the old guys sitting around on their expenses cheques. The (English) RFU has managed to blow away a lot of the old cobwebs but the SRU just hasn't moved.
"They don't want to admit it but their best players are south of the border, people like Tom Smith, Budge Pountney, Stuart Grimes and Bryan Redpath. If you take them out of your World Cup team you're looking pretty scabby. But they still don't see it. It's 'Oh well, Budge is English anyway'."
There is a theme emerging on the eve of the Six Nations championship: that outside England, with its sexy national set-up, there are some increasingly poor relations.
Former Irish centre Brendan Mullin has been appointed as the new chairman of London Irish. Mullin, who played for the club between 1987 and 1989, is a director of London Irish Holdings plc. He replaces John Conlan and Kevin Clancy who have been joint chairmen of the club over the past two years, although both will continue as vice-chairmen.
Guardian Service
