Clive Rowlands continues his MS boycott.

This weekend Wales play the Barbarians in a match for which caps are awarded. The merits of awarding caps for such a game have surely been done to death, but that they will be means that yet again Clive Rowlands the former Wales Captain, Coach, Manager and President will refuse to attend the match.

While he is not a fan of awarding caps for matches not against other countries (after all why not award caps for matches against the SA Barbarians etc) his reasons are more personal. He was the coach of Wales from 1968-74 during which Wales won the GS in 1971 and were the bedrock of two winning Lions parties. This was also a period when Wales (and to be fair England) did not award caps for matches against Argentina etc. Nor were cheap caps available for appearance of the bench as back then only certified injured players could be replaced (replacements for injury only allowed following the 1968-9 law changes)

In this period there were a handful of players whose only appearances for Wales were against countries for which caps were not awarded and thus were never capped. Rowlands has long campaigned for this to be reviewed and caps to be awarded to these players. It incenses him that you can get a cap against a non-country yet these guys were never rewarded. In a lot of ways, he has a point.

Good, someone with integrity and principles to follow. The Barbarians essentially represent the world in my eyes and if you're going to award caps for facing a World XV then why not cap players in every game, for club and country?

I wish the WRU would cut back on the antics sometimes, I'm gradually getting sick of this kind of thing.

Why don't the IRB rule on when caps can be awarded rather than leave it up to the national governing bodies? Like with what constitues an 'A' side (and what ties a player to a nation) it should be the same for everybody if possible.

That's too straightforward, though isn't it?