Dalziel Rugby Club head coach Graham Calder doubts Scottish rugby will be back in 2020

Like every other sport, the oval ball game has been wiped out for two months by Covid-19, with the ongoing home lockdown, a ban on public group gatherings and the implementation of strict 2m social distancing measures making the contemplation of a return any time soon look implausible.

“I think rugby is one of the hardest sports to bring back because of the contact nature of it,” Calder told the Times and Speaker.

“And the fact that continually through the whole game you will be in contact with essentially every player on the pitch.

“I don’t see it ever happening with masks on to be honest.

“I don’t think rugby will happen until there is a normality within the way we live our life and the NHS because there is always that risk of injury. You wouldn’t want to put any strain on the NHS if they were already dealing with the current situation that they’re in.

“I think it is looking unlikely that rugby will be played in 2020 but I’m always an optimist. I would always hope that potentially things will hopefully get better and we will get back on the pitch sooner rather than later.

“But if we have to plan ahead and start afresh after Christmas time then that’s what we have to do.”

Dalziel players have been exercising at home to stay fit during the current sabbatical and, as a new innovation, Graham revealed that stars Andrew Glover and Ryan Burrell will be taking on new roles as the club’s strength and conditioning coaches.

“They have come through our youth section and have been playing for the first 15 for the last three years,” the head coach said.

“Through time, the boys will be doing different fitness tests they can do at home in terms of muscular endurance, strength tests and out on the road in terms of cardio stuff.

“Following that, the plan is that the boys will then get personalised training programmes (through group chat and video link) to make sure they’re fit and raring to go when the season starts.

“It’s also going to tie into the youth section within the club as well. So the boys will put up video links about how to do different exercises and that will be put out to all the youth coaches and senior players. It will be done live and recorded.”

Calder said that Dalziel would be raring to go in Tennent’s West Division 2, whenever it restarted after the current crisis had abated sufficiently.

The 2019-2020 domestic Scottish rugby campaign was declared null and void by the SRU with Dalziel sitting in second place in their league after 13 games, 15 points behind leaders Strathaven with four games in hand.

Calder finished by saying that he felt his Motherwell outfit would have gone on to win last season’s competition had the rest of the games been able to be played; they were “raring to go” next season.