Name or shame

For just as Anderson was an absolute disaster, so would be any move to call the team simply Dragons.

There are many Rodney Parade diehards who still think the main team is Newport and there are others who want the name to be Newport Dragons while those in the valleys would prefer the title Gwent Dragons. In other words, the whole business is as polarised as ever.

But I can tell you the vast majority of people out there in Wales take a different view, and so do the Welsh media.

I am in a minority of one among the media who wants the name to be Newport Gwent Dragons. One other notable writer still bangs the Newport drum while all the rest say the main city or town names should be dropped from the four regions and the teams should be called Dragons, Blues, Ospreys and Scarlets.

There was a really heated debate, argument even, among a whole group of us at the British Lions-Argentina game, and to those Rodney Parade fanatics who think I've become anti Newport and bang the regional drum, I can tell them I am viewed by colleagues as a complete Luddite.

Yet I've accepted that regional rugby is here to stay, it's the only show in town when it comes to top flight rugby and we simply have to get on with it.

If you don't agree then you might as well go out and bang your head against the proverbial brick wall.

But that doesn't mean we should abandon those names that have served us for well over 100 years and are known the world over.

The imposition of four blank names like Blues, Dragons etc. is just as bad as imposing the wretched comprehensive education system upon us all.

And just because the Ospreys have gone down that route it doesn't mean we've all got to follow, far from it.

They had to do something because their team was simply a combination of two clubs, Swansea and Neath, when they clearly took in a whole lot of others.

They say they are now setting an example, but an example of what? Trampling the history books into the ground? Showing no regard for tradition?

Fans of their 'movement' say it's been done in New Zealand and it's been done in South Africa. Maybe, but what about England, what about France?

Do they travel around the place glorying in names like Cats, Bulldogs, Hurricanes - no-one having a clue just who they are or where they're from - or do they retain place names like Leicester and Toulouse? You know the answer.

And the reason they still pack grounds like Northampton and Biarritz is because they retain their historical names and clear sense of identity.

If all that sounds like I'm in favour of Welsh teams retaining their historical names and only that, then I'm not because those days have gone and they can't be restored.

But neither should we go down the route of forcing weird names on our major sides. Say it becomes merely Dragons here, would that refer to the outside world as Glamorgan cricket team, also called Dragons? Or perhaps Wrexham football or even Wales itself, all named Dragons?

Where is the sense of identity in that? Who would the rugby team be? Where would they come from?

Take Monday night at the Lions match and the half-time break when a representative of all four home countries was involved in a kicking competition, the prize being a ticket to all three Tests in New Zealand.

Jeremy Guscott was mc and he introduced the Welsh competitor as being from Newport Gwent Dragons. Why? Because the large number of fans from across the Severn Bridge, and there were many thousands as I discovered getting to and from the game, would immediately have recognised where he came from.

In firmly urging the board to stay as they are it is also adopting the most pragmatic and least offensive approach - Newport in the title because it's the clear headquarters of the team, the home base, and Gwent to reflect the region.

Just in case the board are wavering let them reflect on their near neighbours and imagine Cardiff Blues dropping the name of Cardiff from the title. Never in a million years, it just won't happen.

So let's forget about this ridiculous Dragons, Blues, Ospreys and Scarlets lark, retain a sense of identity and get on with uniting behind one region and one team and take the whole thing forward.

What we don't want is more warring factions and the likes of Eddie Butler continuing to put a spoke in.

If he had been invited (fat chance) to the Welsh Charitables dinner last Friday at the splendid Cardiff Coal Exchange in honour of David Watkins he would have been highly embarrassed.

Nearly 400 guests, including past greats like Stuart Watkins, Keith Jarrett and Dai Morris, gathered to pay tribute to Watkins for a career in which he has graced both rugby union and league.

Butler should have listened to the marvellous tribute paid to Watkins by former England 'adversary' Richard Sharpe who made a rare trip outside his Cornwall home after a major personal tragedy especially to pay homage to Watkins.

Yet Butler calls for Watkins' removal. He should hang his head in shame.