LONG READ Mick Cleary: 'You win nowt without proper team spirit, no matter how many high-performing individuals you have in the ranks.'

It was 40 years ago today, as the song almost goes, that yours truly first started covering what used to be known as first-class rugby, merit tables and all that, the forerunner of proper leagues and one of the eventual trigger points for the game turning pro in the mid-nineties. Full-blooded (and occasionally filthy) as the games were back then there was still an amateur feel to so much of it. How could it not be when the phone number for the RFU at Twickenham was still ex-directory and the players were clocking on for work on Monday mornings?

No comparison then to the all-singing, all-dancing PREM which begins on Friday evening with two league games – why two..why not go for a single big bang opener with a showdown between the last two winners, Northampton and Bath – and several months of club action to come? Well, the club game is obviously a significantly bigger draw card for spectators, attendances which help pay the bills, but there are certain truths that are remarkably similar. Firstly, there was a trenchant article in Rugby World magazine in autumn 1986 entitled ‘The Decline of British Back Play,’ written by some bloke with the name of Stephen Jones (whatever happened to him?) while out on the field itself Bath were girding their loins to begin their run of dominance on the English domestic scene in much the manner that their latter-day equivalents, Bath Rugby itself or Northampton Saints, will have designs on replicating.

Bath of all those years ago managed it through time-honoured methods, good coaching, good players and good practices, from Jack Rowell to a Stuart Barnes, Jerry Guscott, and Roger Spurrell through to no-holds-barred truth sessions, trading physical as well as verbal blows, and bloody hard graft.

The professional landscape is, of course, different in that players can be bought and sold to help bring about those ends although it’s notable that the leading contenders, along with the dynasties built by Exeter Chiefs and Saracens before them, are hall-marked by a solid core of players that stay together and stick together, attributes that are as true today as they were back in the day. You win nowt without proper team spirit no matter how many high-performing individuals there might be in the ranks. Finn Russell and Fin Smith need their Billy Selas and Alex Coles to do their spade work if their own talents are able to flourish.

What we learned from Bath in the mid-eighties and nineties is that none of this will happen by simply trying to replicate what happened the year before. Even in the amateur era, standing still was not an option if you wanted to be a champion team.

Saints would appear to be in a good place to go the distance again. That’s the theory at any rate. Easy to predict at this stage with no points on the board for anyone but the fact that no side has gone back-to-back since Saracens seven years ago (with their tittles having an unwelcome asterisk alongside for salary cap breaches) indicates just how difficult it is to go from promising portents to actual delivery. Six different champions in seven years proves that.

What we learned from Bath in the mid-eighties and nineties is that none of this will happen by simply trying to replicate what happened the year before. Even in the amateur era, standing still was not an option if you wanted to be a champion team. What the Saints did last season with their thrilling all-court game may again look good on paper. But it won’t be good enough, that’s for sure. Saints and Bath may well be the market-leaders on recent past reputation but there is no doubt that the revamped Exeter of last year will not be a one-season wonder or that a Mark McCall-less Saracens will be any the less of an item now that they are under the direction of the architect of their original blueprint for success, Brendan Venter. South Africans don’t tend to do easy rides as we have just seen on the international stage.

Gloucester, finally to punch their weight? Perhaps, with the arrival of two top-notch Welshmen, Jac Morgan and Dewi Lake, at Kingsholm. There is a certain Chris Boyd on call too to tilt that coaching tiller, doing for the Cherry-and-White what once he did for Northampton? Maybe. Courtney Lawes and Joe Marchant to stiffen backbones at under-performing Sale Sharks? Again, a fascinating prospect.

Bath Rugby would be the Saints closest challengers, fired once again by coaching guru, Johann van Graan, another man not given to false ideology.

Saints, though, for me are the team to beat. Their set-up is exemplary, their coffers boosted by the rebranding of the ground to DPD Stadium at Franklin’s Gardens, a sure sign that they are an attractive proposition. But money only takes you so far as Saracens illustrated in the early years of the century when they wasted so much by chopping and changing, by chasing high-profile acquisitions and ignoring the need to lay down proper foundations. Saints have done that, notably through their nurturing of coaches, Phil Dowson and Sam Vesty, creating their own version of the Liverpool boot room. For all the fluff and flannel drummed up by Eddie Hearn – and nothing wrong with that as showbiz is the name of his game – there was zero prospect of Henry Pollock leaving Northampton. He knows it too well and they know him too well. It used to be that way with Danny Cipriani at Wasps until heads were turned.

Bath Rugby would be the Saints closest challengers, fired once again by coaching guru, Johann van Graan, another man not given to false ideology. Do the basics, do them again and again, and you’re in with a chance. It will be interesting to see how Bath contend with the loss of Thomas du Toit, their go-to powerhouse from short-range. That said, the potential maturing of Billy Sela and Kepu Tuipulotu, will be interesting to watch.

There are story lines across the PREM board even if there still remains a profound sense that ten teams is not enough for a league to really impact on a sporting weekend. Twelve clubs has to be the objective within the next few years if the club game is to really punch its weight.

Bristol Bears have to get to the next level where they deliver silverware and not just good-vibes entertainment while the same would be true this season for Harlequins after their annus horribilis last time around. Leicester Tigers are right there in the mix for honours even if they will miss the heft and rugby intelligence of George Martin. Ollie Chessum could well be an influential turn for both club and country over the next 12 months.

Finally, if there is to be one overriding hope for the PREM season it is that Newcastle Red Bulls become a properly competitive outfit. They have been whipping boys for too long. It may be a wish too far to see them immediately emulate the energy and innovation brought about by Sir John Hall’s regime all those years ago but if they manage to show that professional rugby has a true and proper place in the far north-east then we will all be the better for it.