Its detractors, and principally those from rugby league, are consumed not so much by the hypocrisy and double standards rife within the amateur game, and which pollute most other sports, but by envy. Rugby union has almost everything that rugby league covets: a genuinely global following, mass media coverage and money. Without even trying, it basks in the success which the professional game craves but which, despite its attempts at self-promotion, it has never achieved.The two advantages it enjoys over rugby union, and they should not be underestimated, are an ability to present a united front and a publicity machine in permanent overdrive. In the immediate aftermath of the Ray Mordt affair, every famous son from Barnsley to Bootle, those who profess to love sport but loathe rugby union for the privilege and position they believe it bestows, mounted their high horses and galloped into action The air waves crackled with moral indignation But let us be clear about one thing. This is not about Ray Mordt, amateurism or that preposterous waste of time and public money, the Sports (Discrimination) Bill.

It is about survival.If it is a fight to the death between the codes, as league clearly believes it to be, consider what would happen if the positions were reversed and it was rugby league which was the snooty aristocrat with the rich inheritance. Would rugby league throw open the doors of the mansion house and invite the poor relations to join the feast? Of course not. So why should rugby union extend the hand of friendship to those who are trying so hard to bite it?Rugby union, and the course it is taking, constitutes a serious threat to the existence of the league game, not as a sport, but as a main-line attraction for television, sponsors and the paying public. The views expressed last week by Alf Davies, the Chief Executive of Leeds, that rugby league must be prepared to 'change or die', are shared by many.