GALA backs coach, Chris Dalgleish, has backed calls for the introduction of summer rugby.

Dalgleish, who played for the club in all conditions, was speaking after Gala’s 18-3 exit to Glasgow Hawks in the BT Cup on Saturday at Netherdale.

“I am very much in that camp,” he said.

“When you look back, and see from the middle of December until now, there has never been any certainty that a game will be played. There are games being called off week after week. You have to try and keep players motivated.

“The crowd for a Gala day in the cup on Saturday was poor. The conditions were poor, skill levels were poor, and if you want to compete at any level, we need to change it – and you would get more players playing rugby and which would help things going forward.

“I would have no problem with that, and if you were to ask anyone involved in the Super League change, there would not be regret it.

“For me it makes sense. In this area, you are competing in this area with all the common ridings and the rest of it. But it is only a matter of time, with all the games that are being called off, for change.

“If you have a club to run, you need to look after the gate, the bar etc, and you cannot do that if games are called off week after week. It has become a bit of a farce. And there games have to be rescheduled again.

“It is time for change. Players come down Tuesday, Thursday to train and Saturday for a game. That has gone on for four weeks for us. The alternative is to have a winter break, but I would be happy to change over.

“We see at the start if the season that the skill levels are much better than they are now

“It is a bit of a guddle.

“You could play three games on that pitch (Netherdale) on an afternoon with something else going on like barbeques, etc. It just makes more sense.

“Yes, it is time for change.”

But time will tell if the powers that be take on board the ideas of men at the ‘coal face’ – or will the Borders throw up the usual scenario: ‘it’s aye been’?

It can be guaranteed that the crowd, who voted with their feet on Saturday and stayed away, and those who suffered the pain and the cold at Netherdale, would support Dalgleish in his views.