RFU awaits Barkley tickets explanation

Olly Barkley and Matt Stevens, the two young Bath players implicated in the mini-scandal over black market tickets during England's Six Nations' Championship campaign, will be dealt with by the Rugby Football Union next week. They are not in hanging judge territory - suspension of their ticket allocation is the worst they can expect - although there is some concern at Twickenham that one of the two has yet to respond to an official letter demanding an explanation.

Olly Barkley and Matt Stevens, the two young Bath players implicated in the mini-scandal over black market tickets during England's Six Nations' Championship campaign, will be dealt with by the Rugby Football Union next week. They are not in hanging judge territory - suspension of their ticket allocation is the worst they can expect - although there is some concern at Twickenham that one of the two has yet to respond to an official letter demanding an explanation.

The RFU indicated yesterday that Barkley, the new golden boy of English rugby following his uncannily accurate impersonation of Jonny Wilkinson in the matches against Wales and France, was the man who had yet to put pen to paper. "We expect a reply by next week, and if the player concerned does fail to meet that deadline, we will have to assume he cannot answer the questions we have put to him," said Paul Vaughan, the union's commercial director, who plans to minimise black market activity on Test days.

England players are given three tickets for each match in which they are involved, and are permitted to buy another 10. Following the match with Ireland at Twickenham last month - a game that marked the world champions' homecoming following their exploits in Australia last autumn and generated such levels of interest that Mike Burton, one of the RFU's three licensed hospitality providers, sold tickets at 15 times their face value - some of the allocation bearing the names of Barkley and Stevens ended up in the hands of punters who had bought unofficial packages.

Ben Cohen, the Northampton wing who was the first player to land himself in hot water, has already seen his allocation withdrawn. Stevens can expect similar treatment: no tickets for a maximum of six Twickenham matches for which he is selected. Barkley will face the same sanction, although there is an outside chance that Jeff Blackett, the RFU's disciplinary officer, might become involved if the outside-half continues to stonewall on the precise circumstances surrounding his alleged misdemeanour. Only then would his place in the England team be in jeopardy.

By and large, the RFU is happy with the licensing scheme, which was introduced last September in an effort to beat the ticket touts and unofficial hospitality companies. Under the system, affiliated clubs can sell their Twickenham tickets to licensed providers at whatever profit they are able to negotiate - a blessing for many a treasurer charged with balancing the books at the end of a season. Had the RFU not put the hospitality business out to tender, or attempted to control pricing, it might have been accused of operating a cartel and been taken to court.

"This is a complex issue, but we believe we have made some progress," Vaughan said. "We police the system heavily and while we estimate that 2,000 tickets out of 75,000 still go the black market - we are actively investigating how 200 tickets for the Ireland and Wales games ended up where they did - between 5,000 and 9,000 tickets were used in unofficial packages before we put the new arrangements in place. We must remember that demand for Twicken- ham tickets is extraordinarily high. For at least four games a year, we could sell out the stadium four or five times over."

* Lawrence Dallaglio, the England captain, will undergo a precautionary brain scan today after clashing heads with his colleague Paul Volley during Wasps' Heineken Cup victory over Gloucester at the weekend.