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Tents in tatters as gale force winds cause Classic chaos

Saturday night's gale force winds caused devestation at the National Sports Centre and wrecked hospitality tents causing the opening matches of the World Rugby Classic to be postponed.

The World Rugby Classic won’t start until tomorrow after gale forced winds wrecked many of the corporate hospitality tents set up for the week-long event.Gusts reaching up to 45mph battered the Island over the weekend leaving behind a trail of devastation at the National Sports Centre where the Classic takes place.Organisers are having to bring in replacements for the damanged tents and with forecasters predicting that winds will remain high until this evening the new ones cannot be put up until it has died down.The practical implications of the delay means that yesterday’s scheduled matches between the All Blacks and USA and the Lions against Italy have been switched to tomorrow and all the other matches will move back a day.Meanwhile, companies with hospitality arranged for yesterday are likely to be moved to Friday and ones with tents scheduled for today will move to tomorrow.“Our big problem at the moment is the wind and trying to get these tents back up again,” John Kane, president of the World Rugby Classic said yesterday afternoon.“We’ve got to wait for that wind to drop a bit. Our best guess at the moment is we will be playing Tuesday through to the weekend. We won’t manage tomorrow (Monday) either. That’s the best guess as of now.”With two days lost to bad weather, the first time that has happened in the 24-year history of the tournament, the games will be squeezed into the remaining five days with teams that make Saturday’s finals facing a particularly bruising schedule.“The players won’t have a problem with it,” said Kane. “They’ll go Tuesday-Thursday, Wednesday-Friday, the only thing is that those on Friday will have a match the next day, at the finals, but that’s it.”If the wind were to drop suddenly it is still unlikely that the Classic could begin before tomorrow as the clean-up and replacement of damaged tents will take some time.“We’ve got to bring in some replacement tents from other suppliers, so we’ve got all of those things to sort out,” said Kane. “Fortunately we had in our calendar two free days, one was Tuesday, one was Friday.“We clash with the football match (Bermuda v Barbados, 3pm) on Friday, so we have to figure out how to avoid that clash because the BFA have first dibs on all the parking and the dressing rooms, so we need to work around that.”The two major issues with the games clashing concern spectator parking and the use of the dressing rooms at the top field. With the Classic hosting two games a night, organisers have typically used the NSC dressing rooms in the lower pavilion and in the main stand to house the teams.Kane and the Bermuda Football Association are due to speak today and the most likely outcome is that Friday’s matches will be played in the evening, after the football match has been played and the spectators for the football have left.“We don’t see there being any problem if that is the case,” said a BFA official yesterday. “The game kicks off at 3pm, so we should be out of there by 6pm.”There is also the logistical problem of having to move corporate guests around so that companies that paid for a tent are accomodated.“We’ve got a good bunch of suppliers, a good bunch of people down here working on making sure the whole thing works,” said Kane. “We’ll fit everyone in, we’ll look after all the people who had tents they won’t be inconvenienced to any great degree.“Its just a question of how we move them around. We might put the Monday people to Tuesday, let the Wednesday and Thursday people stay, and then the Friday we’ll probably put the Sunday people in.”

Revised schedule

TomorrowMatch A: All Blacks v USA, 7.15pmMatch B: Lions v Italy, 8.30pm

WednesdayMatch C: Argentina v South Africa, 7.15pmMatch D: Australia v Canada, 8.30pm

ThursdayBermuda XV v Montreal Irish, 5.45pmPlate semi-final, Loser A v Loser B, 7.15pmClassic semi-final, Winner A v Winner B, 8.30pm

FridayPlate semi-final, Loser C v Loser D, TBCClassic semi-final, Winner C v Winner D, TBC

SaturdayBermuda Barbarians v White Plains RFC, 5pmPlate Final, 6.30pmClassic Final, 8pm