WALES team manager Alan Phillips has hit back at the smaller clubs who have criticised the squad for staying overnight or more at their Vale of Glamorgan base.

WRU chief David Moffett and the board have cut the funding of clubs below the first division by £2,000 each and they have claimed cuts should be made at the top end of the game instead.

They point the finger at the costs of staying at the Vale of Glamorgan and the £200,000-plus salaries of Moffett and Wales coach Steve Hansen.

But Phillips countered by saying, "That's rubbish, the national team's budget has been cut by 25%. It's not fair people coming out with these statements.

"To start with this was a young team and we wanted to keep them together. Everyone should see how much they have put in.

"But now for the week of the England game next month they will stay on Monday and Tuesday then go home, return on Friday, play the game, go to the dinner and then go home on the Saturday night which might surprise a few people.

"No-one is staying here during the pre-World Cup time now, we are not even supplying the players' food, they are doing that."

Phillips also mounted a robust defence of Hansen. "Stronger people than Steve would have wilted after the criticism he has received," he said.

"People need to look at what is going on all around the world and what other coaches are paid.

"People also need to understand what the job entails, you're under the microscope all the time."

Skills coach Scott Johnson, Hansen's number two, stressed the benefits of staying at the Vale.

"You have a club mentality here and you bring a team ethos, it's part of the development process," he said.

"We are not staying here at all now, but will come into camp in the game week. We must put the welfare of the team first. This is a case of perception and reality which are two different things."

Meanwhile, the WRU are looking to wipe out up to a third of their crippling debt by selling the naming rights of the Millennium Stadium.

Union bosses will approach the Millennium Commission to ask them to lift a ban on naming rights sponsors for the 74,000 seat stadium.

If successful, a long-term deal could net the Union up to £20 million - nearly a third of the £66m they owe.

* Nineteen players from Penygraig RFC have been banned for 18 months after a special WRU disciplinary hearing into allegations of refusing to take drugs tests.

The club's secretary Peter Bowen, as an officer of the club, admitted he had 'wilfully obstructed or interfered with' the carrying out of the dope control tests.

The disciplinary hearing decided not to proceed with charges against another official, immediate past chairman Neil Roper.