RFU’s Steve Brown will listen to player concerns in bid to avert strike

• Chief executive Brown: ‘If we have no players we have no England team’• Brown refuses to rule out southern hemisphere successor to Eddie JonesThe new man at the helm of the Rugby Football Union has admitted averting a possible player strike is among his most pressing priorities. Steve Brown, who has taken over from the retired Ian Ritchie, says player welfare is at the top of his bulging in-tray and wants to see a swift resolution to the dispute over the future length of the domestic season.Brown has been at Twickenham long enough as chief financial officer to know precisely how costly it wo…