Wednesday’s Rugby News has more ARU shenanigans, an Aussie coaching summit, a Wallaroos moral victory, and a Will Genia’s return
[one_half last=”no”]
(a)ruh-roh
Wayne Smith is back in The Australian, dropping his usual truth bombs, this time saying that the Melbourne Rebels lodged legal action against the ARU late last week.
Smith writes that the damages is claim is “well massive, innit” “measured in the millions”, as the Rebels lawyers will argue that “the club believes the ARU has mounted a virtual constructive dismissal campaign against it by undermining its financial viability and then questioning its solvency.”.
With the Western Force and the ARU already agreeing to go into arbitration over their dispute, the Rebels will be on their lonesome if that arbitration rules in favour of the Force.
Interestingly, Smith includes the tidbit that the Rebels didn’t back the VRU’s call for an EGM (set to take place shortly), as the club believes there should be a team cut, as long as it isn’t them.
“We’re big fans of the move to go from five teams to four,” a Rebels spokesperson said.
“We believe that is the way to go. And we also believe that having the Sunwolves of Japan playing in the Australian conference will be good for sponsorships.”
In addition, Smith adds that up to 9 Force players have agreed to move to Melbourne if their team gets cut.
[/one_half][one_half last=”yes”]
Coach City
All Australian Super and 7s coaches have gathered in Sydney at Wallabies training a catch-up with Big Coach, Michael Cheika.
In addition to the Super coaches – Stephen Larkham (Wallabies assistant), Nick Stiles, Tony McGahan, Daryl Gibson and Dave Wessels – Morgan Turunui (Rebels backs coach), Rod Kafer (Television Opinion Man), Alan Gaffney and 7s coaches Andy Friend and Tim Walsh were present.
“It’s been really good for Cheik and the rest of his staff to even invite us. We know how difficult things are in the game and how busy things are,” said Dave Wessels to rugby.com.au.
“I think it’s (great) how open they’ve been with everything they’re doing and I think everybody just wants to get better, which is great. We’ve just been having some discussions around how they’ve been doing things and sharing ideas.
As well as listening to Cheika, the Super coaches also asked for feedback.
“I think that’s the nice thing about all this group of coaches, including the Wallabies coaches,” said Wessels, who was presumably handing out most of the tips in this situation.
“Everybody just wants to be better, everybody’s pretty open with their ideas. I think everybody’s got the best interest of Australian Rugby in mind and I’m looking forward to it – been pretty good so far and looking forward to the next couple of days.”
[/one_half][one_half last=”no”]
Wallaroos Go Down
The Wallaroos beat New Zealand 12-10 yesterday. In the second half, that is.
The “”real”” score yesterday – not counting the moral victory cos Australia always wins that – was 44-17, but the Wallaroos can be proud of their efforts considering they played rugby in hail. Hail!
“While we didn’t get the result we wanted, the team put in a much-improved performance from their match against England, and from our last encounter with New Zealand in 2016,” said Wallaroos coach Paul Verrell to the Daily Telegraph.
“The most pleasing thing is after trailing 34-5 at half-time, the team came out and showed some resolve to cross for two tries in the second half.
“We will now look forward to the match against Canada, where we hope to be continuing to build towards our World Cup campaign with another promising result.”
The match featured the Wallaroos highest-ever score against the Black Ferns, with 17 (made up of 3 tries) beating a score of 16 in 2008.
[/one_half][one_half last=”yes”]
Genia Going
Will Genia will be BACK in Australia, probably, after he cut ties with Stade Francais overnight.
“I’ll be back,” Genia told foxsports.com.au. “I’ve just got to choose a club. I’ve finalised my release, which is good. That’s all done.”
With a bit of a complicated contract – Genia was originally signed by Bath, but then Stade Francais bought them out, but Bath still had first dibs or something – it took some time to sort out, but Genia is back and raring to kick out one of the two up and coming scrumhalfs and Nick Frisby for a spot on the Reds’ roster for next year.
“It was just a conversation that had to be had and we managed to come to an agreement that worked for both myself and Stade,” Genia said.
“Stade were very good about it which I was very thankful for. I’ve got the release document all done, so it’s just about choosing a club.
“The Reds [are my preference]. That’s home for me.
“I spoke to my wife this morning and she’s thinking along those lines as well, so we’ll just have to wait and see.”
“My wife said, ‘Bugger Moses Sorovi, bugger James Tuttle, bugger Nick Frisby, it’s all about you BABY'”, Genia unfortunately didn’t add.
[/one_half]
