Australian Rugby / RA

[RedsHappy]

It's perhaps not ideal however for a sport that is trying to navigate a changing landscape and needs to engage a new audience.

That's not saying that David Mortimer might be wholly unsuitable for the job. If he knows what his limitations are, what is required and can facilitate that happening then go for it.

IMO, for these desperately overdue RA board renewals, we absolutely do NOT need status quo types and late-in-life prestige hunters, especially we do not need more 'successful bankers' (FFS they have been disasters in almost every Aust RU they have touched). These types and their types of background will only perpetuate the very syndrome of complacency, low strategic imagination, inwardness/in-brededness, 'good rugby men's club' mindsets that have in their aggregation and relentless continuity nearly destroyed the code in Australia over the last 15-20 years.

We need proven:

- big thinking change agents with clear records of busting complacent and mind-dead status quos and thus forcing next wave thinking and derived action​

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- fearless men and women unconcerned with the opprobrium and negative media that forcing real change always brings 'before the new dawn'​

​

- persons whom by track record have been happy to conduct deep surgical change to an organisation requiring radical reconstruction​

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- age span awareness - at least some of these change agents being able to identify by age, type, cultural sensitivity with the < c. 35 age demographic​

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- persons whom have an appreciation of and experience in the building of truly successful local and/or global sports codes - and they definitely do NOT have to 'love rugby and played it at school or Uni'.​

RA needs deep and radical change in 2020 or the code will be an afterthought by 2025, only surviving in small mini-clusters of grass roots adherents crying at the cold moon each July and yelling 'we told them it would end like this, but no one listened'.

 

[Braveheart81]

More of the same sydney old boys club.

Yesterday's men for yesterday's game.

Likewise though, there's a whole lot of key stakeholders and decision makers at all levels of the game that are part of that club and need to be brought along.

A huge part of rugby's issue is that there has been a complete inability to marry up the realities of a (niche) professional sport in a competitive market with the old school who are highly regarded in their circle and make decisions that affect the sport.

 

[RedsHappy]

Likewise though, there's a whole lot of key stakeholders and decision makers at all levels of the game that are part of that club and need to be brought along.

A huge part of rugby's issue is that there has been a complete inability to marry up the realities of a (niche) professional sport in a competitive market with the old school who are highly regarded in their circle and make decisions that affect the sport.

Perfectly put. And an 'old school' too that clings to and treasures a self-reinforcing 'rugby culture' of a type that feathered their particular preference nests and where accordingly they perceived no real need to change anything very much as 'there'll always be a corporate box seat for me come the winter months'.

 

[wamberal]

Perfectly put. And an 'old school' too that clings to and treasures a self-reinforcing 'rugby culture' of a type that feathered their particular preference nests and where accordingly they perceived no real need to change anything very much as 'there'll always be a corporate box seat for me come the winter months'.

Are any of these assertions based on your first hand knowledge of these horrible people? I have known quite a few of them during the years, in particular old Wallabies who were always happy to go anywhere to promote the game, who had played the game as amateurs, and continued to work for nothing for the good of the game. Feathering their nests, eh? Not the way I would put it.


You do realise, I hope, that corporate boxes cost a lot of money (which comes into the game) and are usually used by corporations to entertain clients. Thus the name. Corporate.

I might add that in my experience the food and drink in corporate boxes is usually abysmal. A mate of mine who is one of those old Wallabies that you despise got to the stage where he had dinner elsewhere before going to the game, rather than face the dross in the box. And it goes with the job (unpaid) to entertain guests and put up with their ramblings with a smile on your face.

Feathering nests?

 

[Dan54]

Are any of these assertions based on your first hand knowledge of these horrible people? I have known quite a few of them during the years, in particular old Wallabies who were always happy to go anywhere to promote the game, who had played the game as amateurs, and continued to work for nothing for the good of the game. Feathering their nests, eh? Not the way I would put it.


You do realise, I hope, that corporate boxes cost a lot of money (which comes into the game) and are usually used by corporations to entertain clients. Thus the name. Corporate.

I might add that in my experience the food and drink in corporate boxes is usually abysmal. A mate of mine who is one of those old Wallabies that you despise got to the stage where he had dinner elsewhere before going to the game, rather than face the dross in the box. And it goes with the job (unpaid) to entertain guests and put up with their ramblings with a smile on your face.

Feathering nests?

I wonder where people get their ideas from Wamb? I have known an All Black or two that were doing duty in Corporate boxes, and were never that keen on them, one other problem is you tend to be with some companie's clients, who are drinking free piss, and expecting you are going to have to a: explain what the teams etc should be doing , b: listening to them explain why they could do it all better, and c: answer questions on why the ref should or should not penalise a team etc, it not a much fun as made out, and quite hard to watch and enjoy the game.

 

[Boof1050]

Well done lads you've given 2 examples of the old boy thinking that Reds Happy was alluding to.
Still doesn't give us any idea on how to improve the game or make it more viable for the future years.

 

[Boof1050]

Me personally I think its going to have to eventually go down the avenue of a superleague style war to get the game moving in the right direction.

 

[barbarian]

Well done lads you've given 2 examples of the old boy thinking that Reds Happy was alluding to.
Still doesn't give us any idea on how to improve the game or make it more viable for the future years.

But this is the problem. The 'old boys' are just about the only thing the game has going for it at the moment.

I don't think we should just throw the keys to the Randwick board and let them go, but it's a bit silly to disparage those groups out of a misplaced desire to burn it all down and start again.

The RA Board has plenty of problems, sure. The 'old boys' network can at times be out of touch and not connected to what is best for the game. But they still represent a big cohort, and a very lucrative cohort.

And they are a cohort that is still passionate about the game. I went to a GPS school, and my mates are the ones still going to Tahs and Wallabies games, buying subscriptions, traveling to Japan to watch the World Cup.

The old boys have their flaws, but at least they have skin (or cash) in the game.
.

 

[RedsHappy]

Are any of these assertions based on your first hand knowledge of these horrible people? I have known quite a few of them during the years, in particular old Wallabies who were always happy to go anywhere to promote the game, who had played the game as amateurs, and continued to work for nothing for the good of the game. Feathering their nests, eh? Not the way I would put it.


You do realise, I hope, that corporate boxes cost a lot of money (which comes into the game) and are usually used by corporations to entertain clients. Thus the name. Corporate.

I might add that in my experience the food and drink in corporate boxes is usually abysmal. A mate of mine who is one of those old Wallabies that you despise got to the stage where he had dinner elsewhere before going to the game, rather than face the dross in the box. And it goes with the job (unpaid) to entertain guests and put up with their ramblings with a smile on your face.

Feathering nests?

Needless to say:

The above is merely a gross distortion of what I said and its meaning. This is no way to pursue a sound argument.

1. Yes, I have much first-hand experience of 'the [rugby] old boy system/cliques/'club'' etc that is a component of what might be called the Australian Rugby Establishment. I have known and know ex-Wallabies, Super players, club players, ex GPS schools players, rugby coaches, and numerous senior RU executives.

2. At no point did I say any such persons by type were 'horrible people', I do not think that. My point is that I have witnessed in many rugby circles (esp pro rugby circles) very high degrees of insularity, cultural and background in-brededness, a general lack of openness to persons outside the type of spheres I mention in 1., and a tendency (not by all) to exploit habitual rugby 'elite' networks for personal benefit and aggrandisement as a first (sometimes only) priority.

3. The suggestion that, generically, I 'despise' 'old Wallabies' per se is simply ludicrous and borderline defamatory. I do not. I know many ex Wallabies whom are the finest people. Not all are though. My point was solely regarding: attitude, micro-cultures, insularity of perspectives and values, and, by implication a touch of an elitist tendency to believe that 'rugby has a right to always exist' vs a perspective that is more open to the need for continuous competitive change and adaptation in order to ensure rugby's vitality and survival.

 

[RedsHappy]

But this is the problem. The 'old boys' are just about the only thing the game has going for it at the moment.

I don't think we should just throw the keys to the Randwick board and let them go, but it's a bit silly to disparage those groups out of a misplaced desire to burn it all down and start again.

The RA Board has plenty of problems, sure. The 'old boys' network can at times be out of touch and not connected to what is best for the game. But they still represent a big cohort, and a very lucrative cohort.

And they are a cohort that is still passionate about the game. I went to a GPS school, and my mates are the ones still going to Tahs and Wallabies games, buying subscriptions, traveling to Japan to watch the World Cup.

The old boys have their flaws, but at least they have skin (or cash) in the game.
.

Haha. I guess it depends what one - in this context - means by the term 'old boys'.

Sets of attitudes?

Types of personal backgrounds?

Long-standing 'older' rugby adherents?

Long-standing members of long-standing rugby elite systems?

I'm not trying to be argumentative. Rather the term I guess is somewhat fungible.

 

[RedsHappy]

But this is the problem. The 'old boys' are just about the only thing the game has going for it at the moment.

I don't think we should just throw the keys to the Randwick board and let them go, but it's a bit silly to disparage those groups out of a misplaced desire to burn it all down and start again.

The RA Board has plenty of problems, sure. The 'old boys' network can at times be out of touch and not connected to what is best for the game. But they still represent a big cohort, and a very lucrative cohort.

And they are a cohort that is still passionate about the game. I went to a GPS school, and my mates are the ones still going to Tahs and Wallabies games, buying subscriptions, traveling to Japan to watch the World Cup.

The old boys have their flaws, but at least they have skin (or cash) in the game.
.

So did I btw go to a GPS school so I certainly know you you mean ;-).

I would note that the very complacency of ARU/RA 'elite' institutional thinking that over the years I have had cause to mention here is IMO nowhere better found than in the way these bodies have totally taken for granted, and done nothing to replenish, the strategically negligent notion that 'GPS Rugby Will Always be There in Force and Provide our Elite Players Forever'.

In many GPS schools (a) for winter sports, rugby is being gradually - or quickly - overtaken in participation numbers by AFL or Soccer and (b) the GPS Heads of Sport and school rugby coaches will typically tell you that, unlike the national bodies of these two other codes that have been highly active in supporting GPS schools to promote and encourage their respective codes, the ARU/RA has for years not taken this competitive threat seriously and has provided essentially no active support to help sustain or grow the code in most GPS schools.

Meanwhile the NRL talent-spotters sit licking their lips at GPS rugby games picking the eyes out of rugby's young talent pools. Aided and abetted by the increasing torrent of negative media stories about the code as a whole in this country.

 

[kiap]

I went to a GPS school, and my mates are the ones still going to Tahs and Wallabies games, buying subscriptions, traveling to Japan to watch the World Cup.

But how are those Tahs and Wobs crowds going, trending up or down?

And maybe more of that GPS cohort would turn up if the game was better run. The average age of these fans, particularly at the RWC, would be closer to forty than thirty.

The RA Board has plenty of problems, sure. The 'old boys' network can at times be out of touch and not connected to what is best for the game.

More OB buffers in charge doesn't increase the number of GPS types buying subscriptions or attending games. Plenty of us went to expensive schools, my man. Short of gross RA incompetence, that GPS cohort will still be the last fans standing.

But that's not sufficient for the top two tiers of rugby to prosper. You've got to widen the support base. As one instance, where are the local Pasifika plans for growing a share of that target group in our code rather than another? Neglected, I'd suggest - at best.

 

[kiap]

The old boys have their flaws, but at least they have skin (or cash) in the game

Their skin and (small time) cash is fine. I remain a fan of what the Shute clubs did with getting TV coverage happening a few years back. But let's be frank - the RA buyout of the media rights was a bailout of sorts. It's not a model that can be scaled up for the game nationally. The turnaround won't come through car park appointments via the old school tie network.

There is a gradient between executive types who steer existing corporations and business people that can create them or turn around and expand them. Some can do both, but the reality is most people on boards cannot, and you can include old girls with old boys in this.

The goal should be getting people who bring real money to the game. They won't join RA themselves but job of the board and management is to bring them in.

The Sydney old boys need to ease their grip on the game and let others in for rugby to survive.

 

[barbarian]

Of course. I don't want to respond point by point, many of your observations are spot on. I was just sticking up, briefly, for the broad 'old boys' sector who are probably the largest and most lucrative fanbase we have left.

We should widen the base, include new perspectives, seek other experts on the Board. Yada yada yada.

 

[kiap]

^ Yada yada yada … in other words, talk to the hand. I hear ya.

You've stuck up for them.

Now draw a line under this sectional interest, nationally in charge, and holding back the rest.

 

[barbarian]

^ Yada yada yada … in other words, talk to the hand. I hear ya.

You've stuck up for them.
.

I'm not arguing with you mate. And I've stuck up for them here, but written a number of articles where I've been highly critical.

But whatever.

 

[Braveheart81]

The reality is that we need to bring those people along because it is too damaging not to.

You can't persist with an environment that many club players view the professional side of the game as the enemy and have no interest in attending Super Rugby games (or whatever replaces it) and test matches.

As we see pretty much every week in the media, there are a large portion of that old school tie network who are very influential both on other rugby fans and the broader public.

 

[RedsHappy]

But how are those Tahs and Wobs crowds going, trending up or down?

And maybe more of that GPS cohort would turn up if the game was better run. The average age of these fans, particularly at the RWC, would be closer to forty than thirty.

More OB buffers in charge doesn't increase the number of GPS types buying subscriptions or attending games. Plenty of us went to expensive schools, my man. Short of gross RA incompetence, that GPS cohort will still be the last fans standing.

But that's not sufficient for the top two tiers of rugby to prosper. You've got to widen the support base. As one instance, where are the local Pasifika plans for growing a share of that target group in our code rather than another? Neglected, I'd suggest - at best.

Part of the debated issue here is that, in fact, the so-called old boys network is actually the most identifiable, prominent and media-gaining element of the code in this country, but it is by no means the most numerous. In many ways it gets more attention and comment than it ever deserves (certainly on its merit in contributing, where it does, to the running of the game).

But it's a total myth to posit the idea that this network and its adherents is "all we have left". It is instead what we have that is most visible as a strata within the code and it is the strata that in general has been most successful in gaining and sustaining elite positions in, variously, rugby media and the governing bodies of the RUs. And thus it's become good, very good, at self-perpetuation.

Down in rugby club land, and in the GPS rugby-playing parents land, in local rugby 7s comps land, and in the everyday fan land I used to enjoy so much sitting beside at Suncorp, in these lands there are to be found people from every walk of life, from the not-well-off, to the teachers, the tradies, the middle managers, the 'ordinary' guys and girls.

There are many thousands of them, thank God. They actually fell into the game for all sorts of reasons and with all sorts of motives and patterns of required fun and enjoyment. They are certainly not of any identifiable elite group, they are typically not that well off, and they don't network with any kind of 'old boys' strata within the code.

They are truly the forgotten people of Australian rugby. They are typically not at all well represented in the management of the code or its media identity. No one talks too much about them. One consequence of this is that are are slowly but surely leaving the code as, I would argue, Australian rugby's elite bodies, no matter what they say, have by and large never been truly interested in understanding and catering to its 'everyday' 'ordinary' fans. Rather, and implicitly, these bodies just believed that 'if there is rugby the fans will be there'.

 

[WorkingClassRugger]

Part of the debated issue here is that, in fact, the so-called old boys network is actually the most identifiable, prominent and media-gaining element of the code in this country, but it is by no means the most numerous. In many ways it gets more attention and comment than it ever deserves (certainly on its merit in contributing, where it does, to the running of the game).

But it's a total myth to posit the idea that this network and its adherents is "all we have left". It is instead what we have that is most visible as a strata within the code and it is the strata that in general has been most successful in gaining and sustaining elite positions in, variously, rugby media and the governing bodies of the RUs. And thus it's become good, very good, at self-perpetuation.

Down in rugby club land, and in the GPS rugby-playing parents land, in local rugby 7s comps land, and in the everyday fan land I used to enjoy so much sitting beside at Suncorp, in these lands there are to be found people from every walk of life, from the not-well-off, to the teachers, the tradies, the middle managers, the 'ordinary' guys and girls.

There are many thousands of them, thank God. They actually fell into the game for all sorts of reasons and with all sorts of motives and patterns of required fun and enjoyment. They are certainly not of any identifiable elite group, they are typically not that well off, and they don't network with any kind of 'old boys' strata within the code.

They are truly the forgotten people of Australian rugby. They are typically not at all well represented in the management of the code or its media identity. No one talks too much about them. One consequence of this is that are are slowly but surely leaving the code as, I would argue, Australian rugby's elite bodies, no matter what they say, have by and large never been truly interested in understanding and catering to its 'everyday' 'ordinary' fans. Rather, and implicitly, these bodies just believed that 'if there is rugby the fans will be there'.

The 'Working Class' aspect of my username is there for a reason.

 

[Dan54]

Am I reading this right? There seems to be a section of posters who don't want ex players etc involved in running the game?
Well that's what I am reading, or is it former Wallabies or what you are against? I know we talk that many of the ordinary men (or women) aren't getting a say in how the game is run. But to be honest how many of them are standing for positions so they can have a say. I in no way saying the game is being run without a hitch, but to say that Joe Blogg who is on the sidelines is feeling disconnected is a little unfair, as I don't think any sport can be run by having to run down to the sidelines on a Saturday to ask what their opinion, like in politics etc, really if you feel passionately about it, get down to the club, join the committee, and start getting the game run as you think it should be, and not how these ex players etc do!