Australian Rugby / RA

[Bullrush]

This may have fallen back post COVID

Yes - it has fallen back

but it shows there is market for a domestic comp and we would be starting on an equal if not better footing

what proof do you have of this?

As you already admitted, it has ‘fallen back since COVID’ and we know that games against the Crusaders or Blues are often more popular than an all-Aussie game against the Force or Rebels.

Perhaps fans actually just want good rugby regardless of the opposition….

 

[Derpus]

Yes - it has fallen back

what proof do you have if this?

As you already admitted, it has ‘fallen back since COVID’ and we know that games against the Crusaders or Blues are often more popular than an all-Aussie game against the Force or Rebels.

Perhaps fans actually just want good rugby regardless of the opposition….

Begone foul beast.

 

[Linerunner2023]

Any credibility in options below?
1. continue with the current teams but somehow push into joining the Japanese league 1 competition where they can receive significant cash investment to play the Japan club sides - and potentially
2. Start a domestic competition with current club rugby sides (would make sense to place 2 sides together but that you loose the rivalry between them eg Randwick and easts
Only way this can work is to use teams who have some kind of supporter base to start and juniors
3. Last option and least favoured is work off from the schools. Old boys so schools combine and post school like a joeys best graduates get picked for their seniors side? Didn’t joeys and Riverview get 15k a year or so at Leichhardt? Again it’s a rivalry although doesn’t help western Sydney or public schools the schools system is strong and has passion, supporter bases

 

[Linerunner2023]

I made a similar comment to this on the Bidwell article:

There are two options:

1. Have Super Rugby in order to keep all the best players in NZ and Oz, and in order to better prepare players for test rugby.

To make this model work for Australia, Super Rugby needs to go back to its roots. When Oz had only 3 teams, Super Rugby was a great competition and the Wallabies were great too. And the Wallabies were able to single-handedly convert a nation into rugby-lovers. It really did work as a model.

The decline in the Wallabies competitiveness and the decline in the appeal of Super Rugby as a competition correlates to the increase in Oz Super Rugby teams. Coincidence? I think not.

I think this model could still work for Australia with 4 Super Rugby teams, but it needs a structure underneath it to better build the Super Rugby teams. I have advocated for a simple structure over in the 3rd tier thread.

2. The second option is to drop Super Rugby and each country have their own national domestic comp in order to reach and grow the fan-base in each country.

They are the two options. What is NOT an option (in my opinion) is trying to combine the two. This has been our big mistake and has ruined both Super Rugby as a comp and (I would argue) also the Wallabies. The old ARU should never have tried to expand through Super Rugby in order to create a national footprint and give it a pseudo domestic vibe—without a well-established third tier already in place. They needed to do one or the other.

Biggest challenge For rugby in Australia other then itself Is competing against nrl and afl! While we pretend we have the national game our domestic game isn’t on the same postcode as the other two atm
Although we could reduce teams we allready have f all pro sides compared to other codes so all the best kids will go to the other sports instead for a better chance of making it
ATM super rugby is just a wallabies selection trial - one of our work colleagues sons debuted a few years ago in super rugby and after 1 game they were talking about wallabies which made me realise this
Currently if we go to 3 sides we will have under 100 pro players in Aus leaving more to go to other sports or overseas while nrl and afl are heading towards 20 sides and and over 600 pro players

 

[LeCheese]

Yes - it has fallen back

what proof do you have of this?

As you already admitted, it has ‘fallen back since COVID’ and we know that games against the Crusaders or Blues are often more popular than an all-Aussie game against the Force or Rebels.

Perhaps fans actually just want good rugby regardless of the opposition….

Not to be presumptive of the point @mst was trying to make, but I think it was more around the case that the hype which absolutely existed during the COVID-affected domestic competitions may have subsided a bit post-COVID if we had continued with the domestic structure, not that it's returned to status quo now.

I for one have not seen a Super audience engaged like that 2021 year in a long, long time. God it was good. Obviously other factors were at play, but the rivalries actually felt important and the outcomes unpredictable. I absolutely agree with @mst in saying it was apparent there was an appetite for something different.

 

[LeCheese]

1000 pages in - surely we've cracked it by now?

 

[KiwiM]

Isn't it just about timing so that an alternative option can be funded?

2025 - the Lions tour pays off the $80 million debt

2027 - part of the RWC $ can be used to set up a proper domestic comp.

 

[eastman]

OMG this is madness, that is an idea from a different lifetime and it didn't work then and it definitely won't work now. That would be Melbourne V2.

What does any of that mean?

 

[Pfitzy]

The decline in the Wallabies competitiveness and the decline in the appeal of Super Rugby as a competition correlates to the increase in Oz Super Rugby teams. Coincidence? I think not.

The decline in Wallabies competitiveness is directly linked to the wisdom erosion of our development systems.

If those systems were invested in correctly we would have a better professional system.

It took Ireland 2 decades to learn that.

 

[Omar Comin']

1. Have Super Rugby in order to keep all the best players in NZ and Oz, and in order to better prepare players for test rugby.

To make this model work for Australia, Super Rugby needs to go back to its roots. When Oz had only 3 teams, Super Rugby was a great competition and the Wallabies were great too. And the Wallabies were able to single-handedly convert a nation into rugby-lovers. It really did work as a model.

The decline in the Wallabies competitiveness and the decline in the appeal of Super Rugby as a competition correlates to the increase in Oz Super Rugby teams. Coincidence? I think not.

It could easily be a coincidence. You could just as easily say 'the decline in the Wallabies competitiveness correlates to not having the best flyhalf in the world' which is also true. There are several other factors that have influenced the decline of the Wallabies compared to the late 90's/early 00's, a big one being the improvement of other nations (particularly NH teams).

It was a relatively short period of the time when the Wallabies were on top and it's tempting to assume any number of correlations are causal. The Wallabies have really only ever had a couple of short periods on top in the history of the sport and that's probably about the best we can hope for going forward given the advantages a few other nations have over us. It's logical to expect NZ, South Africa, England and France to all be ranked above us more often than not. They have significant advantages we'll probably never overcome (much larger playing bases and professional rugby opportunities for the latter 3, and the pick of the best athletes suited to rugby in the case of NZ and SA).

We can hope to have periods above some (and very occasionally all) of those teams, same as nations like Ireland and Argentina, but I don't think there's really any possibility of the Wallabies ever being a top 2 team consistently over a long period. And given the growth of the game globally (particularly in Europe and the Americas) the number of competitive teams is likely to increase.

 

[eastman]

The decline in Wallabies competitiveness is directly linked to the wisdom of our development systems.

If those systems were invested in correctly we would have a better professional system.

It took Ireland 2 decades to learn that.

Australia adopted to professionalism far better than other countries because we had league next door to emulate.

Correlation does not mean causation.

 

[mst]

Yes - it has fallen back

what proof do you have of this?

As you already admitted, it has ‘fallen back since COVID’ and we know that games against the Crusaders or Blues are often more popular than an all-Aussie game against the Force or Rebels.

Perhaps fans actually just want good rugby regardless of the opposition….

Proof- Um, the metrics that showed a +20% uptake for Super AU?

Post COVID - in general most broadcasts have fallen back with some. Its what happened when we could all go out again. Look at Netflix, Apple TV, Paramount just to name a few as examples that have had to cut content as people were not living via TV and could get out. When crowds returned viewers dropped off.

Perhaps fans actually just want good rugby regardless of the opposition…. true, and to prove it you just need to look at the low viewer numbers due to lack of decent rugby.

 

[half]

Rugby is a football code it should operate a league that most of those football codes operate, Soccer/AFL/NRL/NFL/Basketball. I didn't say we would be overnight millionaires, reality is a bummer. We should have done this 25 years ago, but now we are flat broke, and living of a credit card to pay those Wallabies to play at home in half empty stadiums.

Look I don't have all the answers, I just get sick & tired of seeing the game go down the gurgler, yet mention any alternative and immediately its NO NO rugby could never do that, so we can't have invested fans, tribalism, dedicated followers.

The proposed model is the one we can afford, which is fuck-all, but its reality, its time to sober up.

Hoggy, on the whole I am completely with you, but this post of yours is way to optimistic. We start with not that far ago and RA's clumsy attempt to shrink to greatness, now we have it by default. [That there spells the timetable where changing the system presented itself.] The status quo is living beyond our means, and shrinking. We don't have the funds for 5 teams, and now should expect those funds, (maybe suitable for 4 teams) to be reduced. And so on.

Highlighted by our utterly disastrous RWC and plummet in the world rankings. And a follow up that showed, in contrast with the claims that we earn money from the Wallabies, that the RWC cost a fortune. And does apparently, every 4 years. Not something mentioned much in the past or now - when claiming our pro comp is dictated by the Wallabies.

Regarding your bold text, that was for me some time ago.



What makes you think this is not on the cards irrespective of an alternate competition? How long are the Lions going to be that enthusiastic about a team ranked 9? Can you see the Lions being organised for an Italy tour? Italy are ranked ahead of us ffs.

***

We are reacting way too late, and right now need to deal with a downtrend in which there would appear to be no evidence of a pending turnaround. We've missed the obvious timing for a swap to domestic. Cross fingers the opportunity presents again. Everything else seems to lack a grounding in reality.

I have long argued for a National Domestic Competition, however we are a number of years to late in starting and don't have the funds to start now. Further there is a lot of planning to do its not easy.

The issue is planning and creating a competition sellable to broadcasters, fans, sponsors and investors.

The next media deal will determine funds available to undertake the planning and development process.

I guess the hope is that with the L & WC we can pay back the loans and maybe start something. However the planning needs to take place now .

Its no longer a minute to midnight its 5 past midnight.

If we don't start soon we will become the new hockey

 

[dru]

1. Have Super Rugby in order to keep all the best players in NZ and Oz, and in order to better prepare players for test rugby.

Palpably this does not happen. 5 teams did not manage a broad base of talent development through to professional. It also resulted in talent diaspora often with our best being over seas. By cutting 5 to 3 you just ensured another 100 or so potential high level talent not having the opportunity to do so.

 

[hoggy]

The only constant in the game of rugby in this country is about every 3-4 days an article bemoaning the structural set up of the game here turns up and off we go, endlessly debating it until bingo! the next article turns up and we start again. It’s been rinse and repeat for 20 years now.

The problem I see with the so-called global approach for Australian rugby is that it will endlessly suck up any revenue you ever earn in a never-ending cycle to reach the summit of a mountain you will never end up being able to climb.
A RWC every 4 years but wait now there’s gonna be a Nations cup in between. All with the promise of more & more revenue, but all that is happening is the top end is just self-funding itself, and along with that will come an ever increasing appetite for more revenue to ensure that everyone associated with that pathway to the top is equally funded you can’t avoid it, the more you feed it the hungrier it will get.

That promise to fund the grassroots will be that a never-ending promise, we just need to climb a bit more of that Mountain first, promise I’ll feed you once I get to the top.

 

[Derpus]

Australia adopted to professionalism far better than other countries because we had league next door to emulate.

Correlation does not mean causation.

How did we emulate NRL?

 

[Strewthcobber]

How did we emulate NRL?

Gold Digger has a good interview with Rod McQueen on this. He worked a lot with AFL and league coaches to understand what professional football looked like through the transition from amateurism. Things like how to train seven days a week. How to get fit for a pro football season etc etc.

He also obviously recruited in John Muggleton which transformed defense across the whole sport

 

[KOB1987]

How did we emulate NRL?

Emulating NRL is a lost cause. What we need is a pro U23 comp marketed at the same demographic, to feed into the 3 or 4 Super Rugby teams. There is a huge niche opportunity here for the code and it also addresses the problem of providing a professional pathway from the juniors into the second tier. I won't go into the specifics of how to structure it or how to pay for it, but as a starting point I'd be looking at the US college football competition. Players over 23 who fall out of the second tier either drop back to club rugby or go overseas for their twilight years and can be selected from there if need be.

 

[hoggy]

Emulating NRL is a lost cause. What we need is a pro U23 comp marketed at the same demographic, to feed into the 3 or 4 Super Rugby teams. There is a huge niche opportunity here for the code and it also addresses the problem of providing a professional pathway from the juniors into the second tier. I won't go into the specifics of how to structure it or how to pay for it, but as a starting point I'd be looking at the US college football competition. Players over 23 who fall out of the second tier either drop back to club rugby or go overseas for their twilight years and can be selected from there if need be.

The only demographic you could market that to would be NRL scouts, another tier to fix the tier above to fix the tier above that and so on.

 

[Mick The Munch]

Congrats to all involved - we have made it to 1000 pages