Declining participation and ARU plans for the future

[Quick Hands]

I have found this thread an interesting read. I'm going to make some comments from my personal observation in recent years.

I grew up on League. When my son wanted to pick up an oval ball that's the direction we went. But, despite living in rugby heartland my son had barely ever seen rugby. Partly because my bent was to League but also because most rugby is hidden away on the obvious access point for most people, free-to-air TV. Rugby is traditionally not visible - except to those who already follow the sport and that's not where growth comes from.

My son's conversion (and mine) came on the back of the father of a friend inviting him to try Rugby. He loved it and has left League a long way behind.

My son went to a public primary school where rugby was the only oval ball code in the school as recently as 2012. but, the rugby in the school was/is maintained solely by eager rugby parents (not the ARU, not the SJRU and not the local clubs). At that same school, over just a few years since 2012 League has become massive (multiple boys and girls teams) and AFL has also taken off. The reason? Both of those codes put people and resources into the school through the local clubs and as well development officers from the codes themselves. They are there regularly and they help the school to deliver their "product". (In fact last Friday I visited the school during the day for the first time in years to see my younger son and there was Greg Florimo and a couple of NRL bedecked helpers.)

Public schools run on the good will and interests (or lack of interest) of the teachers. They're great in providing opportunities to the kids but the easier you make it for them, the more likely it will be that it will happen.

This is a complicated issue and there is no one solution but Rugby's greatest failing is that it simply doesn't put the effort in to ensure its product is out there to be seen (by those who aren't already involved) and to support those who are positioned to help it grow.

Your example is a micorcosm of what's happened in the past thirty years.

Hope that your young blokes stay involved in rugby. It's a great game - it's the clowns who run it who are the problem.

 

[BAR]

Your example is a micorcosm of what's happened in the past thirty years.

Hope that your young blokes stay involved in rugby. It's a great game - it's the clowns who run it who are the problem.

The other thing that bemuses me is that almost all of the promotion of junior rugby appears to be to the people who are already involved.

I'm sure they'll stay involved. The oldest plans on being a Wallaby.

 

[Quick Hands]

The other thing that bemuses me is that almost all of the promotion of junior rugby appears to be to the people who are already involved.

I'm sure they'll stay involved. The oldest plans on being a Wallaby.

Very astute. You've hit the nail on the head. We have a whole lot of people who preach to the choir and fail to understand that there's so many people out there who would become part of rugby if they actually took the time to try to appeal to them.

But, even in the past 12 months we had the NSWRU torpedoing a redevelopment of the Sydney Football Stadium because it would mean that they had to spend two seasons playing Waratah home games at Homebush. I'm sure that the thought of it would have sent them into therapy for a couple of weeks at an exotic Carribean island.

NB: not only was their position foolish and shortsighted in the extreme, but also not one based on evidence as the evidence showed that the Waratahs actually drew better crowds to Homebush than Moore Park.

 

[RugbyReg]

I have found this thread an interesting read. I'm going to make some comments from my personal observation in recent years.

I grew up on League. When my son wanted to pick up an oval ball that's the direction we went. But, despite living in rugby heartland my son had barely ever seen rugby. Partly because my bent was to League but also because most rugby is hidden away on the obvious access point for most people, free-to-air TV. Rugby is traditionally not visible - except to those who already follow the sport and that's not where growth comes from.

.

One of the drivers to get women's sport on tv was the saying "you can't be what you can't see".

I feel this is pretty relevant to Australian rugby at the moment too.

 

[Norfolk & Chance]

If you put two NZ super rugby teams playing each other on free to air and told people they were from Australia, there would certainly be more people interested in rugby. The Australian product is just rubbish at the moment. If you started now it would take 10 years to fix Australian rugby as it starts at 8 year olds, they need to learn the simple things(catch/pass, tackle, ruck/maul, kick reception, restart execution) and do the drills over and over until they are finished playing rugby at 40. Currently those drills are done until they are 12ish, and then all coaches seem to want to do work on structure.
If the ARU actually took control of the game maybe we would start to see change. By control i mean, own the product from to bottom up not from the top down.
My personal view is people walk away because the competition is weak. At club level the grading is so unbalanced, you have limited teams, so you end up with three grades A, B, C, a large club has 3 teams so A, B, C, and a small club only has one team and it's graded a C. But they are significantly weaker than the large clubs C, and get flogged every week. those boys are gone the next year.
At School level it has become semi professional, with a high focus on the so called elite. Multiple training session, weight programs, special diets, etc and you end up with boys that are massive for their age and you are now seeing that down in 12's and 13's. It scares kids away, it scares their mum's away, you hear it all the time, "look at them they are massive, what age is that".

The ARU needs to combine the schools and club competition, to add depth to the pool, from 6 to 16 year olds. Set guidelines regarding who can play up and down 1 age group. I understand the schools have Saturday sport, with a little thought I'm sure everyone can be accommodated and the schools would still be able to play 1st 15, 2nd 15, with boys in senior school older than 16.
There also needs to be a reduction in the number of village clubs, if you ended up with 3 super clubs in a district that would be a great thing.

Without the depth at club/school level the game will die.

 

[I like to watch]

The Schools not even bothered about the strength of their 6 or 7 team comp, just as long as they are winning.....

Until the ARU steps in with a big stick, the Schools will continue cannibalising other Schools and village clubs.

But as the board & the CEO all grew up thinking GPS is the centre of the universe,I recommend you don't hold your breath waiting.

 

[BAR]

If you put two NZ super rugby teams playing each other on free to air and told people they were from Australia, there would certainly be more people interested in rugby. The Australian product is just rubbish at the moment. If you started now it would take 10 years to fix Australian rugby as it starts at 8 year olds...

Not sure I agree with all of your points N&C but there are a couple of points I'll pick up on.

Drills - The fact is that rugby juniors do too little in the way of training on basics. My son changed teams last season to learn something new and was thrilled to come away from training that was drills and skills based. On the same front, it amazes me that rugby is so dependent on kicking yet the kids aren't coached in it. In 5 seasons of junior rugby (school and club and rep) and I am yet to see any kicking coaching at all! I think that if the kids aren't learning they'll turn away from a sport...

Size - I am a convert to the idea of weight grading but mainly because there's nothing worse than watching a game where size pretty much decides the result. Personally I think the safety issue is more about perception than reality (that is, the risk is a lot lower than people believe). But, even so the perception needs to be managed and the easiest way to do that is to introduce weight/size grading. I do think the size issue affects participation.

Leaving the sport - Athletes leave sports in droves in their early teens. This is not just rugby, it is all sports (every club in every sport asks itself how to keep hold of its teenagers). One of the biggest contributors to this is simply rationalisation. Children play heaps more sports than we did. One winter and one summer sport was my childhood but these days it's multiple codes and school sport all competing with each other and the kids make choices (although many of the private schools dictate this choice). The issues for the ARU are how to make rugby the choice that is made and, how to stop rugby competing against itself (ie school vs club) to the detriment of the game overall.

I agree that concentration on the 'elite' or future possible 'elite' is a problem in junior sport. Across the board it is a ridiculous idea because you can't judge a child's athletic capability and potential until they mature. In effect you exclude potential future stars. Soccer has milked the desire to have elite children for lots of $$$ by making every second player a rep squad member - which probably helps their retention (but we don't want to go down that road). Personally, I think we need to aim to develop every player to their highest potential. Keep them interested, keep them learning and ... keep them.

 

[Quick Hands]

The Schools not even bothered about the strength of their 6 or 7 team comp, just as long as they are winning...

Until the ARU steps in with a big stick, the Schools will continue cannibalising other Schools and village clubs.

But as the board & the CEO all grew up thinking GPS is the centre of the universe,I recommend you don't hold your breath waiting.

I've always advocated that the ARU/NSWRU just bypass the schools. Not do anything to harm them, but bypass them.

If the ARU could achieve one thing in the next 5 years it would be to have a district based club competition, run on Saturdays and not dependent on players doubling up from schools. My opinion only - it's actually not new, it's what happened for most of the 20th century.

I'd also have the junior rep season after the junior village club and school competitions finish and open it to everyone in the district who wants to try out (it's what most sports do). For example; you live in Manly and go to Shore, you play school footy for Shore and at the end of the school and club season you try out for the Manly rep team alongside the boys who spent the year playing for Roos, or; you live in Newport and go to Knox, you play for Knox and then at the end of the season you try out for the Warringah rep team alongside the kids who played for Newport.

Instead of having the state championships over the June long weekend, you have them in the September school holidays.

 

[Quick Hands]

Drills - The fact is that rugby juniors do too little in the way of training on basics. My son changed teams last season to learn something new and was thrilled to come away from training that was drills and skills based. On the same front, it amazes me that rugby is so dependent on kicking yet the kids aren't coached in it. In 5 seasons of junior rugby (school and club and rep) and I am yet to see any kicking coaching at all! I think that if the kids aren't learning they'll turn away from a sport.

I've posted this on other threads and also with people in private conversations. The focus on ARU sponsored coaching courses is heavily geared towards the breakdown. There's far less focus on catch and pass than there used to be. Kicking is almost invisible in Australian rugby coaching programmes.

 

[CNorth]

I've always advocated that the ARU/NSWRU just bypass the schools. Not do anything to harm them, but bypass them.

If the ARU could achieve one thing in the next 5 years it would be to have a district based club competition, run on Saturdays and not dependent on players doubling up from schools. My opinion only - it's actually not new, it's what happened for most of the 20th century.

I'd also have the junior rep season after the junior village club and school competitions finish and open it to everyone in the district who wants to try out (it's what most sports do). For example; you live in Manly and go to Shore, you play school footy for Shore and at the end of the school and club season you try out for the Manly rep team alongside the boys who spent the year playing for Roos, or; you live in Newport and go to Knox, you play for Knox and then at the end of the season you try out for the Warringah rep team alongside the kids who played for Newport.

Instead of having the state championships over the June long weekend, you have them in the September school holidays.

Yep we get it club Good. School Bad. Your constant. Not the that club land should be accountable for the lack of basic skills in the game considering everyone until 13 plays club. No no bad school
Fix basics before anything else.

 

[Quick Hands]

Yep we get it club Good. School Bad. Your constant. Not the that club land should be accountable for the lack of basic skills in the game considering everyone until 13 plays club. No no bad school
Fix basics before anything else.

If you read that into my post, then I suggest that you need to go back to school for some English comprehension.

 

[Strewthcobber]

Outside of the pro sides, how many full time rugby coaches are there?

Are the SS/Prem coaches full time?

Other than (some) school coaches, there can't be too many out there. It's effectively the pathway for a coaching career isn't it?

Sent from my D5833 using Tapatalk

 

[wamberal]

Your example is a micorcosm of what's happened in the past thirty years.

Hope that your young blokes stay involved in rugby. It's a great game - it's the clowns who run it who are the problem.

If it is such a great game, why is it not more popular in Australia. These "clowns" have only been around for a short while, comparatively speaking. The game virtually died out at the international level in the early post-war years, we were saved by two enormously popular Fijian tours. Those teams played open, attractive, unstructured rugby. They drew ecstatic support from people who were just not all that interested in our game.


We have bobbed along ever since, sometimes thriving, comparatively, more often struggling.


It is not the game that is so wonderful, it is the culture of the game and the people who support and play it that is wonderful. If the game was so wonderful, things would be very very different.

 

[BAR]

Yep we get it club Good. School Bad. Your constant. Not the that club land should be accountable for the lack of basic skills in the game considering everyone until 13 plays club. No no bad school
Fix basics before anything else.

I'm not sure that "school bad" was the message. In fact, I read Quick Hands' suggestion as a model where both associations exist independently and then come together into the rep pathways. There is merit in this idea (in fact, conceptually I like it a lot and something like this would be good to see) but I am not sure about its viability as suggested.

First of all, I think if we take a close look at player numbers then we will see there are many players playing in both school and club. I suspect the suggested Saturday game approach would see club numbers decimated. A move to Saturday will also see players who also play League (and there are a lot of younger players in both codes) having to decide on League or Rugby - another potential loss of players.

The second concern I would have with rep season later in the year is that September leads into summer sports and the better Rugby players are often the upper performers in other sports. I don't know if some of the potential rep players will want to risk their potential honours in their summer sports with an extended Rugby season.

 

[Braveheart81]

If the ARU could achieve one thing in the next 5 years it would be to have a district based club competition, run on Saturdays and not dependent on players doubling up from schools. My opinion only - it's actually not new, it's what happened for most of the 20th century.

The question is how to achieve this.

If the SJRU is in charge of junior rugby in Sydney, who can lean on them to make changes?

Does the NSWRU have any say on what they do?

Does the ARU have any direct ability to push the SJRU or do they need to lean on the NSWRU to then lean on the SJRU?

What is the power base in the SJRU? Is it mostly private school parents who want to have club rugby on Sundays so their kids can play both for as long as possible.

That is the difficulty with the fragmented nature of the many associations around the country. A relatively small but important association can make a decision which isn't for the greater good and the overall governing body can't do much to change it.

 

[BAR]

The question is how to achieve this.

Spot on with that question, if only we had the answers.

On your 4th question, I don't know why Rugby is a Sunday game. Private school parents might be one of those factors but I suspect there are numerous other. League plays on Saturday and many primary school players (and some of the older juniors) play in both codes in my neck of the woods. A number of the private schools directly exclude their players from club rugby or indirectly (through the amount of training etc making the workload too high for players to maintain both club and school) so whether club games are Saturday or Sunday is really irrelevant in those circumstances. The demand on fields is also very high in Sydney, so Sunday matches may reflect thee distribution of that demand.

Personally, I do like my son being able to play both school and club rugby (they offer him different things for his development as a player) but I'd hardly die in a ditch if he had to make a choice.

 

[Braveheart81]

Spot on with that question, if only we had the answers.

On your 4th question, I don't know why Rugby is a Sunday game. Private school parents might be one of those factors but I suspect there are numerous other. League plays on Saturday and many primary school players (and some of the older juniors) play in both codes in my neck of the woods. A number of the private schools directly exclude their players from club rugby or indirectly (through the amount of training etc making the workload too high for players to maintain both club and school) so whether club games are Saturday or Sunday is really irrelevant in those circumstances. The demand on fields is also very high in Sydney, so Sunday matches may reflect thee distribution of that demand.

Personally, I do like my son being able to play both school and club rugby (they offer him different things for his development as a player) but I'd hardly die in a ditch if he had to make a choice.

This certainly happened long after my time of being a junior rugby player but my understanding is that it was driven around wanting kids to be able to play for both the private school on Saturday and the club on Sunday.

In my experience the schools made it pretty much impossible for kids to play both after about under 15s.

I am speculating here but I think part of the problem is that a lot of the control in making these decisions is being done by people with a foot in both the club and school camp and it is a compromise for them.

When everyone talks about wanting junior club rugby to stand up against the private school influence, it seems like the reality is people wanting to find compromise between the two, often to suit their own preferences.

This is all speculation so I'd love for someone to correct me if I'm wrong.

 

[RugbyReg]

If the ARU could achieve one thing in the next 5 years it would be to have a district based club competition, run on Saturdays and not dependent on players doubling up from schools. My opinion only - it's actually not new, it's what happened for most of the 20th century.

hmm, not sure if this would be on the top of my list for the ARU to achieve.

 

[joeyjohnz]

hmm, not sure if this would be on the top of my list for the ARU to achieve.

It's a self-full-filling prophecy though Reg.

The longer the ARU does nothing about the "silvertail" aspect of the game, where club rugby is rendered irrelevant once you hit 15 or 16 because School Rugby - we're destined for more of the same:

A poor following with an elitist tag preventing participation

That is a giant mental block to casual followers, and a giant block to casual players who are lost to the sport once U15's finish because there's noone to play for locally.

 

[RugbyReg]

we have a district based club competition up here.

I guess the ARU can chill out now.