NRC Expansion

[GunnerDownUnder]

What is Australia's obsessions with expansion. Currie Cup Premier Division contains 8 teams. Why do we need 12?

The Currie Cup contains 14 teams, same as the ITM Cup.

Australia should be aiming for the same, the "First Division" or whatever it would be called, gives smaller less traditional areas a chance to grow in a competitive league and another side in QLD or NSW would keep SS players that currently are not selected for a Premiership side in the game.

 

[Train Without a Station]

Yes it does. But the Currie Cup Premier Division contains 8 teams.

Australia doesn't have a market with a real appetite for promotion, relegation and second division teams. Look at the anger over the North Sydney Bears something like a decade or more later and the Newtown Jets 30 years later. These are teams that still exist in the 2nd tier competition, but to the supporters they feel they don't exist at all.

 

[Jagman]

TWAS why do you keep saying that Sydney has 4 teams and that Brisbane only have 1. Qld country is as much a Brisbane team as NSW country is a Sydney team. Also I'm not sure you noticed but the Spirit team was far more diluted of super rugby talent than Rising and yet they beat Canberra. How does it help development to only have 2 starting players outside the rebels squad?

There are never going to be more Aus super rugby teams. Pulver said the reason why they are desperate to keep the Rebels even though dissolving them would solve their financial problems is because it will be extremely unlikely that they will ever win back a Super Rugby franchise. I.e. If they lose the Rebels they will never get them back. Therefore they will never get a 6th Super Rugby team. So the NRC is the only vehicle for national expansion and Super Rugby players just have to be spread more thinly but the quality beneath them needs to rise.

Believe me a Randwick team will not fissure many ties in Sydney rugby fans. Most country fans don't like seeing SS players in "their" team and it's strange to "country" as your local team being quite far from Sydney's geographical borders. If Randwick come up with the finances they will get their own team with the support of UNSW.


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[TheHam]

What is Australia's obsessions with expansion. Currie Cup Premier Division contains 8 teams. Why do we need 12?

Taking that as a rhetorical question and not believing that you're interested in this thread, I'm going to move the goalposts.

In terms of playing strength at the moment, 4 teams in Sydney is too many. Even 3 is diluting their competitiveness (for now). However, that could easily change over time.

There is no "magic number", fixed for all time, for the ideal size of a comp. It's fair to say that the foreseeable number in Australia is likely to be either zero, or between 6 and 14 ..... but if you are infatuated with 8, the CC P-div has not always been set at 8.

Also, the political reality is that the Sydney clubs had to be accomodated for this NRC to exist. It's also the reason why it is highly possible that another Sydney team will be added to make the NRC a 10 team comp. The case for Adelaide is not as strong but the push for it is also there.

 

[GunnerDownUnder]

Yes it does. But the Currie Cup Premier Division contains 8 teams.

Australia doesn't have a market with a real appetite for promotion, relegation and second division teams. Look at the anger over the North Sydney Bears something like a decade or more later and the Newtown Jets 30 years later. These are teams that still exist in the 2nd tier competition, but to the supporters they feel they don't exist at all.

This is the first year The Premier has had 8 teams, they have used the First to develop players and teams. This is what Australia should be aiming for, I dont think anyone is saying we need expansion now but some point in the future it would be nice.

Plus the Jets still get around 8972 to every home game!

 

[Train Without a Station]

Taking that as a rhetorical question and not believing that you're interested in this thread, I'm going to move the goalposts.

In terms of playing strength at the moment, 4 teams in Sydney is too many. Even 3 is diluting their competitiveness (for now). However, that could easily change over time.

There is no "magic number", fixed for all time, for the ideal size of a comp. It's fair to say that the foreseeable number in Australia is likely to be either zero, or between 6 and 14 ... but if you are infatuated with 8, the CC P-div has not always been set at 8.

Also, the political reality is that the Sydney clubs had to be accomodated for this NRC to exist. It's also the reason why it is highly possible that another Sydney team will be added to make the NRC a 10 team comp. The case for Adelaide is not as strong but the push for it is also there.

8 isn't the magic number but the more the talent is spread, the less quality each team has. The less quality each team is the less attractive a broadcast product it is and without it being a broadcast product the game and the code will go nowhere. 8 provides a balance between concentrating the talent to maintain the quality and giving further opportunities for developing players who are not contracted.

 

[Train Without a Station]

This is the first year The Premier has had 8 teams

And in 2012 they had 6. That means after 100 years they have decided their top tier can support 8 teams.

 

[Highlander35]

Perhaps 2 conferences of 6, play everyone within your conference and 3 teams in the other.

Top ranked in either play 2nd in opposite, two winners play in the Grannie.

Change the conferences every 4 years or so. So over 4 years, you've played everyone home and away, twice for everyone in your own conference.

8 H&A, Semi and Grand Finals, room for a bye and maybe even a Sevens tourney.

Of course, making sure the current iteration gets strongly established is far more important than a fanciful expansion dream.

 

[GunnerDownUnder]

And in 2012 they had 6. That means after 100 years they have decided their top tier can support 8 teams.

No it means after a (albeit fairly long) period of professionalism and Super rugby they have decided that the 2nd Tier of rugby can support 8 teams.

This growth would have been impossible or at least less successful, if they had not had a First Division in the first place.

The NRC should aim to have two divisions to allow this here, I personally would be happy for an inter-division set-up and the Top Division only having 5 teams at the moment and growing to a 7 each split in time.

 

[RugbyFuture]

In south africa though the whole currie cup entails 14 teams which each represent one of the traditional unions and then play over 2 divisions. We're playing a franchise system and trying to gain the most commercial advantage in the future by establishing the right amount of times in viable markets and receive the most coverage (particularly while its relatively cheap).

So compared to the currie and ITM cups theres differences in that:

1. There's a franchise system rather than half rep
2. there isn't absolute representative coverage of every inch of the country (teams covering every space)
3. we aren't the pre-eminent code in any single stakeholder category
4. development pathways aren't clear in a number of locations in Australia where previously representatives have come from.

if they set up adelaide now it would cost probably about $600,000 or so and allow for integration into their local club community much like melbourne and perth are doing. It also allows us to get into a market where league doesn't already exist and a rep has come from there in the past. If it isn't set up soon those development opportunities will run away from it as the competition develops to become more professional.

 

[boyo]

I'm gonna go out on a limb here and speculate that the NRC will eventually expand to 11 teams including Adelaide and Randwick into the competition. Now I'm not advocating this just expecting. Why?
Firstly they're the only clubs/locations I've heard of with a motive to be included. I assume they made up the original 11 teams that submitted interest in the first place.

I didn't think Adelaide would ever work but the. Black Falcons and the ARU have been pretty keen on the idea so if Adelaide can afford all the extra cost let them try.


Randwick already tried to have their own team but the financials apparently didn't fly. There are pros for them though. They have left their mark on the Aus sporting landscape like no other rugby club. League fans who remember he 80s remember them and their famous style.
There is no other team in Eastern Suburbs a rugby heartland. Surely that is not optimal.
They have been quietly stockpiling a host of young talent. Sure they weren't great in the SS but they won 1st colts and many of their 1st grade are still colts age. In a year or two this might translate into them being competitive enough for the NRC.


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Way to piss off the Beasties.

 

[Braveheart81]

I think the ARU would be batshit crazy to try and expand the NRC anytime soon.

Sticking to between 8 and 10 teams seems like the way to go for at least a few years until the competition is well and truly settled.

The Adelaide equation isn't going to change anytime soon because you would need to ship the whole team there anyway. It would be a huge investment to get maybe a couple of local players involved in the squad.

As a franchise system, the ARU would be better off trying to keep the existing teams involved and try to increase their supporter base. Tribalism should start the develop as teams develop some history.

NSW Country Eagles should play one game a year at Coogee Oval and then three home games in country regions. If this team can be successful it should improve their support from both Sydney people aligned to Randwick and Easts and the country people where games will be held.

 

[TheHam]

And in 2012 they had 6. That means after 100 years they have decided their top tier can support 8 teams.

I suspect you don't know too much about it, TWAS.

The CC was a ramshackle affair until the late 60s (my apologies for offending any stray Saffas in this thread). But they still had 14 teams in their top league going back 14 and a bit years ago. The push from people like our own John O'Neill, amongst others, eventually cut them back to size with the expansion of Super 12/14/"n" where n is your magic number.*

*n is not 8, by the way.

 

[WorkingClassRugger]

Definitely a financial burden. But for who and why?

Should it proceed, I'd argue the additional cost should not be borne by the competition but by the backers of such a team. We've already said in the posts above that expansion is unlikely to be possible for several years.

But these questions all boil down to one thing: money. If you see money, the answer is nearby.

Adelaide would be nothing but a financial burden on a competition which is already operating on a extremely tight budget.

The NRC needs 4 years of consolidation before any expansion could even be entertained.

Realistically if you went about developing an Adelaide squad they wouldn't be ready for inclusion for at least 4 years. I haven't been suggesting they should be thrown into deep end placing undue financial strain on already limited resources.

However, I agree with Kiap that if someone is willing to foot the bill then they would be worth consideration. In fact, even if/when they prove themselves competitive their entry should probably still involve them covering not only the present costs of the competition like the other entities but any extra in relation to importing talent as well.

 

[TOCC]

An expanded comp means more travel and increased costs on existing teams..

It also means that when the competition is earning enough money from broadcast rights and sponsorship to distribute in the form of grants that the size of these grants will be smaller for each team, which subsequently means each player earns less money.

Furthermore, only 1 game is broadcast each week, so any expanded competition will impact on the number of times each team is broadcast which will impact on the sponsorship potential/value or each team..

Expanding a comp doesn't just place a financial burden on the team which is joining, the cost is spread across all teams.



Expansion teams which fail reflect poorly upon the whole competition, this comp needs to consolidate and start earning more to pay the players a respectable wage before expansion into a non-rugby market could ever be considered.

 

[Pfitzy]

I think the point we need to keep in mind with "only one game per week!" is that we're talking 25% of all games (plus finals) will be broadcast.

With streams and full replays that increases to 100%. I just watched the first half of Eagles v Rams and it was good enough to get a feel for it. I don't want it served up on a platter (unless its delivered via bikini model), just as long as there is access.

Going to get to the Albion as early as I can to the Albion this week, then head up to the ground for the Rams games. Hopefully you hear Pfitzy on your little Fox box

 

[TOCC]

I think the point we need to keep in mind with "only one game per week!" is that we're talking 25% of all games (plus finals) will be broadcast.

The point is that some teams could potentially only be broadcast once per season if they miss the finals, if you expand the number of teams then theres a chance that some teams won't be broadcast at all.

Trying to sell the naming rights of a team to a potential sponsor with only one guaranteed broadcast spot is difficult, if they have no broadcast spots then its going to be even harder. Sponsors pay for exposure, and until Foxtel agrees to broadcast more games there will be a ceiling on the amount sponsors are willing to front up for the teams.



The A-League is a perfect example of how to expand a national competition, its highlights the pitfalls of expanding to rapidly into unknown markets as well the benefits of consolidating in key markets like Sydney/Melbourne. The A-League has 10 teams, this is a reflection of not only the playing quality in Australia but more importantly the corporate appetite for sponsoring professional sporting teams.

 

[BaysideBird]

The Premiership/Championship model with promotion and relegation is a good one when we're talking about the length of competition. In fact it has probably made the ITM Cup a better spectacle, as the prospect of beating a "Premier" team is a big selling point for the little guys.

As for the people banging on about "Tradition" and that bullshit: Tasman rugby was founded in 2006 and they're fucking guns.

So stick that up your arse, Roar critics.

Tasman Rugby is only an entity for the purposes of Provincial Competition (the sub unions still controltheir own competitions. Tasman came about from an almalgamation of two of the most storied teams in NZ rugby, that is Nelson Bays and Marlborough, when the NZRU decided to do away with the amateur/semi-pro 3 tiered NPC and replace with ITM Cup and Heartland. The reason for almalgamation is that the two unions would not have been able to financially support themselves in a professional competition (on an unrelated note Marlborough Sub-Union are still in the shit.)

And as to do with promotion relegation, There is an entirely different (amateur) competition where the rest of the smaller unions play in, the Heartland Championship. So if I was to increase the provinces in Australia I would create an amateur competition based on club competitions outside of traditional rugby centres.

 

[WorkingClassRugger]

Tasman Rugby is only an entity for the purposes of Provincial Competition (the sub unions still controltheir own competitions. Tasman came about from an almalgamation of two of the most storied teams in NZ rugby, that is Nelson Bays and Marlborough, when the NZRU decided to do away with the amateur/semi-pro 3 tiered NPC and replace with ITM Cup and Heartland. The reason for almalgamation is that the two unions would not have been able to financially support themselves in a professional competition (on an unrelated note Marlborough Sub-Union are still in the shit.)

And as to do with promotion relegation, There is an entirely different (amateur) competition where the rest of the smaller unions play in, the Heartland Championship. So if I was to increase the provinces in Australia I would create an amateur competition based on club competitions outside of traditional rugby centres.

I wouldn't mind seeing something like a heartland championship some time in the future as long as is was feasible. Would certainly be an interesting development tool.

 

[Train Without a Station]

I wouldn't mind seeing something like a heartland championship some time in the future as long as is was feasible. Would certainly be an interesting development tool.

That's where the issue lies. Where is the money going to come from? There will be no broadcast demand, and therefore sponsorship would be limited. Travel is greater in Australia than New Zealand and this is a big factor.