RWC 2019 1/4 Final England vs Australia

[Teh Other Dave]

I suspect that change will involve some form of rescue led by World Rugby supported by the NZRU.

World Rugby and NZRU: LOL

 

[Lorenzo]

I concur. You can't disagree that the guy was passionate and I have no doubt really did give it his all. I look at the emotion he was feeling with the Wallabies result vs. Schmidt with the Ireland result and you know what, I want the guy who is truely distraught at having let people down. As you say, good luck Cheika where ever things take you.

You want the guy that is incompetent, but is rude, ill tempered and occasionally sheds a public tear, simply becuase he is upset it all went wrong after 4 bad years of everyone yelling it was going wrong but him not opening himself up to any kind of help?

Fuck that. I want someone who actually knows what they are doing. How often do you see Bill Bellichick cry in public? Would you see he is inadequately passionate?

That's some seriously amateur era thinking right there, that we should want someone simply because they were visibly upset whsn they failed. Its a bit like saying a coach is good becauae the players say nice things about him.

 

[Uh huh]

Step one needs to be a very serious re-think of the kinds of qualifications that make somebody a fit a proper person to sit on the ARU board. The present board is flooded with current and former bankers; people who are in their professional lives free from the obligation to achieve excellence, because they operate in a system that is heavily weighted in their favour, and with no great risk of failure because - should they stuff up - they know the taxpayer will be forced to come to the rescue.

These are not the ingredients for the best administration of what is increasingly a niche sport in a competitive market.

Jobs-for-the-boys needs to be abandoned as a recruitment policy, and the board re-focussed on achievements ahead of school and university connections. Until that happens, any changes are just window-dressing and the inexorable decline of Australian rugby will - at best - continue; and - at worst - accelerate.

 

[formerflanker]

That's some seriously amateur era thinking right there, that we should want someone simply because they were visibly upset whsn they failed. Its a bit like saying a coach is good becauae the players say nice things about him.

Barnes said the same thing on the Fox telecast and gave me quite a laugh.
Stuart Lancaster came in as England coach and all the players were singing his praise - professionalism, former player, etc etc.
Then after they dropped out of the RWC it was all "he's too rigid, trains us too hard, wouldn't allow rest and relaxation etc etc."

 

[Finsbury Girl]

Well at least we can stop listening to the apologists.

Cheika is a great rugby man, is passionate and loves his rugby. I wish only the best for him. That doesn't mean he is immune. He has presided over one of the worst periods in Australia rugby.

Thankfully his time is now over an hopefully there is a wide clean out of players who for the last 4 years have the stench of defeat and have contributed to a period of abject failure. This includes the current captain. The players are the ones who got belted out there. I don't want to hear any shite is all the coaches fault blah blah.

Players, coach, selectors, ARU CEO & board. All culpable. I hope to see some more resignations.

 

[Tex]

THE RED GOD DEMANDS BLOOD!

All jokes aside, I completely agree. No player's position is secure, spill the coaching positions, review the selection panel approach now that the Mad King doesn't need to be restrained from his darker impulses.

 

[The_Brown_Hornet]

Yep, I wish Cheik all the best for the future, but it's clear that from about 18 months ago he'd run out of ideas and ways to lift the performance of this team. A total clean of house is required.

 

[RedsHappy]

World Rugby and NZRU: LOL

Really. Have a serious think re (a) where RA's gross income line is headed post Foxtel's renegotiation from 2021 (much written about that) combined with (b) declining RA Wallaby gate income (and the 2019 RWC outcome will only seriously exacerbate that problem) and (c) many of our best young playing stock post the age of ~19 heading to the NRL or AFL as income levels in those codes begins to exceed pro rugby's here whilst those codes take ever larger market share of all of schools' winter sports and (d) a torrent of our best, more matured players heading to the EU and Japan as their income levels way better there and as they rightly perceive the institutional mess the code is in here and (e) increasing, even relentless, 'no one cares about rugby any more and it's a dying code here' near-pervasive media coverage that just enhances everyday apathy re rugby's fate in this country.........

These parallel, mutually reinforcing and aggregating factors are all aligned and pointing in one direction. That direction is not 'strategically positive'. Brutally, the genuine (vs wishful thinking) countervailing positives are few and the hard fact is that almost all the amateur game levels here need drip or indirect funding from the pro levels here to survive, many observers keep forgetting that.

Next, when a serious financial crisis arrives at RA's door, one must ask: who or what may bail the problems out? Will they be bailed out by anybody, who has the meaningful incentive to bail them out?

There are only two possibilities: one, a group of wealthy persons who want to save the code (though their pockets will need to be deep and sturdy and rugby privatisation in this country has not been a pretty story), and two, World Rugby and the NZRU, the only two established parties that have obvious serious vested interests in the code not irrevocably collapsing here and that could credibly do something about it. (Note, no major media channel will by this juncture want to save Australian rugby, it's too niche and the bill will be too high as a viable risk, and Govt will never lead such a bail out.)

Re the relationship between the above two options: I seriously doubt that WR (World Rugby) would want to or permit a major national rugby franchise to be privatised as per option one, the control and quality-risk and precedent-setting issues are too great, but I'd concede they just might have to indulge this course 'solely as an exception to ensure Australian rugby survives'. That assumes such a private consortium emerges, which it may not at that point in Australian rugby's evolution and decline.

If I am correct re the strategic licensing attitude of WR (World Rugby) to a private consortium owing a major rugby territory (haha, if it still is one then), it will be forced to step in and in doing so it will self-evidently need to inject major new managerial and coaching capability into the fallen statue of the prior regime. Some of that it could bring from Europe, but the closest and likely best place to look will be to NZ as the death of rugby in Australia would have very serious negative ramifications for the NZRU's financial and general competitive viability, that is simply obvious given everything from Bled Cup revenues to the gross media value of SANZAAR etc. Let alone the ABs and NZ Super teams having to always travel long (and costly) distances to compete should Australian rugby vaporise.

I am more than happy to countenance alternative medium-term Australian rugby survival scenarios as per the above but IMO, for solid rational and considered reasons, the above-noted is the more likely one.

 

[Teh Other Dave]

Think you missed the point there champ. I don't see WR (World Rugby) bailing out the ARU, and I fail to see the NZRFU either having the resources or resolve to bail us out. Also bear in mind that SANZAAR's largest income stream is SuperSport.

 

[molman]

You want the guy that is incompetent, but is rude, ill tempered and occasionally sheds a public tear, simply becuase he is upset it all went wrong after 4 bad years of everyone yelling it was going wrong but him not opening himself up to any kind of help?

Fuck that. I want someone who actually knows what they are doing. How often do you see Bill Bellichick cry in public? Would you see he is inadequately passionate?

That's some seriously amateur era thinking right there, that we should want someone simply because they were visibly upset whsn they failed. Its a bit like saying a coach is good becauae the players say nice things about him.

Don't extrapolate beyond what I said Lorenzo. I said between the obvious emotion and passion shown by Cheika compared to Schmidt - two coaches who had equally disastrous World Cup campaigns that ended the other night, yes, I do want an individual who appears genuinely passionate and understandably upset at the outcome. That is all I meant by I want that guy. An individual who is passionate about Australian rugby and devastated by the lack of success.



I never stated I 'wanted' or even felt Cheika should have even been the Wallabies coach at this point in time, or was condoning other elements of his tenure. If you want to go build a strawman and insult my thinking, so be it. Me personally, I stand by my sentiment of wishing Cheika the best for the future.

 

[Lorenzo]

Well even that is stupid. You've no idea now either of them feel. Cheika could be upset about something else (his own position comes to mind) and Schmidt could feel absolutely awful about it without crying on TV.

I suggest you don't take up poker.

 

[molman]

Well even that is stupid. You've no idea now either of them feel. Cheika could be upset about something else (his own position comes to mind) and Schmidt could feel absolutely awful about it without crying on TV.

Based on what I know of Cheika and people who have talked to him, I choose to take a less cynical view and believe that he was distraught for the reasons he offered and the emotion shown. I preferred in this case seeing this as opposed to the potentially stoic display from Schmidt. I hardly believe this is stupid.

I suggest you don't take up poker.

This is dumb.

Anyway, this game is in the history books now. Discussions of what's next are probably more interesting.

 

[formerflanker]

Based on what I know of Cheika and people who have talked to him, I choose to take a less cynical view and believe that he was distraught for the reasons he offered and the emotion shown. I preferred in this case seeing this as opposed to the potentially stoic display from Schmidt. I hardly believe this is stupid.



This is dumb.

Anyway, this game is in the history books now. Discussions of what's next are probably more interesting.

I'm predicting a "new coach" thread that ranks higher than the old Pooper thread but fewer comments than the scholarship thread.