Trans Tasman 2022

[dru]

Back to oz teams for next year and improving their competitiveness.

So we have RA encouraging teams to consider imports. All good but the only team even active on recruitment is the Force with brumbies signings, Fiji winger signing (import) and Going after nrl player Blake Ferguson. Where is all the recruitment news for other oz sides to bolster their depth!

Anyhow I think the force looking at overseas players like maetele and nrl players like Ferguson (nrl players rather then debating whether Ferguson right player to target) is sort of strategy all oz sides should consider to improve quality of player stocks. But at this point the bigger concern is only the Force are active in the recruitment market to bolster / improve their squad.

It is one thing to encourage $ recruitment. It's another to do this after reducing the cap. Doesn't make sense to me.

 

[Dan54]

I agree with what RN says about it being the way to go, but can any other outfits actually afford to import players??
Think that got shown when Tahs turned down Matera, they can say what they want about Hooper etc, but hell a player of that quality would help any team that could afford him.

Just out of interest why any open border or anything wouldn't work. Unfortunately everything comes back to money!

 

[Derpus]

I agree with what RN says about it being the way to go, but can any other outfits actually afford to import players??
Think that got shown when Tahs turned down Matera, they can say what they want about Hooper etc, but hell a player of that quality would help any team that could afford him.

Just out of interest why any open border or anything wouldn't work. Unfortunately everything comes back to money!

Dont Aus franchises generally spend more than Kiwi sides?

 

[Dan54]

Dont Aus franchises generally spend more than Kiwi sides?

Not sure mate, but they certainly not doing it wisely if they are! But regardless if they struggling to buy imports, they going not going to buy any topline NZ players.
Hell Boshier and Ala'atoa would of been a couple that are just wandering off if they had any coin.

 

[Dan54]

I wondering who the Canes are chasing for next year which is probably more important to me, I thinking another 10 to back up Love would be good, and a big mother of a lock would be on my list.

 

[Rebel man]

We can’t be afraid to compete. No doubt the results weren’t great but we got better as the comp went on. People keep trying to say super rugby killed the game in Australia but that is just not that case it’s choosing to exclude so many other factors.

 

[Derpus]

Not sure mate, but they certainly not doing it wisely if they are! But regardless if they struggling to buy imports, they going not going to buy any topline NZ players.
Hell Boshier and Ala'atoa would of been a couple that are just wandering off if they had any coin.

You could argue they arent doing it wisely because they have a way worse pool of talent to work with. Which is definitely the case.

If Twiggy could have All Blacks in the WF i think we'd see a few over there before long, and i think we'd see them being properly competitive.

Hard to say for the rest. Probably not so much, because they are all broke.

 

[dru]

We can’t be afraid to compete. No doubt the results weren’t great but we got better as the comp went on. People keep trying to say super rugby killed the game in Australia but that is just not that case it’s choosing to exclude so many other factors.

A lot of those "factors" are covered if you change add "as managed by RA". After that it depends on the metrics you use for success. If participation, crowds, broadcast numbers and commercial success are the metric then it is a palpable fail. If it is engagement at the grass roots, palpable fail. If you measure it on success at international, judged on anything but let's start with World ranking - palpable fail.

If you are suggesting that Super kept Aus rugby at a higher standard, I'd suggest that is not being holistic.

The problem is not Super, or TT, per se. It is what we need to develop the game in Australia. And that is it seems incompatible with Kiwi thinking. It's sad but I think a truism. A full integration in TT at the expense of domestic will start with a kick downward followed by a consistent downtrend. Where we were before.

Run a domestic followed by TT/champions league. It's not ideal, but cuts through both issues as close as you can to an adequate compromise. One aberration is that I'd like Round 1 of the TT to happen early, mid domestic, on Anzac Day.

 

[swingpass]

I dont know whether this already been canvassed, but expand on Dru’s last paragraph. Why cant both competitions run concurrently like they do in Europe. Domestic comp finishing order seeds the TT champions league pools for the next year and both run at the same time. Some weeks its local v local, others trans Tasman games or pacific rim or whatever

 

[dru]

With respect to the actual rugby at TT, in 2022, presuming it happens:

I expect the coaching to adapt with a much higher focus on D. Structure to D. Then some work around territory which possibly means thinking through the line out. Though personnel will impact this.

There will be lessons and improvement. Unfortunately there is a need for an awful lot of improvement and I doubt will will get close to parity.

 

[Dan54]

Yet funnily enough in 2015 Super rugby was drawing the biggest average crowds in any club/Franchise comp in world.
Even in 2019 these are average crowds in Wales
Scarlets: 8,443, Cardiff Blues: 7,360, Ospreys: 6,812, Dragons: 5,123
And France top 14 has between 7000-21000 crowds

So have the crowds been as bad as some are claiming?

 

[Derpus]

There are about 3 people in Wales.

All of them absolute legends though.

 

[Dan54]

Ok, but same applies to France (Pop 65 mill), England (55 mill) and Scotland I think. All I saying I not sure things have been as bad as some think.

 

[Dan54]

Can I add, if anyone wants to even up comp, what they will probably do is have a comp where all teams play each other once and Aus and NZ play each othet twice, I not keen on it, but will probably happen and that will surely even it up enough for anyone.
I maen playing the Tahs and Rebels twice is surely like a 4 point bonus

 

[KevinO]

Where is all the recruitment news for other oz sides to bolster their depth!

Well the 2 teams who need to do the majority of recruiting don't have coaches signed on for next year, this is a massive issue as nobody is going to sign a contract when they don't know who they will be playing for.

Simon Cron needs to sign for the Tahs and Coleman to the Rebels ASAP. Get it done and start recruiting.

 

[Rebel man]

A lot of those "factors" are covered if you change add "as managed by RA". After that it depends on the metrics you use for success. If participation, crowds, broadcast numbers and commercial success are the metric then it is a palpable fail. If it is engagement at the grass roots, palpable fail. If you measure it on success at international, judged on anything but let's start with World ranking - palpable fail.

If you are suggesting that Super kept Aus rugby at a higher standard, I'd suggest that is not being holistic.

The problem is not Super, or TT, per se. It is what we need to develop the game in Australia. And that is it seems incompatible with Kiwi thinking. It's sad but I think a truism. A full integration in TT at the expense of domestic will start with a kick downward followed by a consistent downtrend. Where we were before.

Run a domestic followed by TT/champions league. It's not ideal, but cuts through both issues as close as you can to an adequate compromise. One aberration is that I'd like Round 1 of the TT to happen early, mid domestic, on Anzac Day.

But the game didn’t go backwards as a result of Super Rugby it went backwards due to a lack of investments in pathways and developing players. As a kid that way back played in Melbourne you see the massive benefit of having super rugby here. The amount of professional players coming out of Victoria is greatly increased

Also it’s not the fault of super Rugby that the game has grown financially overseas so much more and we can’t keep up financially

 

[rodha]

I think this year's TT was cobbled together very quickly, under difficult circumstances, and therefore was extremely flawed. The lack of a break between the domestic finals and when this comp started, the uneven number of home games and the lack of intra-conference matches were all problematic. I am extremely hopeful that should Rugby Australia and NZ Rugby decide to work together again in 2022, that next year's competition will be much more well planned and enjoyable for fans on both side of the Tasman to watch. In saying that I really enjoyed this year's comp. Watching NZ teams playing against other NZ teams is boring, I enjoyed watching the Australian teams play.

Completely agree on all points.

Another reason I'm hoping for this potential 12 team full trans-tasman competition is having 6 games being played in the weekend rather than having just 2, which is the unsustainable reality of the isolated Aotearoa and AU comps.

If you're only able to play 2 games per weekend (rather than 6) that means 3x as much time is taken up rugby calendar due to a longer and less efficient competition. Who wants to see another slow AU + NZ comp chewing-up valuable time in the rugby calendar at the expense of less room in the calendar for actual test matches & no room for any potential cross-hemisphere/world-club championship type matches that are only beneficial to the game in the long-term?

The Aussies on here don't seem to get it.. the individual franchises need a minimum of 6 home matches just to make end's meet. To put it into perspective, Super Rugby went from 18 matches per team before Covid to just 8 - that's only 4 home matches a year!

 

[Rebel man]

Completely agree on all points.

Another reason I'm hoping for this potential 12 team full trans-tasman competition is having 6 games being played in the weekend rather than having just 2, which is the unsustainable reality of the isolated Aotearoa and AU comps.

If you're only able to play 2 games per weekend (rather than 6) that means 3x as much time is taken up rugby calendar due to a longer and less efficient competition. Who wants to see another slow AU + NZ comp chewing-up valuable time in the rugby calendar at the expense of less room in the calendar for actual test matches & no room for any potential cross-hemisphere/world-club championship type matches that are only beneficial to the game in the long-term?

The Aussies on here don't seem to get it.. the individual franchises need a minimum of 6 home matches just to make end's meet. To put it into perspective, Super Rugby went from 18 matches per team before Covid to just 8 - that's only 4 home matches a year!

Exactly

 

[dru]

I couldn't agree more on the home games, though 6 is not enough. But if you are calling the TT a 6 game per week series, this only happens with Drua and MP (Moana Pasifika). Nothing stops them joining the domestic comps. Thus 6 games. If Aus fans will watch the NZ games they will watch the NZ domestic comp.

But they won't so it actually means 3 games. IF we get MP (Moana Pasifika) and Drua in apples for apples comparison.

BUT, in a round TT the Aus derbies become irrelevant. They are the only games guaranteed to have a large viewership here but you just devalued them to the shithouse.

A domestic plus TT can arrange exactly the same number of home games as TT but run much higher viewership. It isn't rocket science. I get that it also isn't what NZ fans want, nor some remaining rusted on Aus fans. But that doesn't mean it isn't right for Aus.

 

[cyclopath]

This thread quickly became identical to the 1,000 page infinite loop that is The Thread Which Cannot Be Named.

What's the point of this thread? Seriously. Did you lot get bored running in circles in your quarantined containment thread playground or something?

Think it's time for papa Pillock to break out the digital jandal and nonsense this thread to death until it's dead/locked.

EDIT: Hmm. Seems I shouldn't have ducked out to the shops before sending my shitpost.



Drop the Fat Gif Man on the bastards until some mod locks it and exorcises them back to whence they came.

God, no. We can always use an overflow tank.