Just out of interest, the rough figure to run a team is $10 mill a season, so where is extra money coming from for these teams?
As we know RA is basically broke. Do you cut wages of players? Do you have smaller squads? Perhaps charge the junior teams more to play game so money goes to RA? Or are Stan going to offer more money? Or are there some rich fellas out there just waiting to throw money at game?
It sounds easy to say lets make up a couple more teams, but you need money to pay them, and a reasonable standard of players to fill them.
I not saying that anything is impossible, but with the best will in the world it is probably implausable.
We can't keep pretending that RA is flush with money, and so any solution has to allow for the money side too.
The rough figure to run a team is $10mil per season,
if you are running a team to compete with the Kiwi Super Rugby sides, in their current state.
If we opt for Super Rugby AU into an international club tournament (Super Rugby TT or a competition inclusive of Japan), there is flexibility in how good new teams need to be.
Hypothetically, if the international component of Super Rugby was made up of:
- Top 2 Australian teams
- Top 2 NZ teams
- Top 2 Japanese teams
- Drua + Samoa
We only need two teams that are
theoretically capable of competing with the Kiwi sides. This means expansion teams -- Western Sydney, North Sydney, QLD II -- can sit in the bottom half of the AU table whilst the team gains a foothold in the AU competition. Our Top 2 teams would likely get smashed by the Kiwi teams, but that's the case now, and we'd get an exciting spectacle at the end of the season where we all can
hope that this year will be the year, without having to be disappointed week-in-week-out when it's inevitably not.
Do you think State of Origin would have gotten the same TV ratings -- week in and week out -- when NSW lost 8 in a row to QLD? Of course not, but
hope each year caused people to tune in. Do you think NSW would have taken QLD seriously if they suggested that they play them
every week, and that they should just "get better" (only possible by getting smashed by them every week)?
HOWEVER -- under such a model, Australian Rugby would have greater agency over it's own future, and I believe it will be able to offer a far more compelling product than Trans-Tasman Super Rugby.
I watched every game of Super Rugby AU this year, and only 3 Trans-Tasman games before I got bored.
I know the nay-sayers will say that the inferior product of Super Rugby AU will cause Australian Rugby fans to watch Super Rugby NZ, but I don't think this is the case. Some of the best footy I watched last year was Schoolboy Rugby, Subbies and Super Rugby AU.
Why? It's about the narrative, the fan buy-in, not the players 100m sprint speeds.
Most importantly, New Zealand's current set up and model isn't feasible with the broadcast dollars they'd see from Super Rugby NZ. This means their teams will weaken as their players go overseas / to Australia, and we'd approach an equilibrium based upon the inherent economic power of each competition, based upon corporate interest and the home nations economy.
This means we'll see Australian teams doing better against NZ teams, improving the quality of the Trans-Tasman competition, and perhaps allowing for a reunited Super Rugby Trans-Tasman with expansion teams in the long-long-run.