Where to for Super Rugby?

[Quick Hands]

Billy P can't work out whether the wall should be in Perth or Melbourne.

There's lots of things that poor old Billy P has trouble working out.

 

[cyclopath]

What the actual fuck?

Like any place, there is some of this. I noticed it when living in Melbourne for 18 months among some groups - it was vitally important for them to know "who you knew" and where you went to school pretty much straight off the bat. I wouldn't say it was the over-arching vibe of the place though! The exposure to it that I saw, I would say was a more traditional take on classes. In my much longer time spent in Sydney I think it is a broader but shallower thing, and if you have enough money, it can trump most anything! We can always do superficial much better!

 

[Quick Hands]

Some interesting inputs today from Payto & Pando (extracted) in News Corp online sources (my emphasis):

"THE Western Force are growing more confident of remaining in Super Rugby after advice from lawyers, and will likely meet the ARU next week to present their case.​

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However, the fact remains that if Melbourne Rebels owner Andrew Cox refuses to sell his licence, legally the ARU cannot remove them, leaving the Force as the only option.​

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What the Force are banking on is a backflip from SANZAAR on the 15-team competition, to restore it to the 18 teams it has now.​

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Perth officials believe they can exhaust enough money and time through legal avenues that the ARU will cave on their decision to remove a team, and they believe their South African counterparts in similar situations will do the same.​

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But remaining with 18 teams and the same format, identified as financially suicidal by SANZAAR, would kill much of the already dwindling interest in Super Rugby now it has become clear that officials think it is second rate."​

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Could any of these developments become any more bizarre and quite extraordinary in the context Super rugby faces in business and fan adherence terms?

The ARU was going to wrap all this up in a mere 3 days from when the culling announcement was made. They obviously thought it would all be 'a simple matter'.

Perhaps they lost the files wherein was to be found the Force-ARU Alliance Agreement and Cox's licensing agreement? Mistakes do happen after all, even in the best run organisations.

If the above media assessment is true, I find it truly staggering that:

(i) the ARU could sign a binding agreement with RugbyWA in August 2016 that, inter alia, would guarantee the Force's existence through 2020 and then, just 8 months later, decide the Force could be culled from Super rugby forthwith and thus give no consideration to the nature of that binding agreement, and​

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(ii) the ARU would seemingly grant a full rugby playing rights license to a party in a major State that permits that party to retain that license solely at its own discretion and without relation to, e.g., team performance KPIs, commercial KPIs such as crowd sizes, sponsorship revenue etc, financial conditions, and such like. What now seems to be the case is that no such conditions exist in this licensing agreement and that Cox can retain the VIC rugby license at his own whim with no formal recourse to any of Rebels' team or business or such like outcomes that would in principle protect the ARU's interests if the licensee (Cox) did not perform to expectations. This all despite the fact that the ARU was/is itself providing Cox large, multi-year cash subsidies to prop up the Rebels' financial losses.​

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If (ii) is in fact like that, in all my global deals with multiple licenses and license rights agreements, I have never seen a rights license agreement as dangerously one-sided and thus highly problematic (for the ARU) as this one involving the ARU and Cox appears to be, and Cox is clearly telling the media etc that this is in fact the way it is and, short of him selling his license, the ARU will have to lump the startlingly one-sided terms they have agreed to.

I thought that we had a world renowned coporate lawyer on the ARU board?

 

[RedsHappy]

I thought that we had a world renowned coporate lawyer on the ARU board?

I am just hoping that this all turns out to be a bad dream and none of this is in truth as hopelessly incompetent and professionally negligent as it appears to be from seemingly credible media statements by the participants.

Surely no one, just no one in a proper business with a proper board, could be as stupid as would be the case if Cox's and RugbyWA's attestations regarding their robust contractual rights are in fact true.

 

[Quick Hands]

I am just hoping that this all turns out to be a bad dream and none of this is in truth as hopelessly incompetent and professionally negligent as it appears to be from seemingly credible media statements by the participants.

Surely no one, just no one in a proper business with a proper board, could be as stupid as would be the case if Cox's and RugbyWA's attestations regarding their robust contractual rights are in fact true.

Alas RH, this is all happening/has happened. AFAIK, the agreements with each of the Rebels and the Force were publicly announced by the ARU at the time that they were entered into. Both the Force and the Rebels have publicly stated how they see each of their agreements, and we are yet to hear anything from the ARU suggesting that what's on the public record isn't correct.

As a non-lawyer and non-corporate businessman, I'd simply ask:

1. How can any governing body enter into agreements, which seemingly leave all risk and much of the financial responsibilty with one side?

2. How can a governing body possibly cut any team from its competition without a set of objective criteria in place before any process begins?

 

[Slim 293]

Like any place, there is some of this. I noticed it when living in Melbourne for 18 months among some groups - it was vitally important for them to know "who you knew" and where you went to school pretty much straight off the bat. I wouldn't say it was the over-arching vibe of the place though! The exposure to it that I saw, I would say was a more traditional take on classes. In my much longer time spent in Sydney I think it is a broader but shallower thing, and if you have enough money, it can trump most anything! We can always do superficial much better!

I've been told it's common among folks who went to certain schools such as Melbourne High, but personally never experienced it.

 

[stoff]

I've been told it's common among folks who went to certain schools such as Melbourne High, but personally never experienced it.

That's cause we are so immensely superior to those who went to non-selective entry high schools. Seriously though, I think you mean Melbourne Grammar. In my experience it has always been something the APS guys do. The fact I know they are APS guys is my reasoning for believing that.


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

 

[Slim 293]

That's cause we are so immensely superior to those who went to non-selective entry high schools. Seriously though, I think you mean Melbourne Grammar. In my experience it has always been something the APS guys do. The fact I know they are APS guys is my reasoning for believing that.

Nah, definitely Melbourne High.............. according to a few people I know.

I can never understand some adults obsessions with high school though.

 

[The torpedo]

Nah, definitely Melbourne High...... according to a few people I know.

I can never understand some adults obsessions with high school though.

Because muh old boys

 

[BLR]

I can never understand some adults obsessions with high school though.

Japanese culture is pretty much based on this obsession. Even more reason to cut the Sunwolves.

 

[The torpedo]

Interesting, but I believe there's a time lag with attendances.
I'm pretty sure attendances will be down this year, due to changes in structure introduced last year.
I know my viewing habits have changed this year, I'm much more discerning about which games I watch, previously I would pretty much watch any game that was televised.
Not the case this year.

And % of ground filled should be considered

 

[todd4]

Update from the Force;

ROAD SAFETY WESTERN FORCE UPDATE

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By David Berrie on Fri 21st April 17

Recent media reports have suggested that the Road Safety Western Force’s continued participation in the Super Rugby competition hinges on the outcome of a further meeting between the Australian Rugby Union (ARU) Board and the RugbyWA Board.
RugbyWA’s position is clear. Under current arrangements the Road Safety Western Force is entitled to participate in the Super Rugby competition until 30 December 2020.
There is no basis on which the ARU can purport to remove the Western Force from the Super Rugby competition. The ARU must work to ensure that the Western Force remains based in Perth for many seasons to come.
Put simply, RugbyWA is not required to ‘state a business (or any) case’ for the Western Force to remain in the Super Rugby competition.
That said, RugbyWA remains committed to working with the ARU to help it find a way to achieve a resolution of the current uncertainty. Rugby WA has sought a meeting with the ARU next Thursday, 27 April 2017 to progress discussions as to how it might assist the ARU. https://www.westernforce.com.au/article/road-safety-western-force-update

 

[ChargerWA]

How they might assist the ARU...... eating a bag of dicks.

 

[TOCC]

Nah, definitely Melbourne High...... according to a few people I know.

I can never understand some adults obsessions with high school though.

I think in some cases it's because they plan to send their kids to the same school they went to and want their kids to get the same experience they did from playing sport.

 

[Rebels3]

Can we change this thread to where to now for Australian rugby?????

The coaching, philosophies and player attitude stinks. It's rotten from top to bottom.

 

[Quick Hands]

How they might assist the ARU.. eating a bag of dicks.

It could almost be said that the ARU are beyond help.

 

[dru]

It could almost be said that the ARU are beyond help.

Where next?

Please don't disappoint me with Sydney-centric thinking.

I'm well over this lot. What's next?

 

[Gnostic]

Anybody doubt the future of Super Rugby in Australia. We have one team in Australia with a positive point differential that being the massive +6 of the Brumbies. Add to that the absolute amateur effort by the Tahs tonight to go with the rest of their amateur efforts this year. Not one of the whole useless lot of them deserves to be paid for what they trot out. What a joke. Please kill this lame ugly duck of a competition so the effort can be put into something worthwhile for Australian rugby.

 

[The_Brown_Hornet]

Wind the fucking game up in this country, we're cooked.

 

[blues recovery]

Just come in after a lovely dinner with my girl and see the scores . It's actually becoming funny how bad our Super ( use the term loosely ) teams are .
Just can't see anyway the game recovers from this absolute disgrace for a bloody long time . Cheika will have to be a miracle worker to pull any sort of decent Wallaby team together out of this rabble. Pray he does, the creditability of the game depends on it
Also hoping that the Force and Rebs perform strongly tomorrow to further shove the lunacy of this situation right up the clowns in suits