• Welcome to the forums of Green & Gold Rugby.
    We have recently made some changes to the amount of discussions boards on the forum.
    Over the coming months we will continue to make more changes to make the forum more user friendly for all to use.
    Thanks, Admin.

Where to for Super Rugby?

Status
Not open for further replies.

WorkingClassRugger

Michael Lynagh (62)
Club Rugby! ;)

NRC is no good as its a perfect product for the market and could be really good for the game but nobody has enough political capital in to lever it for personal gain so it's a lame duck.

It still could be leveraged if restructured. Bring in the Tahs and Reds and operate them exclusively from Sydney and Brisbane and then open up the opportunity for Fiji and Samoa from GRR alongside at least one more Aus based squad.
 

Quick Hands

David Wilson (68)
A barbarians team isn’t ideal. Just looking at ways it could be viable.it would be good to get more fringe players on the park to build depth. But logistically it’d be better to have a bye round, as a last minute cobbled together team is on a hiding to nothing.

You'd be better off setting up another franchise representing a town/suburb/area that spending any time or effort on a Barbarians team.
 

Brumbieman

Dick Tooth (41)
100%.

How does it make sense there's a comp with NSW, QLD and ACT in it and then Melbourne? Which is why if there was a TT comp and Aus went to 7 teams it should be Western Sydney and Sydney City, Canberra, Brisbane City and Gold Coast



Keep the current 4, let Twiggy keep the Force up to standard (publicly call him to commit to it) and when we have winning teams, support comes back and with it money. With more money, we can keep more top players around and improve the star power and quality of the comp.

The brands have existing value - that must be kept. Just make the call on going Trans-tasman with 10 teams. Home and away round robin, or shorten it and play the kiwis sides just once. Whichever we go with, will still be supported, it just needs to lose the Jaapies, the time zone doesn't work, especially when our teams aren't winning and no one cares about rugby.

Once there's enough decent players and we're winning/competitive across the current 5, NZ and Aus both add another team and we have Super 12 again. I'd give Western Sydney/Country NSW a team, based out in Parra at Bankwest. Lock in that PI and league defect player pool (it's about as big as NZ as a whole have to work with so i'd be throwing cash at that ASAP!). The fact RA or even NSWRU haven't thrown what they can out there even at club level to Penrith and Paramatta is criminal. Even if we ignore the huge numbers of very talented kids out there, and the community benefit some strong rugby culture would provide out there.....think of the grudge match!!

West v East. Poor v Rich. Working class v silver spoons!

Fuck, that's a State of Origin level clash in the making as soon as Western Sydney knock off the Tahs for the first time and I expect that won't take long. Some decent marketing and a few spicy incidents and we're off!


7th team - same base criteria of - are all teams successful, have we got a positive business case and demand etc, players available, money etc etc etc. Wherever that is, shouldn't matter.

QLD or ACT getting a second team would seem the next step. Vikings in Canberra seem the best placed to start - Plenty of cash, semi-pro already, ready to go rivalry with the Brumbies/Canberra and could provide a good factional rivalry to generate interest. North v South placement that can be played up to as well. Start via the NRC by calling the existing team the Kookaburra's again, and the Vikings go alone and set up their own program and pathway. Plenty of anti-Vikings people around Canberra would would flock to the Kookaburra's and boom! ACT grudge match is up and running, to match the Sydney one.

QLD next i'd say, but no idea where. Certainly not the Gold Coast! Brisbane should have a decent north of the river v south of the river balance. I say get them all together for a 'meeting about QLD rugby' and make one side wear coloured bibs and smash a 6 pack of bundy rum pre-mixers before everyone meets up. They're Queenslanders, they'll just start fighting out of Denisovan instinct and then we have two QLD teams to go with an 8th team to go with NZ's next team.

A NT team built off the back of some good outreach from RA to set up some comps/pay some club level coaches to head out there and set up some programs and pathways/coach the coaches, would would a wonderful project as well. Could even use GRR to get some kind of rep team set up there as a combo with the NRC as a pathway to Super Rugby.

The only thing needed for all that to just happen is for rugby to be popular - existing teams must be winning, and the Wallabies. Fans will come back and bring the money to expand into Western Sydney, Vikings, QLD and NT with success. I think our junior pathways are looking well set up at the moment, club level is getting lots of interest, we just need to get all the different levels connected and working to the same battle plan.
 

WorkingClassRugger

Michael Lynagh (62)
Keep the current 4, let Twiggy keep the Force up to standard (publicly call him to commit to it) and when we have winning teams, support comes back and with it money. With more money, we can keep more top players around and improve the star power and quality of the comp.

The brands have existing value - that must be kept. Just make the call on going Trans-tasman with 10 teams. Home and away round robin, or shorten it and play the kiwis sides just once. Whichever we go with, will still be supported, it just needs to lose the Jaapies, the time zone doesn't work, especially when our teams aren't winning and no one cares about rugby.

Once there's enough decent players and we're winning/competitive across the current 5, NZ and Aus both add another team and we have Super 12 again. I'd give Western Sydney/Country NSW a team, based out in Parra at Bankwest. Lock in that PI and league defect player pool (it's about as big as NZ as a whole have to work with so i'd be throwing cash at that ASAP!). The fact RA or even NSWRU haven't thrown what they can out there even at club level to Penrith and Paramatta is criminal. Even if we ignore the huge numbers of very talented kids out there, and the community benefit some strong rugby culture would provide out there...think of the grudge match!!

West v East. Poor v Rich. Working class v silver spoons!

Fuck, that's a State of Origin level clash in the making as soon as Western Sydney knock off the Tahs for the first time and I expect that won't take long. Some decent marketing and a few spicy incidents and we're off!


7th team - same base criteria of - are all teams successful, have we got a positive business case and demand etc, players available, money etc etc etc. Wherever that is, shouldn't matter.

QLD or ACT getting a second team would seem the next step. Vikings in Canberra seem the best placed to start - Plenty of cash, semi-pro already, ready to go rivalry with the Brumbies/Canberra and could provide a good factional rivalry to generate interest. North v South placement that can be played up to as well. Start via the NRC by calling the existing team the Kookaburra's again, and the Vikings go alone and set up their own program and pathway. Plenty of anti-Vikings people around Canberra would would flock to the Kookaburra's and boom! ACT grudge match is up and running, to match the Sydney one.

QLD next i'd say, but no idea where. Certainly not the Gold Coast! Brisbane should have a decent north of the river v south of the river balance. I say get them all together for a 'meeting about QLD rugby' and make one side wear coloured bibs and smash a 6 pack of bundy rum pre-mixers before everyone meets up. They're Queenslanders, they'll just start fighting out of Denisovan instinct and then we have two QLD teams to go with an 8th team to go with NZ's next team.

A NT team built off the back of some good outreach from RA to set up some comps/pay some club level coaches to head out there and set up some programs and pathways/coach the coaches, would would a wonderful project as well. Could even use GRR to get some kind of rep team set up there as a combo with the NRC as a pathway to Super Rugby.

The only thing needed for all that to just happen is for rugby to be popular - existing teams must be winning, and the Wallabies. Fans will come back and bring the money to expand into Western Sydney, Vikings, QLD and NT with success. I think our junior pathways are looking well set up at the moment, club level is getting lots of interest, we just need to get all the different levels connected and working to the same battle plan.


A shortcut to something similar could be to join forces with GRR. Merge the 4 Super Rugby franchises with the Force, Fiji and Samoa at a minimum. I think they'd actually be a reasonable argument to include the Tigers and potentially other Asian based teams. There's a potential market here for such teams as around 12% of our population is of Asian ancestry. Clever marketing and outreach into these communities would be needed but certainly not impossible. Aim for 10 teams with the option for a 6th Australian team. Open up eligibility for Australian players to play in any team within the competition and still be eligible for the Wallabies.

So we could have the Asia-Pacific Rugby Championship featuring our 5 plus a 6th, Fiji, Samoa, Hong Kong/South China Tigers and a 10th team. My play would be for the Hyundai Glovis who have a very nice facility and have previously expressed interest in joining the Japanese Pro League but aren't eligible as Japan only wants Japanese teams.

From there. We can have a Probables vs Possibles series to determine the Wallabies.

The benefit of this would be the guarantee of between 3-5 games featuring Australian team each week for 18 weeks in much more friendly timezones.
 

Brumbieman

Dick Tooth (41)
I think ideally, we'd get cracking next year with Super 10, and expand as necessary. GRR to continue as normal, would have to run afterwards though if the Force want in.

Asia is no where near being quality enough to compete with Aus/NZ/Islands etc yet. Down the line, i'd love to see them just merge together. Maybe in 10 years time or so, but Singapore, China, SE Asia etc will need at least that to put one barely competetive Super Rugby team together, but they'll get there as long as rugby is popular.


And how the hell is Asia a more friendly time zone than trans-tasman? The Force would be an issue with their time zone!

Current Super Rugby teams from Aus and NZ plus the Force - 10 team comp, friendly time zones, easy structure, known brands and history, it's just such a no brainer.
 

WorkingClassRugger

Michael Lynagh (62)
I think ideally, we'd get cracking next year with Super 10, and expand as necessary. GRR to continue as normal, would have to run afterwards though if the Force want in.

Asia is no where near being quality enough to compete with Aus/NZ/Islands etc yet. Down the line, i'd love to see them just merge together. Maybe in 10 years time or so, but Singapore, China, SE Asia etc will need at least that to put one barely competetive Super Rugby team together, but they'll get there as long as rugby is popular.


And how the hell is Asia a more friendly time zone than trans-tasman? The Force would be an issue with their time zone!

Current Super Rugby teams from Aus and NZ plus the Force - 10 team comp, friendly time zones, easy structure, known brands and history, it's just such a no brainer.


Friendlier than South Africa and BA. A TT S10 would be my preference but we would have to get NZ to come around to the idea. I'd actually like to see a Pacific S12 with a Fijian and combined PI squad.
 

WorkingClassRugger

Michael Lynagh (62)
As we speak of it - https://wwos.nine.com.au/rugby/wall...ne-rugby/541f6a7e-df50-4bfe-bd8f-5b9a00ad029e

Allegedly the anzac players want the same model..


And potentially a PI side. Which would be awesome. This model makes sense and I don't think many of the SA franchises would be too upset with the opportunity to make the move north. The Sharks, Lions and Bulls have expressed interest in following the Cheetahs and Kings in joining the Pro14 in the recent past.

An 11 team compeition. Home and away for a 20 game season. Perfect.
 

Pfitzy

Nathan Sharpe (72)
Well shock, a CEO has to make tough calls and is judged on them with their job all the time. Even if they thought it was the right one at the time. I'm just saying she had to live and die by the deal with SANZAAR.

OK, but what was your alternative?

Hint: "Club Rugby was just fine! Go back to that!" is not an answer, unless you're Poido and took a few too many blows to the head. A lot of people don't give a flying fuck about rugby right now, and therefore it is a much smaller group that cares what Premier Rugby does, or if it even exists. I see a lot of people around here and on social media talking about how club rugby is just fine, without actually joining the dots on how money was going to appear.

From here on in I shall call that collective the Underpants Gnomes, per the classic South Park episode of my younger years.

rdtdrbl7lhg11.jpg


Saying "We should never have signed back up with SANZAAR" sounds like monumental idiocy, unless you've got a viable alternative that puts money on the table. Otherwise you might as well use Rodda et al as a case study into the collapse of pro rugby in Australia.
 

Dan54

David Wilson (68)
OK, but what was your alternative?

Hint: "Club Rugby was just fine! Go back to that!" is not an answer, unless you're Poido and took a few too many blows to the head. A lot of people don't give a flying fuck about rugby right now, and therefore it is a much smaller group that cares what Premier Rugby does, or if it even exists. I see a lot of people around here and on social media talking about how club rugby is just fine, without actually joining the dots on how money was going to appear.




Saying "We should never have signed back up with SANZAAR" sounds like monumental idiocy, unless you've got a viable alternative that puts money on the table. Otherwise you might as well use Rodda et al as a case study into the collapse of pro rugby in Australia.

I agree Pfitzy, because Aus rugby etc is not going to go forward without SANZAAR partners unless there is some agreement for a comp and finances that everyone is keeping secret, and then by all means dump them and just play ourselves!
 

wamberal

Phil Kearns (64)
It's the ultimate sporting graveyard. Not even the AFL can make it work.


25% of the population (at least) are New Zealanders. A lot of the rest are pretty transient, I reckon a lot of these people retain their former sport/club allegiances, also a lot of foreign students. Plus Broncos supporters who have retained their loyalty.


I wonder what percentage that leaves? And probably most of those are retirees, who are happy to stay at home and watch the box. Plus there probably some Lions fans here, who stick with them rather than chancing it with the Suns. The Suns got it wrong right from the start, by throwing huge money at Ablett, unlike the Giants who played for a patient game.
 

Quick Hands

David Wilson (68)
I agree Pfitzy, because Aus rugby etc is not going to go forward without SANZAAR partners unless there is some agreement for a comp and finances that everyone is keeping secret, and then by all means dump them and just play ourselves!

Th problem is that despite the Super Rugby alarm bells ringing for at least 5 years, nobody at RA/ARU seems to have done any planning for an alternative competition in that time. They've essentially been content to sit there and rake in the Foxtel $$$$ year on year because that was the easiest option. Now apparently Foxtel is the enemy.

The resumption of Super Rugby is looking less and less likely as we move forward, if for no other reason that it's financially unsustainable in its current form or even anything like its current form.

I notice also that someone posted a few days ago that NZRU didn't want to continue the arrangement of pooling broadcast money and then dividing it because they provide more teams, more games and their rights deal is worth more.

On the question of co-operation between NZ, SA and Australia, I think it's in the interest of all three to maintain the highest level of co-operation on and off the field. I am totally supportive of that. Regular tests (test series if I had my way) between the three is to everyone's benefit.

However, I'd differentiate between that and supporting the institution of SANZAAR. Do we really need another layer of rugby bureaucracy just to maintain friendly relations? Is it really that hard to organise dates for tests that the full-time officials can't just meet and map it out over a period of 12 years? (Fits with BIL and RWC)

If as is increasingly likely, do we need to have SANZAAR bureaucracy to organise a short champions league at the end of each domestic season? Again, they dates can be established years in advance, it's hosted on a rotation basis and the host nation does the organising.
 

hoggy

Nev Cottrell (35)
I agree Pfitzy, because Aus rugby etc is not going to go forward without SANZAAR partners unless there is some agreement for a comp and finances that everyone is keeping secret, and then by all means dump them and just play ourselves!

But the problem is, the game ends up compromising itself so much structurally & with self-interest that you are never capable of going it alone, you end up never being able to dump them. we've had 20 years to get ourselves in some sort of position to go it alone.
 

Quick Hands

David Wilson (68)
25% of the population (at least) are New Zealanders. A lot of the rest are pretty transient, I reckon a lot of these people retain their former sport/club allegiances, also a lot of foreign students. Plus Broncos supporters who have retained their loyalty.


I wonder what percentage that leaves? And probably most of those are retirees, who are happy to stay at home and watch the box.

If there ever was a domestic competition with 2 teams in SE Qld, I think it would either involve splitting Brisbane or basing a team on the Darling Downs or even the Sunshine Coast (who are apparently campaigning for and NRL franchise) before the Gold Coast. But that needs to be decided by the rugby people in that area with support of data from RA.
 

Pfitzy

Nathan Sharpe (72)
25% of the population (at least) are New Zealanders. A lot of the rest are pretty transient, I reckon a lot of these people retain their former sport/club allegiances, also a lot of foreign students. Plus Broncos supporters who have retained their loyalty.


I wonder what percentage that leaves? And probably most of those are retirees, who are happy to stay at home and watch the box.


Plus you've got the player issues on the GC:

giphy.gif
 
Status
Not open for further replies.
Top