Wednesday Rugby News has angry sponsors losing faith, Mick Byrne begging to keep the faith, the Flying Fijians arriving in town and the Lions being pumped up.
Buildcorp No-RC
Well, it turns out us fans are not the only ones who are pissed at the ARU. Sponsors are too. Already this year, BMW and Lion Nathan have announced that they will be walking away from ARU brands. However, the biggest shock last night was, as reported by The Telegraph, the news that construction company Buildcorp will be pulling a million-dollar sponsorship of the naming rights to the National Rugby Championship.
Buildcorp is one of rugby’s most loyal brand supporters, having sponsored rugby clubs since 1992. They have supported everything from Shute Shield clubs to national teams. But, their reason for pulling their naming rights is a rugby one: they became frustrated with the ARU’s inaction on starting a national women’s competition.
Following the huge growth in female rugby participation, Buildcorp had made multiple requests for a Womens XVs version of the NRC, a request that has not be fulfilled by the ARU. While the ARU are launching a national womens sevens competition in August, for Buildcorp, that was not enough.
Buildcorp co-founder and Principal, Josephine Sukkar, said that Buildcorp could not continue to align their business with an NRC competition that didn’t offer the same opportunities to women as it does to men. Sukkar also is the president of Australian Women’s Rugby, and a director of the Australian Rugby Foundation.
“At Buildcorp we really need to align any partnership we’re involved with to our values, and it was not a championship that was able to produce a women’s competition,” Sukkar said.
“We had asked for that for a long time and we had wanted it to look the same as the men’s and for them to be playing on the same fields as curtain raisers.
“That is the problem for the ARU at the moment to be able to deliver that. So we discontinued that sponsorship this year. It’s the first time we’ve ever discontinued a rugby sponsorship, but that was pretty difficult for us to stand alongside that.”
Buildcorp have been the naming sponsor of the NRC since it’s inception in 2014, and also are the naming rights sponsor of the Wallaroos and Women XVs National Championships.
The ARU sent out a spokesman, complimenting Buildcorp as a ‘wonderful’ sponsor and ‘integral’ to the NRC.
“While it is disappointing to lose Buildcorp as naming rights partner for the NRC this year, we understand their position that they would like to see the formation of an equivalent women’s competition.”
What follows afterwards is another large amount of ARU jargon about ‘how much they’ve invested in women’s sport, the ARU was successful in growing the game’, blah blah blah etc etc. (yes you have, but you just lost a major womens sponsor and 95% of all Aussie rugby supporters are pissed at you for your management. Just saying).
Sukkar however said that she would consider sponsorship again – but only if the ARU introduced a women’s national XV competition.
I’m supposed to be telling the news objectively here, but hey, imagine if there was a national womens team playing before the mens games in the NRC! Wouldn’t it be great?
Byrne calls for Faith
Let’s face it, this year has been total bollocks for Australian rugby. Even national skills coach Mick Byrne admits it. But, speaking to Fox Sports, Byrne also made it clear that there are plenty of positives to come out of such a disappointing season, and has urged rugby fans to keep the faith and support the Wallabies during the June series.
Byrne was honest about the struggles the code has gone through this year, but also highlighted that a huge amount of learning has taken place, which will be helpful for all the Super Rugby and national coaches going forward.
“I think there are some young coaches there that are experiencing things for the first time in Super Rugby,” Byrne said.
“It’s a difficult environment, Super Rugby, when you’re coaching because — I know these are only little things and they’re not excuses — you’re playing a different team every week.
“Sometimes you’re playing a different style of team every week. One week you’re playing a South African team that want to maul you, then you play a South African team that want to run at you and then you play a New Zealand team that’s going to throw everything at the back at you, and then you play an Australian team that’s doing something different.
“So every week your preparation is changing, so Super Rugby is a difficult environment to operate in on a day to day, week to week basis and it takes time to work that out.”
There are certainly signs that there have been improvements, such as the announcement last month of a national coaching panel being set up to assist Super Rugby coaches.
Byrne himself has had plenty of experience in regards to backlash- he copped plenty of blame when he was a member of the All Blacks coaching staff under Graham Henry when they crashed out in the quarter finals of the World Cup in 2007. But the NZRU stuck with Henry, and it proved beneficial in the long run.
“When you’re in your first or second or third year and you’ve faced a lot of adversity, like some of our coaches have around this year especially, you learn a hell of a lot,” Byrne said.
“The value of that reappointment is — it was obviously in the quality of the people you’re reappointing — in the knowledge of what had happened over the last three or four years and the knowledge learnt from going through a campaign, and the knowledge through development and the growth of the players.
“When you come out of that adversity, all that knowledge is with the existing group who then move forward with all that knowledge.”
Byrne highlighted that all the Australian Super Rugby coaches will be better off after this tough season.
“They want to get better. They’re learning from it. They’re trying different things. They’re not accepting where they’re at and what’s going on, and that’s a huge quality as well.
“My feeling from all the coaches is that they all want to get better, they’re all willing to learn and they’re desperate for it to turn around, and that’s a good place to be because if we’re providing the support for them then they’re going to be willing to take it up and that’s a big plus.”
It makes sense that they will use this experience to improve. Unless, of course, if you are Richard Graham.
The Flying Fijians mean business!
Fiji are here to play rugby. They haven’t beaten the Wallabies in 63 years, but like Samoa did in 2011, they are out to grab a big scalp when they meet the Wallabies this coming weekend in Melbourne.
Fiji captain Akapusi Qera says that the team has been taking inspiration from that famous victory when he spoke to rugby.com.au.
“It’d be a massive achievement for us as a team (to beat Australia),” Qera said.
“As a young group, it’ll be a massive achievement and if Samoa can beat Australia in Australia, so can we.
“It’s a challenge for us, it’s a challenge been laid by Samoa and we’ll try and equal that or even better them.”
They face their Pacific rivals Samoa and Tonga in a series of World Cup qualifiers, so a shock win over Australia would be a huge shot in the arm for the Fijian’s confidence.
The Fijians are grasping the opportunity with both hands, as the team barely ever gets to play against Tier One opponents. Now, they will be facing three in three weeks, with matches against Scotland and Italy to follow.
“I always say to the boys, ‘We hardly get this, even in November Tests, we hardly get three Tier One nations’,” Qera said.
“This is a massive stepping stone for us as a group and for Fiji rugby. So, we are looking forward to it and hopefully we can make Fiji proud.”
A win against the Wallabies would not only be big for Fijian rugby, but for the country in general, according to coach John McKee.
“It’s quite amazing in Fiji how the whole nation gets behind the national team whether it be Sevens, playing on the Sevens circuit or when the Flying Fijians are playing,” McKee said.
“Certainly playing Australia is a major, major Test match. It’s a big motivator for the players here but also a big thing for all the people back home.”
“All the players will bring their standard up to the Test match because the standard to play each match is different from club rugby.”
The Fijians will open their June series campaign against the Wallabies at 3pm on Saturday at AAMI Park in Melbourne.
Lions ready to be ‘agents of rugby chaos’
Following their less than impressive win against the NZ Barbarians on the weekend, the British & Irish Lions attack coach Rob Howley has vowed to unleash ‘rugby chaos’ on New Zealand’s Super Rugby franchises.
Speaking with the UK’s Telegraph after an ‘explosive’ training session on Monday, Rob Howley has made it clear that he expects the Lions to be up to a much better standard when they take on the Blues this week. The Blues will have a full strength side containing eight current and former All Blacks.
“We are working on our foundations, putting some principles of how we want to play in place and having a framework to so that players have the ability to play what is in front of them. It is about playing smart, intelligent rugby,” explained Howley.
“We’re all aware of the pace of the game in the southern hemisphere. That’s the nature of the game here, playing from chaos, from kick returns and turnovers. It’s the ability to react in those situations and to not get left behind, to be ahead of the game. That’s something we’ve talked about with 15 vs. 15, the Rugby Chaos.
“We did a drill on Monday, an offload drill and the contact was explosive. Things got pretty heated which is what you would expect in such a competitive environment. It’s all in its infancy at the moment but we’ll see improvement on Wednesday night.”
With the Kiwis breathing down the Lion’s necks from their lacklustre weekend performance, Howley has made it clear that they will need to be much better for the rest of the tour.
““We don’t want to give them information, we want them to go out and play and that’s what the message has been over the last three weeks,” said Howley.
“There are obviously messages that you have to get out, you have to get numbers around the ball so there’s a bit of structure there, but ultimately it’s about playing some intelligent rugby. When you work with quality players you get an understanding of their mindset and how they see the pictures on the field.
“It is not about the pictures we see as coaches, it is about the pictures the players see. They are the ones who put an identity into the jersey.”
The Lions face the Blues on Wednesday before travelling down to Christchurch to face the currently unbeaten Crusaders on Saturday.
