I think being an Australian, it's hard not to envy something that NRL and AFL have - that accessibility to viewers, consistency, popularity, and local rivalry with people and places you know. Those factors make it easy for a sport to build tradition and become established within the cultural fabric of society.
I remember in the early days of social media on rugby forums, plenty of kiwi and SA fans also longed for their traditional domestic teams and competitions for the same reasons, which had now been slide-lined by Super Rugby. And it was easy to empathise with them. There was something special about the NPC and CC. NZ and SA still have those comps of course, but they're no longer the same. I understand why they needed to move to Super Rugby for financial reasons. But it's still sad.
Super Rugby from the very beginning should have been 3 domestic comps with the best team(s) from each coming together for a short period at the end as the icing on the cake. Then we could have had the best of both worlds. As a fan, it makes it simple because you follow just one team in your own domestic competition and then go for ultimate glory in a short champions league. But the key is for the icing to remain the icing and not become the whole cake. Super Rugby was exciting when it first started, but its very structure was the seed of its own downfall. It was all icing with no cake.
Starting with 3 domestic comps would have given Australia the chance to build its own national domestic comp to gain ground on the other codes (especially if it were already established during our golden era during the late 90's and early 2000's). But alas, we needed the money, and Super Rugby was the key to that. There was something special in the air when the ARC kicked off in 2007, but it wasn't to be. Now, as helpful as the NRC is in the role that it plays, it's very hard for it to get established as anything more than a development comp when it isn't the main game.
When Super Rugby first expanded with the Force and then Melbourne, I was cheering because I thought we would eventually morph into 3 domestic structures followed by an international component. But I think because NZ and SA already had their domestic structures firmly in place, they never intended on that. And without moving in that direction, there were too many compromises and the whole comp just got ugly.
But now, here we are. A crisis has hit us through the coronavirus. And even though it has caused damage, there is the potential for something better to emerge.
(Apologies to those who liked Super Rugby the way it was. I understand that Super Rugby was working pretty well for many fans, and particularly for NZ rugby overall).
edit: sorry Dan, just noticed your post above mine. Yeah, I can totally understand you preferring a round robin over the conference system. In hindsight, I can see that was better than what we ended up with.
