ARU take over the Western Force.

[Train Without a Station]

They were? Outside of 'Telstra Smart Rugby'?

Well $10M+ was put into Shute Shield in that period wasn't it?

 

[mst]

This is based on the premise that the Waratahs have achieved 100% saturation of the Sydney market, which i think most people on here would agree hasn't been achieved, not even close. In terms of playing resources it is really no change to the current situation in terms of competition for player recruitment, and in terms of corporate support, Sydney is a large enough market that it could and would cater for two teams without negatively impacting on each other.

You illustrate my point well by accident.

They Tahs have has exclusive access to a captive market yet as we all know they are still struggling for support in both bums on seats, general popularity and sponsorship etc. They are far from flush with sponsorship and financial resources, as is most of NSW rugby.

If your statement were correct about sufficient corporate support to support 2 teams without negatively impacting etc the Tahs would be a financial powerhouse which it is not with significant financial resources.

In addition, with the abundance of support in Sydney you refer to the ARU would be surely be a beneficiary and be far better placed financially which it is not.

The player issue is irrelevant.

Again the reality is far different to what is being talked up. If the oasis existed the first thing the ARU should have done is put an NRC team on the mythical Western Sydney well of abundance and not load up clubs with its costs.

 

[Quick Hands]

QH absolutely the Giants are an investment by the AFL.

They are investing not to get current fans, but future fans.

They have resulted in a hit to the Swans. If the Waratahs had taken a 5k hit over the last 5 years they would be broke now.

And there is no indication that any Western Sydney team would have greater support than the Force, based on neither start up in Western Sydney in other codes having greater support than the Force.

So it's potential corporate dollar then. And how well have the Waratahs been going with that? How much major sponsor turnover have they head due to sponsors discontinuing?

As I previously noted, weren't the Waratahs selling 2016 jerseys without a major sponsor because they did not have one tied up when the jerseys were made?

Other codes have shown slight hits at times with other teams being introduced.

If the Waratahs had lost 5000 fans in 2011, how would they have fared in the period 2011-2015? They were already skirting close to the red.

Surely talk of splitting any market would only be feasible for a team that was in a position similar to the Reds 2011-2014. And they showed how quickly it can fall apart.

I reiterate that I am NOT advocating the establishment of a second super team in Sydney.

I am merely discussing things that others have raised. Like any of these issues it does have positives attached as well as negatives.

It's not going to happen. It shouldn't happen in the current environment. Nor should have it have happened in 2011.

We don't have the money in rugby to try anything new at the moment or in the foreseeable future.

The 5 super franchises should stay where they are.

The other levels of the game need to be structured for optimum value for every cent spent - this is not happening at the moment.

EDIT: And I'd also note that the Waratahs lost a lot more than 5,000 fans during the Hickey/Foley era. Crowds plumetted 55% without any rugby competitor in the same market.

Sadly, most of the problems facing rugby are self-inflicted.

 

[Ozee316]

Over what time frame, how many clubs, and how much does that differ against past funding?

NZRU has 26 provincial unions so $9mil equates to approximately $350k per union that then needs to be spread across their clubs.

NZR is increasing funding annually by $9m. This is to cover ITM Cup and Grass roots. ARU is increasing by $5m so it's comparable.

Current funding is already between $20-25m including $15m for ITM cup

 

[TOCC]

If your statement were correct about sufficient corporate support to support 2 teams without negatively impacting etc the Tahs would be a financial powerhouse which it is not with significant financial resources.

In addition, with the abundance of support in Sydney you refer to the ARU would be surely be a beneficiary and be far better placed financially which it is not.

Monopolies on markets rarely achieve maximum saturation or productivity due to inherent lack of efficiency in their own organisations.

Using the Tahs finances as an example of why a second team would not work in the Sydney market ignores the benefits of added competition, in both the A-League and AFL cases the pre-existing Sydney team has mutually benefited from the introduction of another cross-town rival. Not only has it increased AFL and A-League coverage in local reporting but it has also introduced another level of rivalry in the local market which has driven a passionate fanbase.

There are only so many sponsorship opportunities in a sporting team, for a decade HSBC were the principal sponsor. This prevented any other bank from coming on board as a sponsor of the Tahs. This is where increased corporate support lies and why a sporting monopoly will never achieve full market saturation when it comes corporate support.


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

 

[Train Without a Station]

How have the swans mutually benefited? They're averaged attendance dropped by 5k and has now just recovered.

In that time they've made the finals every single year and won a premiership.

In fact in their premiership season in 2012 they were still considerably down on their 2010 peak attendance.

 

[TOCC]

How have the swans mutually benefited? They're averaged attendance dropped by 5k and has now just recovered.

In that time they've made the finals every single year and won a premiership.

In fact in their premiership season in 2012 they were still considerably down on their 2010 peak attendance.

It only dropped by 1k in the Giants inaugural season(or increased by 1k if you include finals) The Giants inaugural season marked the bottom of a downward trend which the Swans crowds had been experiencing in the years preceding that. In the 5 years prior to the introduction of the Giants the average attendance of the Swans had dropped by 9k.

More importantly Swans average crowds have increased from 26k to 32k since the introduction of the Giants, the Swans have posted an annual profit every year since 2012, they have increased membership by over 12'000 members since 2012 and whilst financial reporting is sketchy annual revenue has increased $35million to $45million since the Giants have joined the AFL.


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

 

[mst]

Monopolies on markets rarely achieve maximum saturation or productivity due to inherent lack of efficiency in their own organisations.

Using the Tahs finances as an example of why a second team would not work in the Sydney market ignores the benefits of added competition, in both the A-League and AFL cases the pre-existing Sydney team has mutually benefited from the introduction of another cross-town rival. Not only has it increased AFL and A-League coverage in local reporting but it has also introduced another level of rivalry in the local market which has driven a passionate fanbase.

There are only so many sponsorship opportunities in a sporting team, for a decade HSBC were the principal sponsor. This prevented any other bank from coming on board as a sponsor of the Tahs. This is where increased corporate support lies and why a sporting monopoly will never achieve full market saturation when it comes corporate support.


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

There is a basic rule of thumb that business use to assess sponsorship - Eyeballs; which is worked out by doubling the bums on seats. The more you have the more sponsorship is worth. The more competitive the market the higher value of the sponsorship.

Exclusivity or control of crossover marketing of sponsorship is not a measure, just a general good business practise.

Based on your argument, noting that Sydney had more available eyeballs than any other place in Australia (where franchise are located), how much is the Tahs sponsorship worth?

Can you supply us with a figure of how far above all the rest of the franchise it is?

Can you also provide how much higher the bums on seats, or the TV audience is?

 

[TOCC]

There is a basic rule of thumb that business use to assess sponsorship - Eyeballs; which is worked out by doubling the bums on seats. The more you have the more sponsorship is worth. The more competitive the market the higher value of the sponsorship.

Exclusivity or control of crossover marketing of sponsorship is not a measure, just a general good business practise.

Based on your argument, noting that Sydney had more available eyeballs than any other place in Australia (where franchise are located), how much is the Tahs sponsorship worth?

Can you supply us with a figure of how far above all the rest of the franchise it is?

Can you also provide how much higher the bums on seats, or the TV audience is?

Waratahs annual report are publicly available, if you want specific figures then you can look them up yourself.

Waratahs appeal to a specific sponsorship demographic due to their history, where they are located and the demographic of the fanbase. Are you suggesting that the Waratahs have achieved 100% market saturation in available sponsorship, corporate support and fans within the Sydney catchment, and if they haven't what is the value of this corporate support and does it exceed what they could achieve in Perth... because that's really the crux of this issue..


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

 

[Quick Hands]

Well $10M+ was put into Shute Shield in that period wasn't it?

I'm not quite so sure about that. I'd need to see a break down of the figures.

I seem to recall, that in the absence of an ARC/NRC, that the ARU funded the Sydney and Brisbane premier competitions as the 3rd tier, so that super rugby players had a high level of competition after the super season. So that particular money wasn't intended for grass roots, rather it was the ARU using those competitions for their own centrally contracted players.

I acknowledge your longstanding antipathy towards Shute Shield (a view that you are entitled to hold). From my experience on the board of a SS club for a short time and representing the club at meetings, SS clubs possess no money or assets to speak of. The ARU has decided that they are no longer its preferred vehicle for player development.

Such a pity that the ARU feels that it can't supply the grass roots section of these clubs in any way. Using these clubs would be far more cost efficient that the ARU micro-managing a variety of overlapping programmes.

If people are so worried that clubs can't be trusted with money (which may or may not be correct) - tied grants are a fairly simple solution.

 

[Train Without a Station]

TOCC, the swans averaged around 32k in 2010. Do you think members who signed up to the Giants who existed prior to their first season could possibly be part of this?

QH, more a comment that money has supposedly gone to grassroots in this time. Clearly it hasn't yielded results, probably because it wasn't directed in the best manner to achieve the best return.

Right now clearly the focus needs to be on what will bring the most fans going forward. That will lead to the funds required for other areas. What funding the other areas clearly hasn't lead to is the funds required to grow the fan base, or the growth in the fan base itself.

 

[Quick Hands]

QH, more a comment that money has supposedly gone to grassroots in this time. Clearly it hasn't yielded results, probably because it wasn't directed in the best manner to achieve the best return.

Right now clearly the focus needs to be on what will bring the most fans going forward. That will lead to the funds required for other areas. What funding the other areas clearly hasn't lead to is the funds required to grow the fan base, or the growth in the fan base itself.

Essentially, rugby faces two big issues; firstly there isn't enough money to do all of the things that need to be done and secondly knowing where to allocate the funds that do exist.

As has been noted by a few posters - there is the world of difference between "spending" on one hand and "investment" on the other. IMO, there has been too much spending (much of which is ephemeral) in the past and not enough investment in rugby infrastructure (which is more permanent or longlasting).

 

[Train Without a Station]

If we look at the other codes, the AFL at least, certainly spends rather than invests.

Right now it's also important the game invests in growing fans as a priority. Which I think they are moving towards, for example the NRC has not seen any ARU investment.

Areas like viva 7s, western Sydney and women's rugby they have announced they will invest.

 

[Gagger]

The Force (even with Pocock, Sharpe and Gits) never got above 7th position. Amongst other reasons, the main one was that they can't get top talent over there - too far from the centre of rugby in Australia. Talk to anyone involved and they'll tell you that's THE massive problem.

Clearly, making money isn't the strong suit for of ANY Super rugby teams in Australia. So if it's about player dev, the argument is foregone: NSW creates about 50% of the semi/pro level players in Australia and yet there is only one Super team there. The Force could only survive with the the players who came from NSW/QLD.

Those making points about having two AFL teams in Syd or Bris and it not working totally miss the point - would the AFL, NRL or any other sport ever have had just ONE team in their home market (Melb for AFL) but instead dotted basket cases around Australia first?

ARE YOU FUCKING KIDDING?

We may have fucked ups few years back with this decision, but that's no reason to perpetuate it now

 

[liquor box]

2 AFL sides in Sydney means a local game every week too. Much easier to get a share of media if you're playing at home.

We have five teams and cannot even have a team from Australia on a Friday night game.

This should be a concern. ( I realise we have a Sunday game this week) It is essential to have a prime time game on Friday and Saturday night every week.

 

[Train Without a Station]

Most of them would prefer to cut the number of teams in their home market, but can't because they are all foundation teams. They only have multiple teams in a single market because they are a city competition that has evolved.

Do you think if they started from scratch today they would do that? How many multiple team markets did the first season of the A-League have?

Who cares where they have finished. To an extent that's absolutely irrelevant.

The comments about the other codes are because the Waratahs in their best ever season made $400k. Looking at their annual reports, the sponsorship revenue has declined since 2011. They were struggling to find a sponsor for 2016 at some point. No competing code gets more numbers to their games in western Sydney.

So why are we saying a western Sydney team would be feasible? They'd be having the exact same problems the Force are, for any Sydney players they'd more easily recruit, they'd likely lose QLD players (who make up a huge chunk of their roster).

Then there the fact that if they took any Waratahs fans or sponsors, we'd probably have a situation where the Waratahs lost money in a championship season and would also need financial support.

So how would we be better off?

We can say they'd not have to pay overs to recruit players. But is that true? Underperforming Sydney NRL teams have had to. Look at some of the big money deals parramatta have had to offer big name players.

But that still ignores the issue that if they don't make money what's the point? There's a very good chance the ARU would need to invest in the area long term, much like the AFL are doing with GWS to see the result many people (who oddly live in Sydney) think would be seen.

As somebody said earlier, this would only have merit of the Waratahs were a financial powerhouse. They aren't so anything that could potentially take any of their support would be a huge risk.

But most importantly of all, what exactly would the gain be?

 

[WorkingClassRugger]

The Force (even with Pocock, Sharpe and Gits) never got above 7th position. Amongst other reasons, the main one was that they can't get top talent over there - too far from the centre of rugby in Australia. Talk to anyone involved and they'll tell you that's THE massive problem.

Clearly, making money isn't the strong suit for of ANY Super rugby teams in Australia. So if it's about player dev, the argument is foregone: NSW creates about 50% of the semi/pro level players in Australia and yet there is only one Super team there. The Force could only survive with the the players who came from NSW/QLD.

Those making points about having two AFL teams in Syd or Bris and it not working totally miss the point - would the AFL, NRL or any other sport ever have had just ONE team in their home market (Melb for AFL) but instead dotted basket cases around Australia first?

ARE YOU FUCKING KIDDING?

We may have fucked ups few years back with this decision, but that's no reason to perpetuate it now

So, what should we do? Go back to the three team model. The ACT doesn't really produce too many players. Perhaps we should also cut the Brumbies? How many of their roster are locally developed? Not transplanted but started playing and rose through the ranks? Would it be more than seven, as that's the current number of Perth developed squad members of the Force. But of course booting the Brumbies would be sacrilege.

 

[Sully]

Both the NRL and the AFL started in single city competitions and then developed in to multi city competitions. Super Rugby has been a international competition since day one. There is no super rugby team that shares a city with another. Sydney has trouble supporting one team how is plonking another one there going to help?

 

[barbarian]

Force are losing cash and have never had a winning season. They are a failing team. Plain and simple. Fix one or both and then everything changes, but that looks unlikely with things as they are at the moment.

So then we move to the next question- could we do better with our 5th side elsewhere? Western Sydney is the obvious choice, but it's FAR from a lay-down misere.

There is no evidence from Parramatta, Penrith or the Rams that there is a support base large enough to sustain a Super side. Or a talent base, frankly. They would play at Parramatta Stadium (presumably), which is about to be knocked down.

They may do better on the field, but this would just come at the expense of other teams. There is also no doubt that they would cut into the Waratahs supporter base.

I think it's clear now that we can't sustain 5 Super sides. But we're locked into the broadcast deal so we're not going back to 4 any time soon. So we end up choosing between two options, both of which have plenty of flaws.

I'm not sold either way.
.

 

[Train Without a Station]

How many Australian expansion teams have performed well?

The NRL had the Titans in 2007.

Before that they had the Storm in 98 and both the Cowboys and Warriors in 95. The Warriors took until about 2003 to make any dent in the competition, the storm were immediately successful on the field but never off it whilst the Titans have struggled on and off the field for their entire 10 year existence. The Cowboys have won a premiership, have been strong for a few years but had many lean years. They also have one of the best players in the game in their team, who only went there because of them paying overs to get him.

The Titans are also in the biggest Rugby League heartland of the 3 with strong local competitions and 2 teams in the state league and have 2 of Australia's strongest nurseries in PBC and Keebra Park High.

The AFL has had:

GWS Giants - 2012
Gold Coast Suns - 2011
Fremantle Dockers - 95
Port Adelaide Power - 97
West Coast Eagles - 87
Adelaide Crows - 91
Brisbane Bears - 87

The Bears never really took off and only after a merger with an existing team they saw any success on or off the field. West coast and Adelaide won multiple premierships in their first decade.

Fremantle was never a contender until the last 5 years. Port Adelaide won their first premiership in 2004 but have fallen on tough financial times recently.

The Giants and Suns have not made finals yet, despite being in their 5th and 6th seasons. Neither are self sustaining off the field either. Neither have a great deal of local talent, this is despite the Gold Coast having 2 NEAFL teams of local origins.

It certainly seems that the more recent teams have entered these competitions, the harder success has been to come by. The Eagles won their first premiership in 92, the Crows their first in 97.

Port won a premiership in 04 but Freo are yet to win one.

As for the NRL, the only expansion team since 98, the Titans have made the finals once or twice in their decade history. So perhaps local talent helps the WA and SA teams over the Giants and Suns, but the abundance of local talent has done SFA for the Titans.

What is a real possibility, is that is become harder and harder for new teams to grow in competitions.

Not a single new team in a long established competition has exceeded or even met expectations since 1998.

Perhaps the more professional and established a competition is, the harder it is to catch up and there is every chance that a western Sydney team would be experiencing many of the same issues as a West Australian team, except they'd be able to recruit Sydney players easier.