National Rugby Championship 2014

[Dave Beat]

I certainly think they should look to introduce an U20s equivalent down the track. It would allow us to compete more with League for talent.

And giving the young colts in WA, and VIC, a chance to get exposure against Nsw, and Qld teams.

 

[RugbyFuture]

colts would certainly provide the clearest pathway for every talented kid into pro rugby. If this competition is done correctly, eventually we should be able to combat the player drain to the toyota cup and be able to develop profesional corporate setups for all the franchises involved that can have talent programs in place.

Sent from my Transformer Prime TF201 using Tapatalk

 

[TOCC]

Indeed...

The Sydney teams in particularly will get exclusive access to the best club players from the Shute Shield....

It's not going to create equal competition to have similar numbers of Melbourne and Perth club players involved to that of their Sydney/Brisbane/Canberra counterparts...

It won't be exclusive access, if the Western Force come to a Shute Shield player and say we are thinking of signing you for next year, we want you to play for our NRC team this year to prove your value, the player will jump ship..

It's not going to be exclusive access to any team, and teams will use their super rugby backing to sway players to come to their club for opportunities.. And rightfully so, thats the purpose of the competition, player development.

But it won't serve it's purpose if "Team X" has 22 Super Rugby players on its book and then a further 5 or 6 of the best Premier grade/Shute shield players trying to prove their value for a contract.

 

[TOCC]

And I think we'll find that many of the club players coming out of Sydney and Brisbane will probably be just as good as many of the second string Super Rugby players floating around.....

These second string Super Rugby players were signed because they were the best/greatest potential club players out of Sydney or Brisbane, you then give them numerous years in a professional sporting environment and they are a level above.

You then add in the fact that these club players are playing for a team stringed together in a matter of weeks compared to Perth or Melbourne where for 10 months the team has been playing and training towards a certain style under a coaching team..

 

[Stands]

So from that point of view I want to see sydney uni and randwick in the comp, purely so the rest of rugby community in sydney gets behind the other teams out of pure hate.

And if Sydney Uni & Randwick lead this competition won't this breed National hate?

 

[Slim 293]

It won't be exclusive access, if the Western Force come to a Shute Shield player and say we are thinking of signing you for next year, we want you to play for our NRC team this year to prove your value, the player will jump ship..

It's not going to be exclusive access to any team, and teams will use their super rugby backing to sway players to come to their club for opportunities.. And rightfully so, thats the purpose of the competition, player development.

But it won't serve it's purpose if "Team X" has 22 Super Rugby players on its book and then a further 5 or 6 of the best Premier grade/Shute shield players trying to prove their value for a contract.

But if Perth can only draw on Perth club players outside of the Force's Super rugby contingent then that scenario is impossible.........

 

[TOCC]

But if Perth can only draw on Perth club players outside of the Force's Super rugby contingent then that scenario is impossible...

The inclusion of a rule stating that teams are only allowed to recruit from their own club tournament is far worse then a rule limiting the number of super rugby players in a team..

It's counterproductive for the teams and players and could have dire consequences if players who are well below the standard are required to

Do you not agree that the best 150 players need to be starting every weekend for this competition to reach it's full potential?

 

[Slim 293]

It's counterproductive for the teams and players and could have dire consequences if players who are well below the standard are required to

But that's exactly what will happen if you tell the Rebels and the Force they're only allowed to choose up to 18 players, and then they have to draw an extra dozen (or more with injuries permitting) from their local leagues...........

I don't think we'll see the best 150 best players starting, but we'll get close to the best 150 players starting as there will be teams with better depth in some positions..........

It's an impossible task to try and evenly split Super Rugby players amongst the 10 teams (particularly with injuries/players coming in and out of the test side), and in the process you create a ridiculous situation where there are added financial burdens relocating players to places they have no connection with and we're back to seeing the silly artificial teams that plagued the ARC...........

The best way to create legitimacy is for the teams to draw on players from their Super Rugby/club pools, and allowing players the choice to return home to represent their relevant venture.

In the end you'll probably wind up with close to the reported number of Super Rugby players the ARU want to allegedly enforce, but it'll happen in a more legitimate manner that benefits the teams and the players.

 

[TOCC]

But that's exactly what will happen if you tell the Rebels and the Force they're only allowed to choose up to 18 players, and then they have to draw an extra dozen (or more with injuries permitting) from their local leagues.....

Who is forcing the Rebels and Force to choose from their local leagues, the likely scenario is that both teams will have a list of players from the Shute Shield and Premier Grade rugby who they are interested in recruiting, they will be in contact with those players and recruit them for their own NRC teams so they can have a firsthand look at those players before making the ultimate decision of who to sign, already the Brumbies have a similar concept(ala Jesse Mogg) and the Rebels and Force routinely invite players over for training camps to gauge them firsthand before signing them, this is ultimately the whole purpose of the NRC.

I don't think we'll see the best 150 best players starting, but we'll get close to the best 150 players starting as there will be teams with better depth in some positions....

It's an impossible task to try and evenly split Super Rugby players amongst the 10 teams (particularly with injuries/players coming in and out of the test side), and in the process you create a ridiculous situation where there are added financial burdens relocating players to places they have no connection with and we're back to seeing the silly artificial teams that plagued the ARC.....

Its an impossible task to ensure a completely level playing field, it is however an easy task to ensure there aren't massive discrepancies between playing rosters.. And if the current concept of having 23 contracted Super Rugby players representing the Force or Rebels goes ahead against one of the Sydney teams with 4 or 5 Waratahs and the rest of Shute Shield Players, their will be massive gap in playing ability. Do you deny that?

The best way to create legitimacy is for the teams to draw on players from their Super Rugby/club pools, and allowing players the choice to return home to represent their relevant venture.

In the end you'll probably wind up with close to the reported number of Super Rugby players the ARU want to allegedly enforce, but it'll happen in a more legitimate manner that benefits the teams and the players.

These players will be allowed to return home? Under what pretence, the same one which has seen Brumbies, Rebels, Force and even Reds players made to play in their Super Rugby's local competition rather then returning to the Shute Shield or wherever they were previously from...

 

[Slim 293]

Who is forcing the Rebels and Force to choose from their local leagues, the likely scenario is that both teams will have a list of players from the Shute Shield and Premier Grade rugby who they are interested in recruiting

The same Shute Shield teams that are forming joint ventures to participate in the NRC?

And then is it the ARU who are going to cover costs to relocate the players from Perth to Sydney and vice versa?

Its an impossible task to ensure a completely level playing field, it is however an easy task to ensure there aren't massive discrepancies between playing rosters.. And if the current concept of having 23 contracted Super Rugby players representing the Force or Rebels goes ahead against one of the Sydney teams with 4 or 5 Waratahs and the rest of Shute Shield Players, their will be massive gap in playing ability. Do you deny that?

If the ARU want to have 4 Sydney teams then they're going to have to accept that the Waratahs contingent will be thinned out. However, I'm sure there will be quite a few Rebels and Force players that might want to return to their clubs of origin.

But what you can't do is forcibly relocate players to teams they have no connections with.

And let's not forget that in the ARC the Canberra Vikings were one of the strongest teams on paper........ effectively the Brumbies minus their Wallabies filled in with Academy players and a couple of locals......... and they didn't even make the finals (they even got spanked in rd 1 by a rag tag group of Rebels).

These players will be allowed to return home? Under what pretence, the same one which has seen Brumbies, Rebels, Force and even Reds players made to play in their Super Rugby's local competition rather then returning to the Shute Shield or wherever they were previously from.

We're talking about a smaller number of players leaving their franchise area........ and I'm sure the ARU would step in on this one for the sake of the NRC.

But in the end we need to have teams that have legitimate connections with the Super Rugby franchises and club teams that are looking after them.........

 

[TOCC]

If the ARU want to have 4 Sydney teams then they're going to have to accept that the Waratahs contingent will be thinned out. However, I'm sure there will be quite a few Rebels and Force players that might want to return to their clubs of origin.

But what you can't do is forcibly relocate players to teams they have no connections with.

Why should they accept that the region which produces the majority of Super Rugby players be allowed to have lower quality teams? Once again do you believe that if the Rebels or Force with up to 23 Super Rugby contracted players were to play a Sydney NRC team with barely 4 or 5 Waratahs that there won't be a massive gap?

Thankfully, the majority of rugby union players in Australia have connections to Sydney and given that most of them used to return to Sydney to play in the Shute Shield post Super Rugby season this will unlikely be a problem for the NRC either.

And let's not forget that in the ARC the Canberra Vikings were one of the strongest teams on paper.... effectively the Brumbies minus their Wallabies filled in with Academy players and a couple of locals... and they didn't even make the finals.

Its funny you mention the Rebels, because their success was because other Unions allowed their players to play for a team outside of their state. This wouldn't have been possible had every union kept hold of their best players.

We're talking about a smaller number of players leaving their franchise area.... and I'm sure the ARU would step in on this one for the sake of the NRC.

So you agree the ARU needs to step in and ensure that Super Rugby clubs allow player distribution for the NRC?

 

[Slim 293]

I've always said that there will, and should be players allowed to return back to their clubs of origin for the NRC.........

But it can't be done with forcible quotas as there are too many complications............

A much more streamlined process where players negotiate with their Super teams and the ARU is what I'd like to see so there remains some legitimacy with the teams and there are no burdens placed on players forced interstate..........

Teams like the Force and the Rebels would still end up with a few extra Super Rugby players in their NRC teams but then if they're only allowed to draw on their local leagues then it balances out the competition.

 

[TOCC]

And the issue with just expecting it to happen 'naturally' is that there is the high probability that it won't... The Issue is that in 10months time we will have quite a few teams well and truly rooted to the bottom of the table with few tries and even lesser fans.

It surprises me that people think the NRC will be able to self govern player distribution amongst the teams when every other professional sporting competition has a rules and mechanisms in place to ensure this actually happens.



Im a Queenslander but i still recognise that for this competition to be a success, the Sydney teams can't be allowed to fail... the Sydney marketplace market is what Melbourne is to the AFL and Sydney is to the NRL.. It is the largest pool of players, of commercial support and most importantly the largest market of rugby union fans in this country.

 

[RugbyFuture]

early on, in the smh before the comp was announced I think and it was just rumour, Matt Burke suggested a player draft for the top pro players.

 

[Train Without a Station]

TOCC you cannot compare the ARC Rebels squad to today and say the other unions "let the players" leave to player for another team. The ARC teams were separate entities were they not?

The Melbourne ARC team will be run directly by the Rebels who contract and are paying the playing salary for these players which covers the NRC games. Completely different scenarios.

 

[RugbyFuture]

not sure about other teams but the ARC teams if they were seperate entities had most of their teams run out of the waratahs office in nsw. Have some of their documentation and its "if you have any questions, contact NSWRU media." Pretty sure back then the Rebels were considered a NSW franchise too.

 

[gel]

If Sydney cannot field 5 competitive teams, then the problem is that five teams is too many for Sydney to handle, not that other teams have too many Super Rugby players. Last year's rugby thread is replete with comments how so many Shute Teams would be competitive in the ITM cup. So where have all those players gone to now?

The notion that the best 150 players need to be playing is an ideal concept - however it doesn't even happen in the super rugby (how many reserves do the waratahs have that every other super rugby franchise would gladly have in their starting line up?). <That's the way it goes - it's not ideal but injury cover is injury cover and rugby is no longer a 15 (or even 23 man) game.

The fact is that Sydney and Brisbane are better equipped to produce a player capable of replacing one of their super rugby players if injured than the Force and Rebels are.

There is even greater motivation for the Premier and Shute players now to train harder with options to fill out the NRC teams in those two cities that never existed before. They probably thought they were never going to be a super rugby player, but the NRC - that's another level that they may well aspire to. There may just be more motivation for the better than average players to stay here as well (instead of going overseas as a journeyman) with an avenue to a better income here than what was previously available.

I don't expect the two Brissie teams to be winning everything this year - but I would expect that in the years to come they will be right up there. As will the Sydney teams.

tldr: Sydney probably only has enough players to cover 3 or 4 teams if they want to be competitive. There's no need to spread the love.

 

[Dave Beat]

I'm thinking all these posts suggest 3 or 4 teams in Sydney, and Sydney Uni is causing my problem (I think they deserve to stand alone though).

1. Sth Hbr (Randwick / Easts / Souths)
2. Nth Hbr (Manly / Rats / Norths Gordon)
3. West (Wests / Parr / Penrith / Woods)

Uni - it would be a player imbalance putting them with Sth, and a Geographic imbalance putting them with Nth.
If it is true Woos arent interested do we replace them with Woods in the West?

 

[Train Without a Station]

The thing is Dave this isn't under 8s and everybody gets a trophy. Personally I think the best bids need to get the go ahead. If that means the West (or any other region) is initially under represented, whilst not ideal, so be it rather than having to prop up teams who cannot support themselves adequately.

Mail is that the North Harbour bid is strong and the Sydney Uni bid is expected to be strong based on them already adequately providing everything required barring a home ground suited to broadcasting.

Natural selection to an extent needs to occur. By providing content that will secure a better TV deal, the ARU can afford to look at matters like expansion and subsidising teams in areas which may not bring money to the table though are large markets.

 

[RugbyFuture]

I think you need to figure out the passing speculation from the strong facts.

facts that have been put out and are pretty secure:

South harbour jv broke apart, souths are now part of the Rams JV

North harbour is working together well

Randwick will bid with their partnership with UNSW, with input from easts.

Uni are bidding in their jv with balmain and warren livingstone.

west is 5 clubs including eastwood, parra, wests, penrith and southern

lack of monetary involvement doesn't seem to hinder participation, because every club knows they need to contribute to this for the good of rugby.

conclusion: 4 teams in sydney, randwick and uni stand alone, Western team is called the Greater Sydney Rams, The northern consortium are figuring out things well.

Based on the facts rather than pure ideals now since we are getting to the due date.