Where to for Super Rugby?

[kiap]

Anyway, here it is. Have a look and then let me down gently.

https://www.theroar.com.au/2020/05/09/my-blueprint-for-australias-rugby-calendar/

I haven't had a look yet, but gave you an upvote here for taking a shot at it.

<EDIT> 3 teams. The question will be budget per team.

Rebels join Force in Rapid Rugby then.

As far as your NRC goes, Fijian Drua in West Syd is not gonna fly.

 

[waiopehu oldboy]

Eh? I don’t think he ever played loig?

He was an ACT Rugby product..... St Edmunds, ACT U20’s, Aus U20’s, Canberra Vikings, Brumbies, Rebels.....

And then NZ.

First & foremost a Wainui product. Chose rugby (or had it chosen on his behalf) when it became clear Union potentially paid better but would've gone back to the dark side had things not gone as they had.

 

[Rugbynutter39]

Mate lomax would never had moved back to nz if could still stay in oz and play for AB’s. Fact is like why a lot of nz’s in oz made the move and stay here as with bigger economy more diverse and better opportunities esp in corporate space. Which is why we would get more nz players interested in playing for oz sides as for some they would see settling and living in oz would set them up better for life after rugby.

If you can’t see how a more open borders would create a better competition think if we said if bath and Leicester could only recruit English players against other teams less restricted by available talent or if Toulon could only recruit French players to play against other top 14 sides with no such restriction.

This is part of why these competitions still have large fan appeal cf super rugby that doesn’t. And people who support those clubs don’t give a crap how many English or French players in the team.

 

[eastman]

If I wasn’t clear I meant that comp should allow free movement of players between the comp regardless of the nationality/ eligibility. Why shouldn’t Michael Hooper play for the Auckland Blues if they offered him a competitive contract. No one is too concerned when SBW played for the Roosters or when Jason Taumololo runs around Townsville.

 

[eastman]

You want the strongest competition and best product possible- if it’s 70% kiwis initially then so be it.

 

[eastman]

How do you propose that Strayan teams accommodate All Blacks within their salary cap? Or are you talking about an exchange of sub-international quality players (in which case why bother)? And are you seriously saying you'd be ok with Hooper swapping NSW for Auckland blue?

I’m saying I would much prefer Rob Thompson playing outside centre than Lalakai Foleti or Alex Newsome- and I promise most fans wouldn’t care at all where he was born.

 

[half]

And yet there are still those who claim that Super Rugby was always a disaster, they always knew it was right from the start.


I know my memory is not as good as it used to be, but I remember it being an absolute sensation. Big crowds, lots of media interest.

No doubt..... it was a big hit in those early years - I still remember the 'razzle dazzle' ads that used to run all the time on FTA.

I've been doing a clean out of VHS tapes and discovered some of semis and finals matches that aired on Prime back in 2000/2001.

But I recall the Brumbies were still averaging good crowds in Canberra up until the late noughties.

Wam & Slim

I was one of those early folks saying it would fail over time. To me it was obvious for a number of reasons.

I have often posted doing nothing is by light years the greater risk, than leaving the existing golden handcuffs media deals.

My stated stance was akin to climate change today, transition from an existing system to a new system. Its not coal today and solar tomorrow. Its solar growing over time to replace coal.

Rugby was never SANZAAR today, no SANZAAR tomorrow. It was always when safe and with revenue streams in place take you time and plan your way out in the early 00’s I said 3 to 4 years in discussing and planning and then a few years to implement. Latter I said we need a minimum of 4 to 5 years to transition.

After the FIFA world cup in SA logic said the revenue and political influence [for SA gov] was in Europe and sooner or latter SA would move to Europe.

For a few years now I have been pushing for a privately own and run league based off USA franchise models. This is still our best option.

We have totally run out of time, the do nothing and hope for the best will be fatal.

Very very very, briefly my reasons pre 2000, where based on pure logic, not competition across the time zones and so few local games could survive, and with League coming off is Super League war, AFL rebuilding from poor management from the late 80’s to the mid 90’s and soccer in its death throws we looked good. Logic said they would I time rebuild.

Today logic tells me we are a game torn apart by self-interest, ego, arse covering, finger pointing, protection of existing revenue streams for self-interest. A rabble in chaos.

The same logic tells me the only way to change; - is for new leadership and systems. To achieve this, we need how we elect the board expanded to include all key stakeholder groups. Further the new board needs to be elected by a broad range of stakeholders.

With a broad range of stakeholders mostly new, I believe there would be the collective wisdom to stop the ship from sinking and set a new course.

Finally, there is hope with a new board elected by independent stakeholders could attack at least the interest of potential investors. The chaos of the current board and the lack of management expertise has us looking like a rabble that no one will come near. Without private finance we are destined to slide down the totem pole

 

[waiopehu oldboy]

I’m saying I would much prefer Rob Thompson playing outside centre than Lalakai Foleti or Alex Newsome- and I promise most fans wouldn’t care at all where he was born.

And I'm saying there's approx 120 guys with a Super Rugby contract & zero chance of ever being an AB. Nothing to stop your clubs signing them but they don't. Why is that? IMO it's because they don't offer a significant enough upgrade on what's already available over there to be worth signing. If NZR rescinded the "must play in NZ to play for NZ" policy tomorrow you might get a few guys at the top end of the pay scale leaving but they'd be going to Japan, UK/ Ireland, or France not Australia.

http://www.greenandgoldrugby.com/community/threads/where-to-for-super-rugby.17402/page-744

See post # 14861.

 

[Rugbynutter39]

You want the strongest competition and best product possible- if it’s 70% kiwis initially then so be it.

Difference is if have say comp of 7 nz teams and 3 oz sides ie 70% kiwis vs 5 kiwi sides and 5 oz sides with still 70% kiwis - you know which comp would have bigger fan base and commercial appeal.

 

[Dan54]

Difference is if have say comp of 7 nz teams and 3 oz sides ie 70% kiwis vs 5 kiwi sides and 5 oz sides with still 70% kiwis - you know which comp would have bigger fan base and commercial appeal.

True RN, and what everyone is forgetting without a reasonably successful Wallaby side Aus rugby will struggle, and you certainly not going to get that witha 70% kiwi representation in Super sides. As WOB has pointed out, as I have time and again, there is nothing to stop the players from coming over here and playing except being picked for ABs, and the majority of NZ rugby players are not going to be an AB. We have seen Daniel Braid and Adam Thompson play for the Reds when their AB days were over, and even those 2 you had a feeling that it was because maybe their days of being starters in NZ super was over, both were successful, but it reinforces what we saying, there has to be something to attract players over here.

 

[Dan54]

I just wondering if Super has a 10 week comp here for this year, and perhaps it maybe after NZ's so would stuff up playing off for winner etc (I think), would be good if travel bubble is up and running how good would it be if RA had a chat with NZRU and got something like a Maori AB team to tour and plat super teams? Would get a bit of TV exposure I think, and get good crowds as you got something for local fans as well as getting kiwis along to games??
Just a thought.

 

[Rugbynutter39]

And I'm saying there's approx 120 guys with a Super Rugby contract & zero chance of ever being an AB. Nothing to stop your clubs signing them but they don't. Why is that? IMO it's because they don't offer a significant enough upgrade on what's already available over there to be worth signing. If NZR rescinded the "must play in NZ to play for NZ" policy tomorrow you might get a few guys at the top end of the pay scale leaving but they'd be going to Japan, UK/ Ireland, or France not Australia.

http://www.greenandgoldrugby.com/community/threads/where-to-for-super-rugby.17402/page-744

See post # 14861.[/quot

You completely miss the point - many of those 120 players have ambition to represent the all blacks and equally teams investing in young players are hoping to unearth the next wallaby or AB. But that is why nz players would be less inclined to play for oz sides as with nz policy out of mind out of sight and equally why oz sides don’t want to invest in nz players knowing if they succeed they are likely to head back to nz to be more visible and on the radar for AB selection. Stacks of examples of that. You are seriously clutching at straws to refute suggestions an open borders policy would not create a more commercially viable and wider fan base trans Tasman competition. You are simply refusing to understand why uk and French comps are so more successful as not restricting the talent pool available to clubs by putting each on more equal footing.

See my response to your post WOB in the box

 

[wamberal]

One of these teams needs to be a Western Sydney team based out of Parramatta Stadium- the team that should have been introduced before Melbourne or Perth ever were added to Super Rugby.

Got any plan to truck in some spectators? I still remember the total embarrassment of the Western Sydney Rams playing in front of a couple of hundred or so family and friends. Admittedly the ground is a lot better now. But.....


IMHO the best place to start would be on boutique grounds close to existing rugby heartlands, with games played in the afternoons. That would be the best chance of getting crowds. Free beer would help.



As I typed this, I recall that when the Central Coast Mariners started out, they had free admission for the first season, might have been longer, just to build up a following.

 

[Dan54]

I just wondering if we look at the graph used earlier in this piece to show who people were supporting in ruuby on tv or whatever, if 34% of them were following NZ teams (and I not sure how it works out), so if we got a domestic comp are we trying to drop another 30% of rugby fans or followers or whatever we call them? Certainly not sure I would call many supporters! Is that going to make it more attractive to TV ?

 

[Rugbynutter39]

True RN, and what everyone is forgetting without a reasonably successful Wallaby side Aus rugby will struggle, and you certainly not going to get that witha 70% kiwi representation in Super sides. As WOB has pointed out, as I have time and again, there is nothing to stop the players from coming over here and playing except being picked for ABs, and the majority of NZ rugby players are not going to be an AB. We have seen Daniel Braid and Adam Thompson play for the Reds when their AB days were over, and even those 2 you had a feeling that it was because maybe their days of being starters in NZ super was over, both were successful, but it reinforces what we saying, there has to be something to attract players over here.

Disagree completely dan see my post 15093 above - you also hate some controls by having quoto’s. As your argument is refuted by EPL where one of most successful comps and has huge uk following. To grow the size of the pie you need an attractive and appealing product which the current super rugby product with closed borders does not support. The only other option is we have a domestic comp and if we could support it that would clearly be the best option, but in view of competition with other football codes we can’t support hence looking at trans Tasman options.

We will have to respectively disagree here as every point you and WOB raise on this just reinforces to me a model where we rely purely on pro rugby model with nz sides with no open borders policy is completely the wrong model for us. A model where we have our own domestic comp and then champions league style comp yes maybe as future model. I enjoy our debates Dan as often we agree on things but here we will agree to disagree. But then again if we all agreed and had a simple solution we might have made this thread about 1/1000th of the size it is.

 

[Rugbynutter39]

Disagree completely dan see my post 15093 above - you also hate some controls by having quoto’s. As your argument is refuted by EPL where one of most successful comps and has huge uk following. To grow the size of the pie you need an attractive and appealing product which the current super rugby product with closed borders does not support. The only other option is we have a domestic comp and if we could support it that would clearly be the best option, but in view of competition with other football codes we can’t support hence looking at trans Tasman options.

We will have to respectively disagree here as every point you and WOB raise on this just reinforces to me a model where we rely purely on pro rugby model with nz sides with no open borders policy is completely the wrong model for us. A model where we have our own domestic comp and then champions league style comp yes maybe as future model. I enjoy our debates Dan as often we agree on things but here we will agree to disagree. But then again if we all agreed and had a simple solution we might have made this thread about 1/1000th of the size it is.

Should also add this open borders policy for a trans Tasman comp is part of a broader set of solutions required as no one magic silver bullet here which includes us sorting out a lot of our shite

 

[WorkingClassRugger]

Super Rugby failed because it could never give us that domestic comp feel, exasperated by the fact that we see what NRL and AFL fans get to enjoy in this country every year. Super Rugby worked at first because the teams were like our traditional rep teams plus an exciting new ACT rep team, and every game felt like a SoO event. Over time however, we felt the lack of a domestic presence and we wanted more teams, and then we rejoiced at the suggestion of the conference system, but all the while SA and NZ never meant it to solve our domestic comp craving because they already had that sorted. Eventually we realised this and became too frustrated to bear Super Rugby anymore.

I actually think a TT comp will eventually frustrate Oz fans in the same way. There are problems if we have too many Oz teams in a TT comp, and there are problems if we have too few teams. But there are also problems if we just try and go with a stand alone NRC model.

However, if we had a revamped NRC with our test players available and a TT comp to follow, then there are lots of advantages:

• The TT comp would no longer need to fulfil that desire for a domestic comp experience in Oz. The NRC does the trick.
• The TT comp would only need to have 3 strong Oz teams to join NZ's 5, and we'd all still be happy. Because NRC. The TT comp would become the best vs the best again. Like the original S12.
• Our 3 teams could go back to acting like proper rep teams, and the TT comp could become like a SoO concept rather than a lengthy competition that tries to emulate a pseudo-domestic comp. Less is more. Every game is an event.
• It might be too risky to have a stand alone NRC, but with a short TT comp that demands revenue because it leaves fans wanting more of its intensity, we might be able to build the NRC and establish any new brand names without losing all our top players.

I have tried to outline a model like this, which I think will also suit NZ fans from an enjoyment perspective, and fit with NZR's goals and systems that have served them so well (because it needs to advantage NZ rugby as well). I also think it ends up a pretty good deal for the Sydney clubs as well.


Anyway, here it is. Have a look and then let me down gently.

https://www.theroar.com.au/2020/05/09/my-blueprint-for-australias-rugby-calendar/

I like the premise of your idea. In being I've long thought that the NRC with real marketing and access to talent would be a far better product to market than Super Rugby to our domestic market. I still think that with tweaks it certainly could be. Being if as RedsHappy suggests that there are indeed people of means willing to buy into the game that the NRC would be the near perfect framework to do so.

But, I do have to agree with the general sentiment of Kiap in regards to what happens to the Force and Rebels in the TT scenario. Ideally, many in NZ would also get their way and move toward a supercharged M10 Cup and then we could go to the NRC and have a TT/Pacific Cup competition between the two.

In that scenario we'd see our domestic league running for 14 rounds and a 16 team Cup competition broken into 4x4 pools playing home and away for a further 6 games. Excluding finals etc. each team would play a minimum of 20 games. Which is a pretty solid schedule if you ask me.

 

[Dan54]

Disagree completely dan see my post 15093 above - you also hate some controls by having quoto’s. As your argument is refuted by EPL where one of most successful comps and has huge uk following. To grow the size of the pie you need an attractive and appealing product which the current super rugby product with closed borders does not support. The only other option is we have a domestic comp and if we could support it that would clearly be the best option, but in view of competition with other football codes we can’t support hence looking at trans Tasman options.

We will have to respectively disagree here as every point you and WOB raise on this just reinforces to me a model where we rely purely on pro rugby model with nz sides with no open borders policy is completely the wrong model for us. A model where we have our own domestic comp and then champions league style comp yes maybe as future model. I enjoy our debates Dan as often we agree on things but here we will agree to disagree. But then again if we all agreed and had a simple solution we might have made this thread about 1/1000th of the size it is.

Mate I have no problem, and happy to agree to disagree, why I like to come here as I believe we can all at times have different views without it being a problem. I would point out that in Wales you have to play for local team, and certainly not hurting rugby comps up there. I don't actually have a problem with Aus teams having NZ players, or Pom,SA etc etc players if they feel that will help them, I agree it would be great. I only say that Aus can't tell NZ to pick players that play in Aus if they choose not to, the same as NZ cannot dictate to Aus who they can and cannot pick. So really apart from that as both me and WOB have said, any player can come and play here if it attractive enough, and at moment it doesn't seem to be.

 

[Quick Hands]

Some very good points there @mst. However, why do any of us assume, as seemingly does RR, that, should RA collapse and be then be entirely, positively re-birthed with new owners, boards and leaders etc that in that very case there would not be attractive new sources of capital to also redesign and execute far better comp structures for Aust rugby, both pro and otherwise?

See this for example: https://www.smh.com.au/sport/rugby-...-rugby-s-future-is-local-20200508-p54r97.html

In that model it's quite conceivable there would be broadcaster interest, probably FTA. Not at $50m pa or anything like that for sure, but maybe a very useful say $8-$10m pa in a drastically lowered cost Aust rugby operation where such $ income levels could really be put to good application vs being wasted on ridiculous exec salaries and grossly excessive overheads as we have today (150 heads in RA, 60 in the QRU, I mean, FFS).

I don't want to get into the Twiggy arguments all over, but it's clear he was and could be again potentially willing to invest serious capital into an RA 2.0, I know of other high net worths that would do the same with serious $s, and let's get WR (World Rugby)'s $16m into an RA 2.0 only once the whole deathly shebang of RA 1.99 is eliminated in its entirety. There are also major PE players looking at various scenarios to invest in Sth Hem rugby in some form.

No one of calibre and means would in any way invest in the current RA and local RUs organisation and governance system. But that does not mean in any sense that there's no good sources of development capital available to support a radically changed and relaunched rugby Australia with viable pro and amateur levels.

(A PS: I would estimate there is probably at least 200 head count positions that could be totally eliminated within the whole of rugby Australia's total set up and no one would know the difference post the departures and related sensible rationalisation. Just the irrational functions duplication across all the RA/RUs is huge.)

Great analysis RH.

We all know that it suits supporters of the status quo and the pan-continental model to make doomsday prophecies.

Of course currently RA has no broadcast agreement and thus severely reduced income for the short term regardless of what model is followed. We know that Super Rugby rugby in its current form is a dud and has no prospect of salvation, whereas a domestic model has a realistic prospect of long term success.

Regardless of what happens there will be less money available for the players in the short term. The game here is broke and if it was a corporation in the business world, it would already be in voluntary administration by now.

As to the claims that every single player on a professional deal will immediately move to Europe or Japan made by some. It simply doesn't stand up to any sort of logical analysis. There's no doubt that most if not all of the top level players would go, but the idea that European clubs have room on their rosters for another 120 full-time professional players is fanciful, particularly when many of the 120 are at best of equal ability and talent with locals. WOB makes this point as to why NZ journeymen type players haven't been signed to Aust teams. Add to this that if players go on a semi-pro basis, then they would need to work to survive in countries which have a much higher cost of living than Australia. So, unless these semi-pro group have an entitlement to an EU or a UK passport then it would be very difficult for them to be signed by European clubs.

 

[Dan54]

If RA does actually collapse like some are suggesting, would that then release all the players to take up contracts elsewhere, which for the safety of their livelihoods I imagine plenty would? I not sure we would not be in pretty dire straits for a few years.