National Rugby Championship 2014

[Badger]

More on the Sydney Uni and Balmain JV.

Tentatively named the Sydney Stars and planning to play home games at Leichhardt Oval.

http://www.foxsports.com.au/rugby/b...n-benji-marshall/story-e6frf4pu-1226826415299

 

[RugbyFuture]

oh god what a horrendous name.

Someone tell them to contact me so I can give them a lecture and picture of how they should be branded.

 

[Jagman]

Thanks insider.

I got most of the country players from the guys from NSW who represented combined country against the Lions last year. Others I got from the cockatoos vs Sydney game that was last held in 2012 and Gilbert played #8 for country that day, as did Delit and Walton. Ryan, Carter and Pinchen were the only players I got creative with to add them to the country team.


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

 

[Bruce Ross]

oh god what a horrendous name.

Someone tell them to contact me so I can give them a lecture and picture of how they should be branded.

Before ridiculing the name, RF, you might have been well advised to take 30 seconds to visit the link provided by Badger, which makes it clear that the team name will not be the Sydney Stars.

And as for your generous offer to to give Messrs Mortimer and Livingstone "a lecture", I wouldn't bother waiting by the phone. Any outfit that has Warren Livingstone involved would hardly need to seek outside assistance in branding and marketing.

I'm now quite happy that the new entity, if it eventuates, will not be badged as Sydney University. It is already clear that it will have a very different image and style to the unashamedly conservative and tradition-ridden Sydney University Football Club.

Talk about a marriage of opposites! But I have a feeling that it might work extremely well.
.

 

[Train Without a Station]

I'm actually disappointed to see Uni lose a lot of their identity, but you gotta do what you gotta do to engage the market.

 

[RugbyFuture]

Still with these things Bruce, these competitions are usually bred for participation and end with the conservative take up of the running name.

They've become very wealthy from their craft and I appreciate that they're experts. Experts get it wrong sometimes, particularly in this rushed bid process.

It is a good thing though that they are being setup as a separate entity though. We knew this was coming. May I point out Iain Payten also blatently missed the Rams bid though.

Your aggravation to me is noted however!

 

[Badger]

But I have a feeling that it might work extremely well.

Bruce, I love the idea to engage the kids by involving them in coming up with alternative names and jersey designs. Hopefully, it gives them some "ownership" of the team when it runs out on Leichhardt Oval on a Sunday afternoon.

 

[Bruce Ross]

May I point out Iain Payten also blatently missed the Rams bid though.

I'm very surprised that Iain Payten would miss an important detail, RF. He and I go back a long way. He's the only journo who's ever been prepared to give me any publicity, albeit in a Twitter tweet.
.

 

[RugbyFuture]

I can only hope he'll send me out some regulation detail some day!

(sidenote: my skewed view must just be because the rams brand looks so damned good!)

 

[Hugh Jarse]

Not entirely correct @Bruce Ross.

While not all that "mainstream journalism", does page 45 of this publication count as publicity? (http://www.susf.com.au/files/ROAR_21.pdf)

 

[Bruce Ross]

(sidenote: my skewed view must just be because the rams brand looks so damned good!)

For at least a couple of years, RF, I have been an admirer of your creativity with logos and brands. You are quite gifted in those areas.
.

 

[RugbyFuture]

because behind paywall

Victoria first to tender for NRC
http://www.theaustralian.com.au/spo...o-tender-for-nrc/story-e6frg7o6-1226826537289
ONLY one bid so far has been received, from Victoria, but a further 11 are expected to be lodged before tenders to participate in the new National Rugby Championship officially close later today.
John Boultbee, the long-time rowing and Australian Olympic official who is chairing the NRC Commission charged with setting up Australian rugby’s long-delayed so-called third tier, said yesterday that everything was looking good for the new competition to kick off later this year.
“The Australian Rugby Union board still has to be satisfied that it is a goer from a financial viability point of view but I think that there will be good tenders to look at from what we have been told so far,” Boultbee told The Australian.
“It’s still open as to whether it will be eight, nine or 10 teams. I think there will be, from people who have been talking to us, up to 12 tenders, so a 10-team competition remains a possibility.”
Boultbee conceded all the dots would need to connect for a 10-team competition — expected to be made up of five teams from NSW, two from Queensland and one each from Victoria, the ACT and WA — to be approved.
“Yes, especially the financial viability dots, because we don’t want clubs or Super franchises harming their core businesses by putting money at risk, and we don’t want the ARU or any state unions left holding a baby,” he said. “So there is going to be quite a lot of due diligence around the finances.”
At first glance, it represents the height of audacity by the ARU and its chief executive officer, Bill Pulver, to be pushing ahead with the competition scrapped by his predecessor John O’Neill in 2008, ostensibly because it was uneconomical, at a time when the national body’s own finances are in a deplorable state.
But it is almost a case of the ARU not being able to afford postponing any longer the creation of a tier linking club rugby with Super Rugby, not with the new broadcast deal to be negotiated next year. In order for the broadcast rights to generate the sort of money that will allow the ARU to stop living its present hand-to-mouth existence, it needs more rugby content to sell.
At present, top-line rugby effectively goes into recess from the Super Rugby final at the start of August through to the start of the next competition in February, save for The Rugby Championship and the end-of-year spring tour, a maximum of 11 Tests spread over six months. The NRC would give rugby a continuing presence in the months it traditionally has ceded to the AFL and NRL.
The fact that Melbourne Rising was the first to lodge its tender might almost be interpreted as a show of confidence from the Rebels, the Super Rugby franchise most under strain financially.
Boultbee said the Victorian bid would be examined closely to ensure that the Rebels would not be financially compromised by fielding the Rising side. “That means fitting in with the existing budget or having some new money come in,” Boultbee said.
Rebels CEO Rob Clarke said the tender documents outlined both options — new money and old. “From the outset I set a goal for the Melbourne Rising to wash its face financially,” Clarke said.
The Rising will be able to cut costs by using a lot of existing Rebels infrastructure, including its showcase stadium AAMI Park which Clarke said had offered an excellent base for the NRC side to play its four home matches there.
But the Rebels boss also admitted to being pleasantly surprised by the level of corporate interest being shown in the NRC venture. “There is quite a lot of appetite for this product, in particular because the more modest costs for corporate support appeal to businesses that have a national profile but don’t want to take on a sponsorship at Super Rugby level.”
Meanwhile, the long process of finding a Brumbies CEO to replace Andrew Fagan appears to be drawing to a close, with the announcement of a new ACT Rugby boss expected soon.

 

[Bruce Ross]

Not entirely correct @Bruce Ross.

While not all that "mainstream journalism", does page 45 of this publication count as publicity? (http://www.susf.com.au/files/ROAR_21.pdf)

I didn't count the ROAR acknowledgement, Huge, as the young Sydney Uni Sport staff might have only been brown nosing the President.

By contrast, Iain Payten's elegantly crafted tribute was entirely unsolicited, and all the more appreciated because of that.
.

 

[Hugh Jarse]

An unpaid intern at Sydney Uni Sports perhaps?

 

[Braveheart81]

More on the Sydney Uni and Balmain JV.

Tentatively named the Sydney Stars and planning to play home games at Leichhardt Oval.

This is the best part of this bid.

I'd be tempted to support them purely based on watching some rugby games at Leichhardt Oval.

 

[Lee Grant]

I was chuffed about the mention of due diligence, but I wonder who on the NRC Commission will do it; hopefully a firm with rugger partners will do so, gratis.

I also liked the mention of corporate interest, modest as it is.

People may think that 12 (expected) tenders out of 41 expressions of interest (EOI) is a low fraction but it probably isn't.

Parties had to express their interest formally to be involved in the dialogue of questions and answers and many prudently dropped out after that process. Plus many of the 41 EOIs would likely have been doubles—where the boxes for both individual and joint venture were ticked on the same application.

But the figure of 12 is only "expected".

It depends on the quality of the tenders, but if I were entering into an enterprise where I needed nine, ten or eleven participants I'd like to have more than twelve "expected" tenders.

If I wanted eight participants I'd like twelve definite tenders; so I think that eight (the minimum) is the right number of teams for the NRC in Year 1.

It may be the job of the Commission to do a bit of cajoling to merge the interests of some of the applicants.
.

 

[Dave Beat]

I was chuffed about the mention of due diligence, but I wonder who on the NRC Commission will do it; hopefully a firm with rugger partners will do so, gratis.

I also liked the mention of corporate interest, modest as it is.

People may think that 12 (expected) tenders out of 41 expressions of interest (EOI) is a low fraction but it probably isn't.

Parties had to express their interest formally to be involved in the dialogue of questions and answers and many prudently dropped out after that process. Plus many of the 41 EOIs would likely have been doubles—where the boxes for both individual and joint venture were ticked on the same application.

But the figure of 12 is only "expected".

It depends on the quality of the tenders, but if I were entering into an enterprise where I needed nine, ten or eleven participants I'd like to have more than twelve "expected" tenders.

If I wanted eight participants I'd like twelve definite tenders; so I think that eight (the minimum) is the right number of teams for the NRC in Year 1.

It may be the job of the Commission to do a bit of cajoling to merge the interests of some of the applicants.
.

YES

 

[RugbyFuture]

Just a thought, they're expecting 12 bids, first of all we know Adelaide are on of those extra 2, who's the 12th?

Also, if all twelve teams are viable, how much would it cost extra to implement a 12 team competition?

 

[Jagman]

This is the best part of this bid.

I'd be tempted to support them purely based on watching some rugby games at Leichhardt Oval.

I'm also conflicted. I go for anyone playing against Uni in SS but I was brought up to follow the Balmain Tigers. I could see leichardt oval from my house growing up and if I wasn't at the game I could hear the sounds carry over the water. Obviously I don't care for League any more and I don't care too much for "Wests" but you can't shake those childhood affiliations. If the Uni team wears Balmain colours I'm sold.

 

[Braveheart81]

I'm also conflicted. I go for anyone playing against Uni in SS but I was brought up to follow the Balmain Tigers.

This describes me as well.