Aussie Pro Rugby
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@voodoo NZ doesn't look much better to me, clubs going belly up, abysmal crowds in stands, i think some of us look at +60k people turning up to an AB's game and think all is fine....what we need to +20k every week for all teams in the super rugby
The fact the AB's can play in chch in the stadium with 25k capacity...and you can still get tickets the week of (that was my experience when living in chch)...aint good
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@Kiwiwomble Yep
The purpose of my post was to paint a depressing picture, not a positive one. I'm actually a bit down on where we go from here, I genuinely think we are in for a long period of NH /SA dominance. Strong and well backed club game, with a really solid test window against quality teams - self-perpetuating stuff.
NZ can maybe replicate the club format (or NPC, I dunno), but that'll take time. And our geographic position means quality tests are always tough to schedule - we have years of experience of France and England sending C teams to play us in June, then we get the Wallabies who suck, and now SA don't want to play us anymore. Playing Japan is fun but ain't gonna solve the issue
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@barbarian said in Aussie Rugby:
I think if you look at Australian rugby with a very long lens (since 1960) then this doesn't look like rock bottom. What it looks like is a reversion to the mean.
And the period from 1990-2003 is the outlier. As the code became more professional, Australia adapted much better than any other nation and were richly rewarded. As the other countries caught up, we've gone back to the pack.
So now we sit were we always have, maybe slightly below. We will rise and fall but the idea we will return to #1 is fanciful.
I've been saying that for years to supporters whose expectations were set on a generation of outliers. People without a sense or knowledge of history. The amount of disbelief when you explain to some of them that the Wallabies have lost to Tonga for example. The sad aspect is it didn't have to be this way, but instead of becoming Ireland, they spent 20 years mismanaging it and squandering the opportunity.
That's why there's the hope that 2025-27 will be a great reset. But as the FIFA WWC showed, you need your team to be successful at the same time. Eddie may well be correct that there's quality in the current squad that will turn into world class players, but that light at the end of the tunnel is very dim.
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@Kiwiwomble said in Aussie Rugby:
@voodoo NZ doesn't look much better to me, clubs going belly up, abysmal crowds in stands, i think some of us look at +60k people turning up to an AB's game and think all is fine....what we need to +20k every week for all teams in the super rugby
Why, when you can watch it from home and not get gouged for food and drinks at a ridiculous nonfamily friendly time?
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@antipodean i cant argue with that...but other sports manage it (and much more), so i think rugby is missing something
@Tim said in Aussie Rugby:
Australia needs to drop two SR teams, or there needs to be more NZ teams. Current competition isn't competitive.
personally i feel that means theyre only going to be developing less than a hundred top players...so i feel the latter is a better option, might lower the average skill level in the short term....but long term i think it will come back up
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@Kiwiwomble said in Aussie Rugby:
@antipodean i cant argue with that...but other sports manage it (and much more), so i think rugby is missing something
I'd change the scheduling so that there was only one marquee game at night and the rest during the day so families could attend. I'd also make it cheaper for families to attend games which drives atmosphere. Better atmosphere, more water cooler talk, more attendance.
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@antipodean said in Aussie Rugby:
@Kiwiwomble said in Aussie Rugby:
@antipodean i cant argue with that...but other sports manage it (and much more), so i think rugby is missing something
I'd change the scheduling so that there was only one marquee game at night and the rest during the day so families could attend. I'd also make it cheaper for families to attend games which drives atmosphere. Better atmosphere, more water cooler talk, more attendance.
definitely
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@antipodean said in Aussie Rugby:
@Kiwiwomble said in Aussie Rugby:
@antipodean i cant argue with that...but other sports manage it (and much more), so i think rugby is missing something
I'd change the scheduling so that there was only one marquee game at night and the rest during the day so families could attend. I'd also make it cheaper for families to attend games which drives atmosphere. Better atmosphere, more water cooler talk, more attendance.
But think of the TV rights holders!
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@NTA said in Aussie Rugby:
@antipodean said in Aussie Rugby:
@Kiwiwomble said in Aussie Rugby:
@antipodean i cant argue with that...but other sports manage it (and much more), so i think rugby is missing something
I'd change the scheduling so that there was only one marquee game at night and the rest during the day so families could attend. I'd also make it cheaper for families to attend games which drives atmosphere. Better atmosphere, more water cooler talk, more attendance.
But think of the TV rights holders!
lol you need an audience for TV
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i cant see why schools cant be part of the pathway
When i was a teenager, i played U13 for "Dunedin Kavanagh" which was an alignment between Dunedin RFC and Kavanagh college, dunedin didn't run teams above U13 until you got to colts...so when you left school you could go back to Dunedin
I went to Otago Boys rather than Kavanagh but there was a pathway available
obviously you could go wherever you like but it just showed how school fit into a system
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@barbarian said in Aussie Rugby:
@NTA No, what he's saying is that the priority of schools isn't to be a part of a pathway.
Now that may be part of the overall systemic problem, but that isn't the schools fault nor should it be on them to fix it.
OK point taken. That being the case, perhaps schools could simultaneously cease activities that harm clubs (player restrictions) and work with the rest of the rugby scene to ensure retention.
EDIT: Because crowing about how many Wallabies you've produced, while actively engaging in behaviour that is harming our systems, is the highest evolution of Shitbird.
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@Kiwiwomble said in Aussie Rugby:
i cant see why schools cant be part of the pathway
Rugby League does it - we have guys in our club who would play school midweek, club weekend for their local RL outfit.
Never a mention of "workload" or "burnout". Probably made some of them tougher.
I look at our top-level rugby injuries and wonder whether they needed more miles in the legs.
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@mariner4life said in Aussie Rugby:
This morning felt like rock bottom for Australian rugby, it really did. And unfortunately for NZ, we are intrinsically tied to them.
There is significant danger that what we are seeing now is not a temporary blip, but the beginning of the end for the code as a serious force.
Everyone knows the current format is not working for them, and interest is at an all-time low. The problem is, what next? The ARU are broke, and it's already a case of community rugby paying up to fund the elite level, rather than the other way around. The two big football codes go from strength to strength, hoover up more fans and more resources, and spend heaps on development pathways. Rugby is two decades behind in this, and catch up is really hard to do.A little over 2 decades ago rugby was flying here. Wallabies were the World Cup holders, we had the Lions series that almost single-handedly re-vamped the concept. The 2003 world cup was one of the best ever. Since then a series of shithouse decisions has been made by i cavalcade of either Sydney investment bankers, or dangerously under-qualified old boys has reduced the code to it's current state, broke, hidden behind a streaming service, best players overseas, and no interest.
And we are slowly getting fucked because of it. Our super rugby teams are getting soft feeding on easy kills for half of the comp. Our skills are deteriorating because we don't need them more then 3 times a season. The Bledisloe lost its shine a decade ago. Super Rugby is going with it. And our major partner is staring down the barrell of irrelevance.
A big issue is, what is probably best for NZ is Australia do nothing, and just continue on the same path. Because the alternatives are a national reset, a process that would take a decade at least, and just further erode our only competition, or they just pack it in all together and leave us with nothing.
Huge danger signs for NZ rugby.
This is convincing me that we don't need to cull Aussie Super Rugby teams in order to be competitive with the Kiwis - just need to hang tight for a few years, until you regress to our level.
