Rugby Australia to target top NRL talent - Lomax case settled

[Wb1234]

R360 respond to unions’ threat to ban players from Test rugby

Several of the world’s top rugby unions, including England, warned players against joining the rebel competition

www.independent.co.uk

“The league’s organisers say close to 200 men’s players have agreed to take part in the league, while female players have also been approached as a women’s version remains in the works.”

If this is true that would be amazing

Union could be right on the precipice

 

[Rabbit toes]

“The league’s organisers say close to 200 men’s players have agreed to take part in the league, while female players have also been approached as a women’s version remains in the works.”

If this is true that would be amazing

Union could be right on the precipice

Are they changing the way the game is played? If not, it remains union, which remains boring.

 

[titoelcolombiano]

A

Content appears to be king these days with so many streamers and other similar services. I think this R360 thing is a play to get a slice of the broadcast pie. Whether some on here like it or not, union has a higher global profile than league so that is why they are targeting union rather than league. League will probably loose a few players who go for the money but I don't see it as R360 trying to damage league otherwise they would be playing league not union.

League or union loosing their top 50 players would struggle, we had it with Super League. Fans loose out and the winners are players with fat pay cheques and lawyers.

I am sure the money people behind R360 would prefer soccer given its global profile but we saw what happened a few years ago with a European Super League. Stand to be corrected, but the courts did not rule the proposed rebel league as illegal, I think it found that UEFA does not have a monopoly to run soccer, but that could be European law. The fan backlash was huge. But money talks and that's why UEFA has expanded the teams playing European competitions to appease the clubs that want more money.

Agree that Union has a bigger profile than League in the world, but Union is far from global. I mean, c'mon Miami, Madrid... lol.

Union is popular in New Zealand, the Pacific, UK, France, South Africa and Ireland and has a reasonable following in Australia and Argentina. It is not in the public consciousness in Japan despite the sugar daddy league.

What I described above is an international sport, but it's not a global sport.

 

[Steel Saints]

Are they changing the way the game is played? If not, it remains union, which remains boring.

Ball in play comparison has union at roughly 35-40 minutes, league 50-55 minutes. So there is less entertainment in union. If r360 don't make rule changes, it will be all over in a blink of an eye.

This is why Nawaqanitawase has become a star in the NRL. He has more opportunities to get involved because there is a longer duration of the ball in play in league/ NRL.

 

[Gobsmacked]

Ball in play comparison has union at roughly 35-40 minutes, league 50-55 minutes. So there is less entertainment in union. If r360 don't make rule changes, it will be all over in a blink of an eye.

This is why Nawaqanitawase has become a star in the NRL. He has more opportunities to get involved because there is a longer duration of the ball in play in league/ NRL.

Marky Mark makes mistakes too, like everyone. In League there's enough opportunities to risk mistakes. I think it's going to be a hard adjustment with that. Make a couple of errors and it turns out to be your whole game.

 

[Canard]

If there's nothing the NRL can do to stop players leaving it will be interesting to see if the ratings, crowds and broadcast money continue to rise if the NRL is missing Walsh, Haas, Cleary, Munster...etc

There is only a finite number of NRL players they would recruit.

Im not saying the loss of the above 4 or 5 stars wouldn't have some affect, but I feel people would very quickly move on. RL is a very resilient sport in that respect.

The strength of any sport is its tribalism, and I can't see people suddenly being huge fans of the Dubai Dogrooters for example.

 

[Trifili13]

A

Agree that Union has a bigger profile than League in the world, but Union is far from global. I mean, c'mon Miami, Madrid... lol.

Union is popular in New Zealand, the Pacific, UK, France, South Africa and Ireland and has a reasonable following in Australia and Argentina. It is not in the public consciousness in Japan despite the sugar daddy league.

What I described above is an international sport, but it's not a global sport.

Yes, I use the term global loosely. Apart from soccer and say basketball, there are few truly global team sports played at a high standard by multiple countries.

And some of the cities R360 propose to play at have little or no exposure to union. Weird. Maybe some of the financial backers are from there or R360 will be paid by those cities. Who knows.

 

[Canard]

Ball in play comparison has union at roughly 35-40 minutes, league 50-55 minutes. So there is less entertainment in union. If r360 don't make rule changes, it will be all over in a blink of an eye.

Its a Union comp, make no mistake.

Of course League is a better sport (the best in the world in fact), but that's not how its perceived outside of Australia unfortunately.

Im not sure its viable regardless of it being Union, League or Ping Pong.

 

[Trifili13]

There is only a finite number of NRL players they would recruit.

Im not saying the loss of the above 4 or 5 stars wouldn't have some affect, but I feel people would very quickly move on. RL is a very resilient sport in that respect.

The strength of any sport is its tribalism, and I can't see people suddenly being huge fans of the Dubai Dogrooters for example.

Mitchell Pearce and Joel Monaghan might be. That's 2 to start with and they build up their supporter base from there.

 

[BuffaloRules]

Jye Gray to remain at Souths

Jye Gray knocks back R360 to remain a Rabbitoh

Despite a huge offer to switch codes to breakaway competition Rugby 360, rising Rabbitohs star Jye Gray will remain at South Sydney.

www.smh.com.au

 

[Canard]

Jye Gray to remain at Souths

Jye Gray knocks back R360 to remain a Rabbitoh

Despite a huge offer to switch codes to breakaway competition Rugby 360, rising Rabbitohs star Jye Gray will remain at South Sydney.

www.smh.com.au

Thank God, I dont think the game could recover from losing such a superstar.

 

[Steel Saints]

Its a Union comp, make no mistake.

Of course League is a better sport (the best in the world in fact), but that's not how its perceived outside of Australia unfortunately.

Im not sure its viable regardless of it being Union, League or Ping Pong.

Yeah unfortunately not many countries know about rugby league. I don't mind the concept of "Global Round", provided that the NRL go to places strategically which would benefit the code, on and off the field. I can't see that happening in Miami, Dubai or Hong Kong though.

 

[Wb1234]

Yeah unfortunately not many countries know about rugby league. I don't mind the concept of "Global Round", provided that the NRL go to places strategically which would benefit the code, on and off the field. I can't see that happening in Miami, Dubai or Hong Kong though.

It’s a future play to get big international streamers like Disney / espn etc interested in future tv deals

When he approached them last time they said league doesn’t have a big enough global presence

Leagues problem is it’s never tried to expand globally too much bc it doesn’t have the money

It’s the kind of sport you can show people and they are instantly blown away by it

If it wasn’t for the super league war league would be doing way more stuff internationally

Pvl needs to ensure dominance in Australia / nz / Samoa Tonga Fiji / png as the platform for global expansion

Talk about Hong Kong or Dubai doesn’t mean much when nz is potentially there for the taking if they throw in a Christchurch nrl team and maybe follow it with one in Wellington 5 years later

 

[Perth Red]

Pvl needs to ensure dominance in Australia / nz / Samoa Tonga Fiji / png as the platform for global expansion

all tiny countries with little financial and global clout. Reality is if rl ever wants to be taken seriously on the international stage we would need another 2-3 ‘big’ countries to get on board and have pro leagues. There has been zero indication for a century of that happening (aside for France 100 years ago and nothing since). I’ll be long gone before rugby league has a decent international profile beyond its current boundaries.

 

[kurt faulk]

all tiny countries with little financial and global clout. Reality is if rl ever wants to be taken seriously on the international stage we would need another 2-3 ‘big’ countries to get on board and have pro leagues. There has been zero indication for a century of that happening (aside for France 100 years ago and nothing since). I’ll be long gone before rugby league has a decent international profile beyond its current boundaries.

What's wrong with it’s current boundaries? Make it the game of the pacific and it will stay strong forever. After they dominate the pacific, which is a big job in itself, then they can work on some other place.

PVL is already working on rejuvenating England. That's a slow burner to start with.

.

 

[Dark Corner]

If there's nothing the NRL can do to stop players leaving it will be interesting to see if the ratings, crowds and broadcast money continue to rise if the NRL is missing Walsh, Haas, Cleary, Munster...etc

If the NRL and all the world's Union comps are devoid of stars they'll all take big hits.

Over on the Roar the Union mob are worried if the top 50 players leave Super Rugby Chanel 9 will be not be paying Rugby Australia for an inferior product.

I really hope it doesn't take off or if it does it Union thats gets the side effects and not League as I would hate to see another Super League fall out as it was nice at all with the damage done to the game.
I used to think Mike Tindell was okay as he would have cross code games for charity but I hate the f**ker now.

 

[taste2taste]

Looks like Tevita Pangia Jnr has signed with R360.

Hes told Warrington he won't be there next season despite being under contract.

 

[taste2taste]

Peter Fitzsimmons article form the smh

Wither R360? I certainly hope so!
For right up until the sudden release of Ryan Papenhuyzen by the Melbourne Storm this week – and we’ll get to that – things had gone very quiet from that direction. My guess was that when the serious people crunched the serious numbers, the all too obvious was apparent.
That is, while it is one thing for the likes of Mike Tindall to throw around the big numbers and maintain there is a fortune to be made by setting up rugby franchises in well-known rugby strongholds like Lisbon, Miami, and Boston, surely wiser heads have prevailed when the time came to write the cheques.
Other revolutions in sport, like World Series Cricket, and to a lesser extent Super League, were able to succeed by filling the vacuum – players had been ludicrously underpaid, so another entity could pay them many multiples of their previous salary, and still make a huge profit themselves.

Seriously, who thinks that is the case with both professional union and league players these days? The economies of cities like Sydney, Brisbane, Paris, and London, already produce million-dollar-plus salaries for their better footballers. That is in genuine rugby and rugby league strongholds.
By what magic alchemy will Lisbon, Miami and Boston produce much bigger salaries?

Perhaps it is by TV money? Nup. In those ultra-competitive and established markets, broadcasters are already standing on tiptoes to pay top-dollar against serious competition. Look at what happened with LIV Golf. Despite all that hoopla, and all that carry-on, they’ve lost more than a billion since they got started because no one is watching. Look at the NRL playing their matches in Las Vegas. All that hoopla, all that carry-on, and how many people watched their opening matches in America? 50,000.

I repeat. 50,000! And that was for top-flight NRL games.

I could go on – and at some length at that – but the central point remains. Nothing about R360 makes sense commercially. None of the pin-stripe brigade that actually understands the dynamics of rugby union could think this is going to work.
LIV pissed off golf people the world over and made no one feel good about Saudi Arabia. Why would R360 work any better by pissing off rugby and rugby league people around the world, too?
Is Ryan Papenhuyzen’s sudden move out of league a mere harbinger of what is to come? Has he done it because he has R360 money in the bank and wants a clean transfer?
It is possible, I guess. But the way these things work is that the rebels sign contracts promising them squillions if they get the funding. Then the circus-masters take the hundreds of contracts to the Big Money Bovver Boys and say, “We have the teams, ready to go, so give us the money.”
Then there’s the huge announcement, and Thunderbirds are go. And always, in the lead-up to the big announcement, there are weeks of leaks: a series of superstars known to have signed.

Here, we have had a few names bandied about, but that’s it. When I interviewed Harry Wilson about it at the Cauliflower Club last month, he was relaxed on the subject. There had been talk about it, certainly, but he was clearly unaware of any big-name players who had signed.
Papenhuyzen aside, it feels like the thing is fading, which is to the good. But this next fortnight should tell the tale.

 

[Foreign Legion]

Fitzys freakin out now, lol... and he'll blame the NRL for it

 

[Canard]

What's wrong with it’s current boundaries? Make it the game of the pacific and it will stay strong forever. After they dominate the pacific, which is a big job in itself, then they can work on some other place.

PVL is already working on rejuvenating England. That's a slow burner to start with.

.

We already are the biggest sport in the Pacific, because we are the biggest sport in Australia.

Which is the only economy worth a pinch of shit on a global scale.

Being "big" in Samoa isn't moving the needle at all globally.