War looms over provincial competition
By James MacSmith
Sunday, September 11, 2005 Print this article
Email to a friend
The NSWRU is set for a showdown with the other Australian provinces and the ARU over plans for a national provincial competition.
The union reckons the move could be a financial disaster and will kill off the game at grassroots level.
With Australian rugby in a minor crisis after five successive Wallabies losses, there is broad agreement that another tier of rugby, below Super 14 and similar to New Zealand's NPC and South Africa's Currie Cup tournaments, needs to be developed to foster depth in the code.
But NSW officials are at loggerheads with the ARU and two rival provinces over what shape the new model should take.
Plans for an Australian Provincial Competition, involving teams from NSW, Queensland, ACT, WA, Japan and the Pacific Islands, have been floated since May, and there were hopes it would be signed off at a meeting of rugby chief executives in Sydney tomorrow.
advertisement - story continues below
This will now not happen.
There are significant fears the APC is little more than a rehash of the defunct Ricoh Championship, that it will struggle to attract sponsors and fans and will kill off club rugby through a player drain.
Significant moves, however, have been made behind the scenes to bring a national club competition much closer to reality.
The Sun-Herald understands Sydney club bosses have, after years of opposition, taken significant steps towards a rationalisation of the Tooheys New Cup, Australia's leading club competition.
One proposal is for a 12-team competition, with six teams from Sydney, three from the Queensland (mostly likely the Brisbane club competition) and one each from Perth, Melbourne and Canberra. Powerful Sydney clubs such as Sydney University and Eastwood would most likely be able to fulfil the mooted criteria on their own, while others, such as Penrith, Parramatta and West Harbour, would need to merge.
NSWRU chief executive Fraser Neill was reluctant to detail any proposals on expanding the Tooheys New Cup into a national competition, but said his union was against the APC proposal.
"The biggest issue we have is that if it doesn't work we have to live with it," he said. "If we kill club rugby off, that will be the end of it, we won't be able to bring it back. You only have one shot at these things - soccer took 18 months working at the A-League but they look to have got it right.
"Everyone agrees we need a new competition but I have big questions about the viability of the APC proposal and whether it will achieve what we want it to. The feeder system has to accommodate where the players come from.
"Of the players in this year's Super 12, 87 per cent came from NSW and Queensland. The players have an attachment to the clubs and the clubs are a vital part of rugby in this country, something that we need to keep alive. And the feedback from the players about the proposed competition is, 'What does it mean to win it?'."
Neill said he expected the Western Force and the Brumbies would support the proposed APC, while Queensland was likely to join the NSWRU in opposing it.
"If I was Perth or the Brumbies I would be going all out insisting it happen, but we have big doubts about it," he said.
Brumbies chief executive Rob Clarke said he expected heated talks between the provinces and the ARU over the matter.
"There is sure to be spirited discussion on the topic but we have to make sure we do what is best for Australian rugby," he said.
http://www.rugbyheaven.smh.com.au
