Nrl should buy super rugby..

[Canard]

It'd be interesting lf the the NRL offered a 'conversion' grant for RU clubs how many would take it at grassroots level. If NRL offered to pay insurance, kits, equipment, train coaches, NRL memberships etc for ten years how many grassroots RU clubs would swap sides? Could be a strategy in weaker RL states?

Say you were RL club president (God Help Us) and Rugby Australia offered this to convert to Union.

What would you do?

 

[Perth Red]

Say you were RL club president (God Help Us) and Rugby Australia offered this to convert to Union.

What would you do?

Depends how my club was travelling, if not well then I'd seriously consider it and put it to the vote.

 

[Canard]

Depends how my club was travelling, if not well then I'd seriously consider it and put it to the vote.

You're not really doing much to dispel the rumour that you're not really a League fan are you?

 

[Perth Red]

You're not really doing much to dispel the rumour that you're not really a League fan are you?

why? If I was running a club then first and foremost Id want the club to thrive.
If the shoe was on the other foot and league was dying and the club looked like folding, I wanted to ensure kids still had something to play and Union was offering a very big carrot then why not?

ps I hate union so Id probably resign and let someone else deal with it lol

 

[Get Rid of The Donkeys]

It'd be interesting lf the the NRL offered a 'conversion' grant for RU clubs how many would take it at grassroots level. If NRL offered to pay insurance, kits, equipment, train coaches, NRL memberships etc for ten years how many grassroots RU clubs would swap sides? Could be a strategy in weaker RL states?

One place this would work well is the inner suburbs of Melbourne.

 

[Canard]

Where has this notion that the inner suburbs of Melbourne are full of Union players, come from?

 

[Vlad59]

Brumbies have looked at relocating to Melbourne, merging with the Melbourne Rebels

I think that Rugby Australia would like them to do these things but they are not interested. Who could blame them?

 

[Vlad59]

One place this would work well is the inner suburbs of Melbourne.

The rugby union clubs in Melbourne are decades old and have no interest in moving to League. At least a couple are nearly a century old. There is a lot of heritage there. Their attitudes to league would be very upper class English snobbery.

 

[Canard]

The rugby union clubs in Melbourne are decades old and have no interest in moving to League. At least a couple are nearly a century old. There is a lot of heritage there. Their attitudes to league would be very upper class English snobbery.

The thing is I don't think Union is struggling at a grass roots level, just the Professionals.

 

[Vlad59]

The thing is I don't think Union is struggling at a grass roots level, just the Professionals.

In Melbourne and Perth that’s exactly the case. These are strong competitions with a lot of tradition. The death of the rebels might knock junior numbers around in Melbourne but not seniors. There are strong school competitions in Melbourne that prop up the game and a big kiwi population as well.

 

[Get Rid of The Donkeys]

The rugby union clubs in Melbourne are decades old and have no interest in moving to League. At least a couple are nearly a century old. There is a lot of heritage there. Their attitudes to league would be very upper class English snobbery.

That's a shame. It will be costly to buy up land to start clubs from scratch.

 

[Canard]

Buy up land???

 

[The Great Dane]

Perth would their junior infrastructure is valuable

brumbies are useless they are dieing anyway

with a core of 3k fans left they offer little

You've got that backwards.

The Force are fine so long as Twiggy continues to underwrite them, and he can afford to underwrite them forever if he so chooses. The Brumbies on the other hand are slowly withering on the vine.

It'll probably take a little while, but the way things are going it's only a matter of time before the Brumbies go under as well unless there's significant structural change in the whole sport of RU in this country. Their case is actually a pretty interesting downfall as it's largely through no fault of their own, which almost never happens.

Most people didn't seem to realise that the Warratahs effectively folded at the end of last season as well. The only reason they so readily agreed to the ARU's centralisation plan and handed their license back is because they were totally screwed with creditors on their tail. They almost certainly would have gone into administration some time in the next few years if the ARU hadn't covered their debts when they handed their license back.

So in effect the ARU has had two clubs fold on them in the last 6 months, a third is teetering on the edge just waiting to be nudged over, and they're $80mil in debt, and that debt is continuing to mount with no obvious path to pay it off. The Lions tour and the WC's in 27 and 29 will undoubtably relieve some of that pressure, but I wouldn't be surprised if they all fail to meet expectations as well (especially if the Wallabies continue to struggle), and that's still an insane downfall from where they were even 10 years ago, let alone 20.

 

[Wb1234]

You've got that backwards.

The Force are fine so long as Twiggy continues to underwrite them, and he can afford to underwrite them forever if he so chooses. The Brumbies on the other hand are slowly withering on the vine.

It'll probably take a little while, but the way things are going it's only a matter of time before the Brumbies go under as well unless there's significant structural change in the whole sport of RU in this country. Their case is actually a pretty interesting downfall as it's largely through no fault of their own, which almost never happens.

Most people didn't seem to realise that the Warratahs effectively folded at the end of last season as well. The only reason they so readily agreed to the ARU's centralisation plan and handed their license back is because they were totally screwed with creditors on their tail. They almost certainly would have gone into administration some time in the next few years if the ARU hadn't covered their debts when they handed their license back.

So in effect the ARU has had two clubs fold on them in the last 6 months, a third is teetering on the edge just waiting to be nudged over, and they're $80mil in debt, and that debt is continuing to mount with no obvious path to pay it off. The Lions tour and the WC's in 27 and 29 will undoubtably relieve some of that pressure, but I wouldn't be surprised if they all fail to meet expectations as well (especially if the Wallabies continue to struggle), and that's still an insane downfall from where they were even 10 years ago, let alone 20.

Happy days seeing them in this state

if the nrl continues as is the whole idea of super rugby in Australia could collapse and it reverts back to semi pro clubs only

 

[The Great Dane]

Can you even just "buy" this though?

Wouldn't the majority of this be reliant on volunteers, parents, kids etc. that are largely unpaid and are clearly Union fans?

Can buying an administration or team just give you carte blanche to do what you want with all its participants?

No you can't technically buy them, but if the only career pathway to play "rugby" professionally locally funnels through your club then it is what it is.

Our experiences of juniors code hopping in pursuit of the best opportunities clearly demonstrates that most people forget about the code wars stuff once money and career opportunities get involved.

 

[The Great Dane]

Happy days seeing them in this state

if the nrl continues as is the whole idea of super rugby in Australia could collapse and it reverts back to semi pro clubs only

They won't revert to semi-pro if they're smart, and their struggles are a double edged sword for RL. In some ways it's good, but for every positive there's a negative as well.

Obviously it's an anecdote, but my experience in Canberra is that RU's struggles is benefiting RL's competitors significantly more so than RL and the NRL, and with some exceptions I'd bet that's the case in most of the rest of the country as well. Take the private school system for example, those kids that traditionally would have played RU in the past are walking straight into the school's AFL, soccer, and basketball programs, and in my experience Brumbies fans that have/are falling off aren't replacing them with Raiders/NRL memberships as a general rule.

 

[The Great Dane]

its very early days for Twiggys investment. They have 3 local kids in the aussie jnr side. A number of jnr Rl players have moved over to their elite pathway program.

Mate the Force have been around since 2006, and they've had a functional local juniors pathway pretty much since day dot that they've largely failed to capitalise on.

Just throwing money at it won't fix RU's problems at any level, and Twiggy's administration has more or less failed to achieve anything other than doing the bare minimum to keep the club alive so far (not that that isn't an impressive feat in of itself BTW). Not saying that they can't turn it around, but frankly they seem to be more than satisfied with simply keeping the club alive and weathering the current storm.

 

[Wb1234]

They won't revert to semi-pro if they're smart, and their struggles are a double edged sword for RL. In some ways it's good, but for every positive there's a negative as well.

Obviously it's an anecdote, but my experience in Canberra is that RU's struggles is benefiting RL's competitors significantly more so than RL and the NRL, and with some exceptions I'd bet that's the case in most of the rest of the country as well. Take the private school system for example, those kids that traditionally would have played RU in the past are walking straight into the school's AFL, soccer, and basketball programs, and in my experience Brumbies fans that have/are falling off aren't replacing them with Raiders/NRL memberships as a general rule.

Let the bean stalks go to afl they are too tall for league anyway

we still get the islanders and others who would never fit in playing afl

union is a parasitic organisation and any time it fails it’s something that should be celebrated

If the death of the Brumbies means no new rectangular ground and afl getting a few more juniors it’s still very positive for rugby league

from juniors sponsors to the fallout on union globally the collapse of union in Australia has many benefits for rugby league

 

[The Great Dane]

Let the bean stalks go to afl they are too tall for league anyway

we still get the islanders and others who would never fit in playing afl

The fans/customers are more important than the participants, and most of them aren't touching RL in my experience. Even then the vast majority of the participants aren't picking up RL. That's especially true of the private school kids; Polynesian, right body shape, whatever, it doesn't matter if RL isn't even an option to you.

union is a parasitic organisation and any time it fails it’s something that should be celebrated

If the death of the Brumbies means no new rectangular ground and afl getting a few more juniors it’s still very positive for rugby league

The Brumbies dying would royally f**k the Raiders at least in the short-mid term.

Their whole juniors system would be f**ked and have to be completely restructured, even then you'd still lose dozens of potential talents in each generation. The Government's grassroots funding for shared programs and infrastructure would instantly be slashed as well, which would be devastating for both sports, and soccer and a few other as well to a varying extents, at the grassroots level.

You can kiss a new stadium and any other major infrastructure goodbye if they go before the ribbon is cut. It'd push it back decades unless the Feds fund it, which would be a double-edged sword in of itself.

I doubt there's a single sponsor or corporate that'd switch to the Raiders if the Brumbies folded that isn't already supporting the Raiders in some form anyway. At this point the Raider's sponsorship space is considerably more expensive than the Brumbies on average, so there's that roadblock as well.

The only genuine benefit is that there'd be less competition for the top junior talent locally, but the Raiders have been winning that battle for years anyway.

So yeah, it'd cause all sorts of serious issues for the Raiders. I tell no lie, it'd dead set be better for the Raiders to buy the Brumbies just to keep them alive than see them fold, well, either that or find a way to privately fund their own stadium and pump 10s of millions of dollars more into junior development and the grassroots yearly.

from juniors sponsors to the fallout on union globally the collapse of union in Australia has many benefits for rugby league

Nah it's more nuanced than that. There're undoubtably benefits, but there're just as many negatives as well. In some places it'd probably work out in RL's favour, but in others it'll have devastating consequences.

 

[Perth Red]

Mate the Force have been around since 2006, and they've had a functional local juniors pathway pretty much since day dot that they've largely failed to capitalise on.

Just throwing money at it won't fix RU's problems at any level, and Twiggy's administration has more or less failed to achieve anything other than doing the bare minimum to keep the club alive so far (not that that isn't an impressive feat in of itself BTW). Not saying that they can't turn it around, but frankly they seem to be more than satisfied with simply keeping the club alive and weathering the current storm.

Reality is you need to spend to gain. Twiggy and his mate have only been pumping millions into Jnr Union here for a coupe of years as covid hit just as he started. It will bare fruit for them, is already. Alongside the demise of the Pirates SG Ball program its gifted them the best 'rugby' (sic) talent in WA.

Forrest's $5m WA donation should settle debate on Force's future, says Pocock

Andrew 'Twiggy' Forrest has an ambitious five-year plan to boost grassroots rugby in the west and already has some big names on board to help.

www.smh.com.au