Thunderstruck said:
Just some points to consider about the RLWC (put away your diehard league hat, and put on your general public hat for a moment):
The Union World Cup is on in France in 2007 and I'm pretty sure it's around the same months as this year's Cup. The influx of tourists to Australia for the 2003 RWC should be about the same (maybe larger due to being in Europe) for RWC 2007. Star Sports showed every game in the competition live throughout most of Asia.
I don't know about the cricket world cup (where will it be held anyway?) but Cricket, Union and League mostly share the same market (mainly former British colonies) If all three are to be held at the same time, League will probably be the weakest in terms of awareness of the competition and sport itself.
The RLWC if it is held in 2007 would have their work cut out for them. RLWC never had good marketing effort (look at the 2000 Cup). The 7 year gap may work for their benefit in terms of quality in teams instead of holding it next year (world cups generally runs in 4 year intervals) but may be a joke in the eyes of general public and sceptics.
Union may be boring to die hard league fans but it's the rugby code that average joes of the world know about, if at all. The general public knows little difference if any, between the two rugby codes. I often have to explain the difference when my friends an I watch the RWC, the League Ashes and the NRL games on Star Sports and ABC AsPac.
The 2007 Rugby Union World Cup will be held in September-October, and the Cricket World Cup in May in the West Indies.
I agree, there is no way in the world we should be trying to hold a World Cup in 2007. Holding it in the shadow of the Union World Cup would be disastrous. As you say, Rugby League operates in pretty much the same markets as Cricket and Union and most companies in these markets would have used up most of their sponsorship and TV rights budgets on the Cricket and Union World Cups, leaving little left over for the RLWC.
We should have learnt this lesson alerady. The 2000 RLWC was held when Australia was still in Olympic hangover mode, so failed to register with the sporting public.
Planning to hold a World Cup in 2007 shows the poor planning of Rugby League administrators. You have to be aware of what else is happening in environment at the time.
We have just had 3 of the all-time classic Ashes tests but having them on the same weekend as the RUWC Quarter-Finals, Semi-Finals and Final just ensured that the RUWC dominated coverage in the newspapers and on TV. Any league news was a drop in the ocean, and aside from a very small group of diehards who got up at 5am, if the average person heard about the Ashes series at all, all they would have heard was a 3-0 series win to Australia.
With a bit better planning we could have moved them back or forward a few weeks so they were played in a less cluttered environment.
The future of Rugby League internationally depends on the next RLWC being a success, and for it to be a success you have to stage it in an uncluttered environment. 2007 is clearly not the time, and 2008 isn't much better either.
2005 would be perfect - no Olympics, Commonwealth Games, World Cup soccer, RUWC, Cricket World Cup or European Soccer Championship to get in the way. The only thing is the World Athletics Championships, but that hardly rates with the sporting public in Australia or Britain.
With better planning from the RLIF we would already be well advanced in the planning of a 2005 World Cup.
But there is still more than enough time to ditch the proven failure that is the Tri-Series and stage a 2005 World Cup in Australia, New Zealand and Papua New Guinea.