Widnes Vikings to play in World Sevens.

[The Observer]

The only problem is the qualifying tournament, which strikes me as a shocking waste. All these developing nations come all the way to Australia, yet only one gets into the World Sevens?

May as well have them all in the World Sevens, and rather than a few thousand people watch them at St Marys, they would get 30,000 at Aussie Stadium.

http://world.rleague.com/tournaments/sevens/qualifier.php

USA, Italy, Aborigines, NSW Country, Coogee Dolphins, Newtown - nearly all the players were Aus based players. Maori, American Samoa, Cook Islands - mix of Aus and NZ based players. Japan probably used a few Aus based players too.

Cook Islands will be made up of Aus based players next year.

 

[griff]

The only problem is the qualifying tournament, which strikes me as a shocking waste. All these developing nations come all the way to Australia, yet only one gets into the World Sevens?

May as well have them all in the World Sevens, and rather than a few thousand people watch them at St Marys, they would get 30,000 at Aussie Stadium.

http://world.rleague.com/tournaments/sevens/qualifier.php

USA, Italy, Aborigines, NSW Country, Coogee Dolphins, Newtown - nearly all the players were Aus based players. Maori, American Samoa, Cook Islands - mix of Aus and NZ based players. Japan probably used a few Aus based players too.

Cook Islands will be made up of Aus based players next year.

Not sure exactly what point you are making here, but I was thinking mainly of the USA and Japan last year. They didn't use any Australian players as far as I know, and came all the way to Australia only to lose to Australian-based players in the qualifiers.

That's a waste. It would have been great for them to be there, and they would have added a lot to the Sevens (USA were even invited to play an "exhibition game", so why not have them playing real matches?). It would have been good for them and good for the game.

I haven't been following the plans for 2004 qualifiers very closely but I think this time there will be even more countries competing (perhaps Serbia & Montenegro for example). If we have all these countries making the effort to be in Australia at the time of the World Sevens, why relegate them to a second-tier comp which will probably be won by an Australian team?

 

[yakstorm]

Not sure exactly what point you are making here, but I was thinking mainly of the USA and Japan last year. They didn't use any Australian players as far as I know, and came all the way to Australia only to lose to Australian-based players in the qualifiers.

The USA team for both the Qualifer and World Sevens was ALL Australian based players, there were no Americans who flew across for the event.

 

[The Observer]

Not sure exactly what point you are making here, but I was thinking mainly of the USA and Japan last year. They didn't use any Australian players as far as I know, and came all the way to Australia only to lose to Australian-based players in the qualifiers.

The USA team for both the Qualifer and World Sevens was ALL Australian based players, there were no Americans who flew across for the event.

Correct - the USA team called upon Australian players like Roosters Flegg hooker Ian Mortimer (American on his mum's side?, son of Chris) and former Sharks forward Stuart Pierce (IIRC cos his wife has a green card!). They may have called upon some NZers with an American Samoan ancestry.

The USA based players flew over to play St George and some other clubs, but they did after the Sevens.

 

[griff]

Not sure exactly what point you are making here, but I was thinking mainly of the USA and Japan last year. They didn't use any Australian players as far as I know, and came all the way to Australia only to lose to Australian-based players in the qualifiers.

The USA team for both the Qualifer and World Sevens was ALL Australian based players, there were no Americans who flew across for the event.

Correct - the USA team called upon Australian players like Roosters Flegg hooker Ian Mortimer (American on his mum's side?, son of Chris) and former Sharks forward Stuart Pierce (IIRC cos his wife has a green card!). They may have called upon some NZers with an American Samoan ancestry.

The USA based players flew over to play St George and some other clubs, but they did after the Sevens.

Fair enough.

I remember Greg "I played NFL" Smith played in it, so even though he is living in Australia, he is still an American.

Also a former Fijian player who plays both League and Union in the US was there.

The point stands though - if the USA were going to compete at all it would have been better to have them in the main show. If they knew they were in the main event they probably would have sent out a proper national team for it.

The more developing nations in the World Sevens the better. Japan at least should have been there.

 

[yakstorm]

Its all Cost V Benefit

To invite a team over from overseas costs around $50,000 a time to invite them into the competition for airfares, accomodation and other costs whilst over here, food, training facilities, etc.

Now in order for clubs to want the World Sevens, they want to know that it isn't going to make a loss, cause that money has to come from somewhere, and whilst it may not directly hurt them, it still can mean that say for the Kangaroo tour, the profit that tournament makes, the NRL wont get much of a share cause it is paying off the RLWC debt.

Its not a direct cost to them, but it is still a indirect long term cost, something many of the clubs are aware of.

So that factor there limits the number of the potential sides in it. Next lets compare where that 50K a side could go. 50K can fund the entire Pacific Rugby League competition for the season..which is a far bigger benefit than giving USA a handful of games on the field.

 

[East Coast Tiger]

What happened to the Sport England funding that payed for England rep teams to compete overseas? This was the whole reason for an England team last year (as opposed to maybe a club or GB team). If this offer was still there it should cut the RFL's costs significantly, maybe even totally. Has the situation changed re Sport England funding?

 

[deluded pom?]

Is Widnes the best they've got to offer?

No Widnes are the cheapest we`ve got to offer . As they will already be in Australia for warm weather training the RFL won`t have to pay for their flights or their accomodation while they are in Australia.