The Roar
The Roar

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90 minute Rugby Q&A, live from midday AEST

7th April, 2014
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Rugby World Cup (AP Photo/Adam Butler).
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7th April, 2014
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Heaps going on in Australian rugby of late and we thought it would be worth unearthing the trusty old Q&A session format that has gone so well in the past. So get your questions in now, and I’ll be online today for 90 minutes, from midday AEST.

For starters, Super Rugby has been simultaneously surprising and predictable. Plenty of teams that were expected to do well are, while a few teams expected to struggle are playing very well, too.

The home-team advantage has taken on extra importance in 2014, with the win rate in favour of the home side still sitting up near 80%, and that’s despite three teams winning away from home in Round 8. Furthermore, it’s remarkable it’s taken this long for Australian and New Zealand teams to win in South Africa.

Is the Western Force’s current, well-deserved top-six position an indication of a shift in power with Australian rugby? What do we make of the Chiefs, after two get-out-of-jail draws in South Africa, and a major blow in the form of Aaron Cruden’s broken thumb? Are the Crusaders getting back into their groove, or was last week’s win the anomaly? And has the Lions’ bubble finally burst, even before they leave Africa?

Today’s Q&A is probably a good closer to our recent interactions with Bill Pulver, too. For one thing, I was quite surprised to read that Australia’s preferred model for Super Rugby beyond 2015 was cast aside – to the point that I actually wonder how hard the ARU pushed it, or argued for it.

Pulver’s subsequent admission over the weekend that “we don’t always make decisions that are exclusively for the good of Australian rugby” was staggering in its frankness, but more so that the head of a national sporting body would make decisions for the benefit of anyone other than the constituents they are employed to represent.

Can you ever envisage Andrew Demitriou saying, “We don’t always make decisions that are exclusively for the good of Australian Rules football”? Neither can I.

Equally worrying for Australian rugby are reports the player’s association continued to push the trans-Tasman model to SANZAR in Singapore recently. It’s hardly the first time, but it’s never a good look for the game when the ARU and RUPA are on not just different pages, but in completely different books.

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So please, start firing in your questions now, and I’ll be online live from midday to cover as many as possible in 90 minutes.

Australian rugby, the ARU, Super Rugby, expansion, whatever. It’s all worth talking about. Heck, you can even ask when I’ll stop tipping against your team, if it’s really causing that much angst.

See you online from midday.

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