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Why the ARU needs to beat the NRL to sign prodigies like these

25th August, 2017
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25th August, 2017
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Rugby in Australia has had a very painful 2017 and it’s still far from over. From the debacle with the Western Force, a board that has all but fallen apart and a CEO on the way out, the ARU is losing faithful fans across the country.

But it’s not just the fans that are moving on to other sports.

We saw earlier in the week the story of 21-year-old Rabbitohs young gun Angus Crichton who is plying his trade in the NRL now despite coming up through the ranks of the Waratahs in Super Rugby throughout his entire junior career.

Despite not having played rugby league, he was forced to field an offer from Rabbitohs coach Michael Maguire to join Souths after he was told he wouldn’t be playing first grade rugby for the Tahs for a pretty ridiculous five years because of his age.

Despite being a two-time Australian Schoolboy player, he was forced out of rugby by rugby itself.

Crichton is far from being alone and one of many cases of the ARU and rugby in this country losing the young talent they need to thrive in one of the most vast sporting markets in the world, as they compete with a host of other sports for participation and high-profile athletes.

Case in point, Brooklyn Hardaker.

Hardaker is just 17 years old but he has the ARU and NRL wagging their tails like excited puppies.

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The man is a footy machine and a star of the future regardless of what sport he ends up in, but that’s the problem.

For a struggling ARU, for a struggling Super Rugby side, for a struggling rugby system, it shouldn’t be a question of what sport he may end up in because as soon as that doubt creeps in for a young player looking to break into top flight sport, they already have a foot out the door.

Coming up through the private school system at Waverly, Hardaker has been a first XV shoe-in for the school for years now, progressing up the ladder into the Combined Associated Schools first XV and playing state level for the NSW first XV as well.

The man can play rugby.

Yet, he’s also played SG Ball for the Roosters within their youth development system.

It’s a great opportunity for Brooklyn that any young kid is likely to take, but it’s worrisome for rugby as a sport in Australia that the opportunity was even an option for someone with so much potential.

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Those are the players, the moments and the key battles that the ARU need to be winning to keep their chances of winning any kind of code war alive in a sport-hungry Australian landscape.

The systems that are in place for grassroots rugby, and more importantly, youth development is quite clearly flawed.

In regards to the aforementioned Crichton case, the Rabbitohs own boss Shane Richardson revealed that this wasn’t a rare opportunity for rugby league to jump on.

“We spent a bit of time looking at Angus before he signed,” said Richardson.

“We’ve signed a lot of other rugby kids as well.

“He’s been a revelation for us, and a lot of other (rugby) kids could be too.”

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That’s frightening in itself for rugby clubs and administration, that it comes across as so ridiculously easy for NRL clubs to pick off young rugby stars and take them from the sport for good.

Another example is Rooster and soon to be Newcastle Knight Connor Watson who, at just 21, has been a major player for the Sydney club since last year and signed onto the Knights for big money thanks to his seamless transition to the league code.

Watson came through the private school rugby system, playing for Knox Grammar and into the early stages of rep rugby, but was snatched up far too easily by the Roosters and thrown into the National Youth Competition where he was given the chance to play top level rugby league nearly instantly.

The ARU has a serious problem on it’s hands, but it comes down to every representative level as well.

Super Rugby clubs are letting players slip through their fingers, club rugby sides are losing players to the NRL’s youth development systems as well.

Rugby union in Australia is struggling and the sport is losing participation numbers at the lowest level and that, of course, means that it’s affecting rugby at every level of the game.

Rugby needs to kill this trend in it’s tracks or the sport will continue to fall down a slippery slope.

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Every sport relies on youth and grassroots participation to survive, they rely on that same youth continuing through the correctly managed system’s and creating a competitive and legitimate top flight competition.

That competition drives revenue which goes back into the base grassroots level.

It’s a basic cycle that is somehow being rudely interrupted by administrators and their lack of financial and organisational management.

Brooklyn Hardaker could play for the Kangaroos one day, he could play State of Origin one day, he could become an NRL legend. The limits of potential for any young prodigy is endless but that is being lost on the ARU and rugby in this country apparently.

Hardaker could be a future Waratah or Brumby, he could be a Wallaby in the World Cup, we don’t know.

Michael Hooper Australia Rugby Union Championship Bledisloe Cup Wallabies 2017

(AAP Image/Dean Lewins)

The issue with these two sides of the coin is that the NRL is much more likely at this point in time to find out whether or not he’ll be a Kangaroo and if he’ll be realising that potential in their sport over another.

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Rugby Australia is too tentative with their up and coming talent and it’s costing them dearly.

They leave the door wide open for young talent to walk through into their rival codes and they’re paying the price over and over every year.

More and more players are disenfranchised with the system when they reach crunch time in deciding a destination for their career.

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