Going global in rugby league's brave new world

rugby league and union will be battleing for the title spot as Australias biggest winter sport within 10 years. I predict big things from league (and union :) ) as they say in the land of the long white cloud, you would have to be un-Australian not to like/ love rugby league.

The simple answer is rugby league has never tried to expand internationally to any great extent. And certainly not with any co-ordinated structure like rugby union. As that changes, rugby league will continue to grow. Much as it has to now boast more than 50 playing nations around the world.

good article steve. And realistic too .. Im a union player and supporter ... and I realise union in Australia will always be behind AFL and NRL .. but the truth is that Union has an international aspect, and soccer dominates winter codes internationally. But I do get a bit sick of AFL loonies going on about intl potential because a bunch of people play 7 a side afl in a public park, between trees and a bbq .. twice a year. Your article was balanced and accepted the current reality, of league existing in small pockets, but having potential for growt. I think League does have potential for growth .. especially in Europe and countries like Spain, where there is a base of union interest, but also an interest in a less complicated game (union is hard to understand for beginners), and a sport not for the giants that now tend to dominate union (Spain has a size problem in rugby.. in my club in Spain our backline was Spanish .. but the forward pack was made up of Aussies, British, Romanians, and Argentinians .. as the Spanish simply didnt have the size to be union forwards). Im currently living in South America, where union has a presence as the second major winter sport .. though obviously miles behind soccer .. people here have heard of Rugby 13, as league is known, but it has never been played here. Would be interesting for someone to try it here one day ... especially as Argentina and their players always feels "left out" by the International Rugby Board and the fact that their players have to go to Europe to become professionals and cant play for Aussie or NZ teams in the Super 14. Argentinians playing league in Australia would be a bit closer to home ...

So we did. But I wasn't sure it was you who posted there. Anyway I am in the process of contacting the authors of the Puttingrugbyfirst report to see if anything eventuated. At this stage the only tangible thing they seemed to have achieved is setting up some Touch Football competitions in the UK & Ireland.

Obviously Jim Wilson, does not like either rugby or australian rules football, doing the same thing in Australian football threads. Was there a newspaper cloumist by the name of Jim Wlison, seem to remember someone of that name writing for the herald sun (sports)in Melbourne years ago.

the biggest worry is that you are going back in threads six months to do this

we already debated this and found that those comments were based on misinformation, it was discussed in the american cone of silence hread.

& now a reality check: http://www.puttingrugbyfirst.com/executive_summary.php Extract "1.2 Rugby today Rugby’s main issue is its narrow global footprint: its popularity is largely limited to the Foundation Unions¹ – eight relatively small countries. Rugby is not played or followed, to any significant degree, in the large and fastgrowing nations that will be the engines of the world’s future economic growth. According to the International Rugby Board (IRB), there are more than four million registered players worldwide, but more than half are from England and over threequarters (3.3 million) come from the eight Foundation Unions overall. Meanwhile, there are less than a quarter of a million players in the ten most populous nations of the world (China, India, USA, Indonesia, Brazil, Pakistan, Bangladesh, Russia, Nigeria, and Japan). Television audience data for the 2007 World Cup final, between South Africa and England, shows that 97% of the 33 million total viewers came from the Foundation Unions – with just half a million viewers of the final spread amongst all the remaining nations where it was shown live. There are 115 members of the IRB – but rugby is evidently not particularly popular in most of them..."

Things seem to be picking-up in Lebanon for RL. -a couple of extra clubs & official status from the Lebanese Government. http://www.lebrl.com/articles.php?id=14 Safety Union is still a dangerous game unfortunately: http://www.nytimes.com/2009/12/16/sports/16rugby.html?_r=1&pagewanted=2 "…A seven-year study of an Australian professional squad concluded that a match causes an average of 1.4 serious injuries, twice the rate of football. The national insurance provider of New Zealand, where rugby is the national sport, ranks rugby playing as its most dangerous occupation, ahead of horse racing and logging...

Czech Republic and Serbia have 2 of the strongest ametaur comps in europe

When Calans R.L have a couple of bad seasons theyll vanish . A plane load of Ozzies will then be parachuted into Germany to form the Heidleburg Broncos . Widness and Barrow will be ignored as they dont fit . R.S.L will blame Vichey France and middle class England for their latest debacle...oh , the BBc too.

I watch League and am a Dragons supporter, but can only watch a handful of games before the boredom kicks in, every team plays the same kinda game no imagination, lucky the game has the likes of Hayne and Inglis cause otherwise it would have no spark at all. Oh yes you forgot, ruck, maul, up and under kicks, real forward hit ups supported by other players, passing to the wing (never happens in league until 5 metres out), lineouts, scrums, dropkicks, set plays. Rugby in general is about the ball but in league there is no competition for the ball.

As opposed to ruck ball, take one up hit for no gain, ruck again, repeat until the eventual penalty is awarded. Kick for goal and win the game! You see, if you don't actually watch the game, then why comment on it. You just show that you have your head in the sand because you want to believe that your game is better, no matter what is going on in the rest of the sporting world.

League = run straight four or five times, get tackled but dont worry about protecting the ball the other team is barely allowed to touch it if you have it, then kick, if close to try line again kick hoping in the mess your team dots it down. Do this 10 - 20 times a game, very boring...

I agree, too late now, its competition is Union who are already too far ahead (see: Rugby World cup as the 3rd biggest sporting event in the world after the Olympics and Soccer World Cup) for League ever to catch up, will always be an Aus PNG and Northern England sport. The french will never take it they like their rugby too much, neither will the Safa's or Kiwi's.

As a south african living in south africa(sorry this is so late after all these posts had been made) the reason why there isnt a south african franchise in the nrl is because SA like most other countries dont give a CRAP about league! in living memory i think they have shown league twice on national television and everyone i was with watch it for about 10 mins said this crap and switched back over to the super 14.....and for your and the entire australian publics information, rugby union isnt a white sport, more black people play rugby than white in south african, its just because of the social inequalities that presently exsists(and is changing despite some of our useless politicains getting in the way) white youths have better access to development structures. Union is growing faster than league will ever hope to grow: Three main reason....... union did away with the shoulder barge and strict sanctions for dangerous tackling which made it safer and thus more appealing to parents for their children. despite all the laws(that hopefully will start being refind in the near future) there is alot of mini battles happening on the feild, with loads of farious tactics that each team can adopt according to their strengthes and weaknesses where as league is uniform and Monotonous in this regard. its a game for all sizes. at every aspect of play the ball can be contested for which gives the game a sense of unpredictability(in the case of equally matched sides

Completely agree with the lead story here - administrators are much maligned, and usually with good cause, but at least they are trying to do something. If you look at Australia historically, for years the AFL was providing money into development all around Australia. They were aware of their strengths outside Vic (SA, WA, Tas), and we aware of where they needed more investment to overcome league and union (NSW, Qld, NT). They chose to build local competitions, campaign for top level games to be shown on TV - just so people were at least aware of the competition. Then, when all these areas were built sufficiently, they chose to responsibly expand into large cities, through either relocation, mergers or new teams. That way, they were guaranteed a level of support and could hit the ground running. I know there are a few other advantages AFL had over the rugbies, such as the AFL not having the competition that league and union had (support for 'footy' in the northern states was always split between union and league - AFL never had to deal with this [cmon, noone cared about soccer 50 years ago]). The AFL also didnt have to deal with super league. Anyway, the AFL chose to build responsibly over time while League and union were content with their strongholds. Now, league has seen that this was a big error, and are actually trying to grow. danwighton.

I think thats a good idea - that way the good of the game will be the priority, not the interests (and hip pockets) of individual clubs.

bahahaha i laughed hard when i read this. i have been to moscow and belgrade and i can tell you that nobody there cares the tiniest bit about rugby and its no more than a novelty token. theyre obsessed with their football and tennis (technical sports). there is limited demand for a sport like this anywhere else. the time or expansion had passed its too little too late now. union might do well but league is the little and unwanted brother

Rugby as a brand has to compete with Football et al in the international arena. League over the years as a professional sport has been very lax at selling it's particular code. Union has shown the way in the short time it has been a professional sport. It has been marketed more aggressively and league could follow in it's slipstream. Funnily enough if 7's becomes an Olympic sport it might help the growth of League as there are some similarities. By the way I am a STH at both Quins and Quins RL.