It’s time for an Australian television channel to start showing French and Japanese rugby. With the enormous number of Aussie rugby and league stars playing in these competitions, interest in the games is growing daily.
Add to the Aussies the number of other international rugby stars playing in the French competition and Kiwis playing in the Japanese sides and you have a rich spread of interest and potential.
Wallabies, Super 14, All Blacks, Springboks, Irish, Argentinian, British and French stars are littered throughout the French competition.
A match like the Brumbies clash with Toulon featuring Sonny Bill Williams and Jonny Wilkinson, though a one-off, is another example of what we’re missing.
While rugby and other sporting fans can find information about their favourite footballers playing in these international leagues on websites, being able to watch the games is clearly what fans want.
The hits on websites like this one and other sporting sites carrying Rugby runs in to the tens of millions.
The addition of the matches from Europe and Japan would be just what the pay-tv operators, in particular, desperately want – more new subscribers.
And into that mix should be thrown either replays of Sydney Premier Rugby’s ABC-TV Match of the Day or, at the very least, a one hour’s highlights package.
The ABC telecast is on while 95 percent of rugby fans are either playing or attending hundreds of junior and senior games around the city. And ABC-TV news can’t even bring themselves to screen one moment’s highlights of the game in their 7pm. news sports round-up.
The first step would be for Fox Sports to do a trade-off with some of the highlights from their matches for the ABC footage.
Premier Rugby, featuring a host of Super 14 players, should then get multiple replays through the week at times that Rugby fans can actually watch it.
The first objection that would be raised would be the language barrier. Obviously the French and Japanese games are broadcast in the native tongues of both countries.
But these days, at the Seven Network and as other broadcasters have done, they’ve not bothered to spend the money to send their commentators to cover matches “live” but rather called them from the studios in Sydney.
And with the right up-to-date information (players, after all, have numbers on their backs) good commentators and producers who do their homework could call them games easily.
There might even be the facility to find an English speaking commentator in each country who could use one of the broadcast boxes to provide a “local” call, matched with the primary broadcaster’s vision.
Adding to rugby fans’ frustrations is the overwhelming volume of tedious league games being broadcast, with their girly scrums, repetition and predictability. And with overwrought commentary that often far exceeds the activities on the field.
Rugby fans, who want the big, explosive, dynamic action and unpredictability of a rugby match are becoming increasingly fed-up, particularly when they are aware of so many entertaining matches being played in Europe and Japan – but there is no opportunity at the moment to see them.
If Fox Sports won’t do it, Seven or Ten could show some initiative and get the rights to these games and build a new audience, with new sponsors and a new revenue stream.
However, it will take a combination of a television executive with some initiative and vision and a rugby fan base to make some “noise” by contacting the television stations and asking for these games.
Bay35Pablo
Roar Guru
Good news boys!! Apparently One HD is in the running for Super 15 rights, meaning Foxtel might have to pay a motza to keep it!!! http://www.theaustralian.news.com.au/story/0,25197,25938118-5015656,00.html So enough money to cover Melbourne, and $3.5m to boot!! Perhaps JON can spend that on a national club comp, hey Sheek?!?! Alternatively, if One HD gets it, Super 15 on FTA!!!
Steffy
Guest
Do you actually believe this tripe?
Pippinu
Roar Guru
This isn't really my argument, but just thought I'd join in anyway. Damo said: "Rugby does not have a problem of popularity -it has a problem of commodification. How to commodify its product to meet the demand for it. AFL and NRL are doing this very well with I would argue a slightly inferior but simpler product. They have the jump on rugby in terms of mass marketing." In one respect, there is some truth in that (about the commodificatoin). In the early 80s, when the VFL was virtually broke and penniless, they undertook a few study tours to the US and learned from the best in the business about how to run a sporting comp (and that included extracting maximum financial advantage from TV rights). But: 1. The sense I get from reading many of the rugby threads, from ultra keen rugby people, is that they are not the least bit interested in "popularising" rugby. 2. The AFL, as a governing body, runs a comp and game in which they pretty much control every aspect of it. The ARU is not in that postion. 3. The point about what is or isn't "inferior" is a very subjective thing - but one would be silly not to accept that League is just about the perfect sporting product for TV (and this thread is actually about TV, not about which game is better). 4. It would be silly in the extreme to think that aussie rules became a mass product overnight. I mention above that it went through a bleak period where it had zero business sense - but the market was always there, and had been there going back 125 years. You have to bear in mind that as early as the mid 1860s, aussie rules games were attracting crowds of 10,000+ (in a small but growing town, as Melbourne was at the time). So the mass market appeal has been there from day one, it didn't just eventuate in a vacuum.
Norm
Guest
Whether it was a slow league day or not is irrelevant tarpo the point is FTA tv is a double edged sword.
westy
Guest
I am actually glad that the Newlands test was NOT on FTA in prime time. The less people who saw this advertisement for rugby the better.
tarpo
Guest
Norm, It is amazing bonus that channel nine reported anything on rugby, must have been a slow league day was it?
Norm
Guest
On channel 9 news tonight the Springbok point scoring was attributed to Morne Morkel. Not the sort of TV coverage rugby needs.
Nick
Guest
Snap...
Gary
Guest
No way would we tolerate a WA Side in the Shute Shield, we in Perth saw what happened to the flourishing WAFL competition when the Eagles entered the VFL. It was completlly destroyed. Your not going to do the same to Premier Rugby in WA. There is a great deal of animosity in WA towards our players pissing off to play in Sydney this season. The average punter here expects that WA players will play in WA. If you want a side from WA resurect the ARC. Some people here accept that the players recruited from the East to found the Force might want to go home for a while and that Wallabies might find it difficult to fly back across the country when the squad is in full training, but this is a temporary measure that in no way will be accepted as a permanent arrangement. Others are openly hostile. For instance Ryan Cross was reported in the Media as saying he misses his family. This on the same weekend that David Pocock play for UWA, also Ryan's home club. I personally overheard several different conversations along the lines of "Der, your family lives in Perth, come and play for your club where you ought to be."
MyGeneration
Roar Guru
I went to a Perth club rugby game about 10 years ago, and the crowd atmosphere was definitely better than anything I'd seen in Sydney for a while. Not a huge crowd, but well into it. Can't remember the name of the ground. Haven't been to club rugby in Sydney for a while, though.
Gary
Guest
Hopefully as the Perth competition grows and improves in standard, the Force players will be playing where they ought to be playing, in their home clubs in Perth as David Pocock did a couple of weeks ago. BTW going on what has been published here, average crowds at Perth Premier Grade matches would be better than many Sydney matches.
Gary
Guest
No League s not the the preferred Rugby Code in Australia. It's the preferred code in NSW and Queensland if you understand the difference. In WA League barely rates a mention whereas Union is exploding in popularity.
MyGeneration
Roar Guru
Damo, Your argument treats people as mindless dupes in the TV execs cunning game, as typified by the "It could be marbles for all the mass market cares." statement. That to me shows a disrespect for people, and I don't think rugby is going to be well served by disrespecting those who it is trying to attract. It also smacks of sour grapes when you insinuate that people only watch league or AFL because they have no say in the matter, as if they are all being deprived of the rugby they would really love if only they had the opportunity. I'm not sure what core argument I missed. Maybe my rejection of the premise has blinded me. But I don't think it's fallacious logic to quote your own words, disagree with them, and by extension rejection the argument that is based on them. The Marxist line was a bit of a wisecrack, I agree, but the John Ribot point is actually a serious one. Your language is similar to the kind of corporate doublespeak that Ribot used when spruiking Super League, and helped alienate a generation of league fans from the game. Once the game becomes commodified, how is it different from all the other sacks of marbles on the shelf? I have no particular argument to push, other than I don't think your type of language and reasoning bears much relation to the way things actually work. If Rugby gets more FTA coverage and proves to be popular, that's fine with me. But it won't get there by treating people as shills.
Damo
Guest
Norm, My Generatiojn, Thanks for your responses Your reluctance to offer an opposition to my core argument suggests to me that you might not have one. When you react please try to stick to the issue without accusing me of disliking people or being a Marxist. It's a fallacious line of logic to attack the source of a particular view as a means of winning folks to your side of the argument. Rugby does not have FTA coverage for its professional comp. Let it go FTA and then we'll see how unpopular it really is Norm. Till then neither I or you really will now.
Norm
Guest
frankly MyGeneration I think you're being too generous.
Norm
Guest
I also at no time used the adjective 'boring" to describe rugby but don't let truth get in the way of a good story!
MyGeneration
Roar Guru
"Rugby does not have a problem of popularity -it has a problem of commodification. How to commodify its product to meet the demand for it." Sounds like the kind of ridiculous spin that John Ribot would have come up with in the Super League heyday. Or Karl Marx in the Communist Manifesto, I'm not sure which.
MyGeneration
Roar Guru
"Well Norm where do you place lawn bowls, obscure old films...? They are all on FTA and have little or no following." I'm not Norm, but I'll bite. They are on FTA because they are cheap to put on, so it's easy to get the money back on them. Which is done with advertising (I don't know why you put that in the same group). If they see that the return from putting on rugby is greater than the expense, they will put it on. "It could be marbles for all the mass market cares." That's just plain disrespectful and stupid. So you're saying to market rugby as a superior form of marbles? If you want people to like rugby maybe you should like people first.
Damo
Guest
Correction, sorry Norm You did not say 'need' for Masterchef. You said "demand." But again, where is the market "demand" for Masterchef? It was not there till the hypers put it there. Rugby does not have a problem of popularity -it has a problem of commodification. How to commodify its product to meet the demand for it. AFL and NRL are doing this very well with I would argue a slightly inferior but simpler product. They have the jump on rugby in terms of mass marketing.
Damo
Guest
Norm, You said earlier that that the FTA coverage of rugby is purely a matter of economics and that there is not enough following for our 'boring' game. Well Norm where do you place lawn bowls, obscure old films and advertisements? They are all on FTA and have little or no following. Masterchef "satisfies a "need?" you said. What NEED is that, Norm? -A need for mindless crap? Hype is what this is about Norm and your argument is based around a tired old marketing fallacy -that people choose to watch things just because they are popular. Wrong -they choose to watch something from limited choices. With no rugby on FTA I might watch a league game -so what ? Am I proving that league is even more popular - no. I am just making a choice for want of a better choice. If rugby could find its way past the FTA media power brokers we would have a chance to hype its many qualities as is the case in SAfrica and NZ . Do all those people over there only watch rugby because they have no league ? Is it because the poor deprived sods don't know any better? The fact is that the simplicity of league suits the current east coast media set-up. NRL and AFL have the run of the hype. They have the mass market narrative. That is not a rock of popularity. Its a wave that is kept alive by the vested interests. It could be marbles for all the mass market cares. Our great Australian game of rugby should be available free to all Australians so that all Australians can indeed choose. At the moment there is no choice. Its simple market economics ,Norm