Reshaping Australian Rugby essential for the future

There are many schools particularly public schools that would see the opportunity od winning say $50,000 as a great incentive. But I wouldn't hand it out as cash. It would have to be spent on school specific eqipment to benefit students. I must say, I do like JF's suggestion. Many teacher's give up there time to coach teams outside of normal school hours ( at least at my school they did). Offering them some sort of assistance ( along with a kit program) so they could act as a DO within individual schools could be just as effective. Couple this with School Development Grants to the victorious schools and you could spark great interest outside of the traditional stronghold's of the game.

Well there is no point doing something just for the sake of doing it either which much of this appears to be. Simply put we need a comp in between club and S15 rugby. That was the ARC, its the answer but not on such elaborate terms in the begining. Run it to coincide wth the Currie Cup and ANZ Cup. With One HD you "might" find someone willing to pay for the rights unlike last time. I assume most of the entities would have learned alot about costs last time and shouldnt make the same mistakes with blowouts. As Yikes? said you must have the best players playing in any higher level comp. You cant have rank, unfit amo's playing against pro and semi pro. It may work in football but not in rugby. Also we dont need cups like Euro football. Aussies like home and away with finals. Not one week, cup, one week league etc etc. Keep it simple. As for amateurs playing as long as possible, have you ever thought that many of them are only interested in playing for 15-20 weeks a year? I can tell you in Melbourne that anymore than that are you are little chance of seeing players turning up.

"Having any team ouside of Sydney/Brisbane playing a Syd/Bris team is a complete waste of time and money and will achieve zero" And this is one of the great problems the game faces. Throwing our hands in the air and saying it's too hard will also achieve precisely nothing. As for how long they will be playing - as long as possible. Note that the end of S14 correlates with the change to NCC from local competitions. You don't like the idea, fine. What do you think we should do??

How many weeks a year would you like these amateurs to be playing? Having any team ouside of Sydney/Brisbane playing a Syd/Bris team is a complete waste of time and money and will achieve zero. Sorry to pour cold water on it but the gulf is that big its not funny. A Vic State team might be able to stay within 30 points of a Syd/Bris club team on a given day.

It also sounds like a good incentive to wave around schools thinking about starting a rugby program. A few league schools might make the efffort to bring in a coach and have a crack

It was suggested as an alternative to the big stick to get the private schools on board. Winning = money is a societal maxim so schoolboy players are already exposed to it.

Not sure about this gents, Schoolboy rugby is one of the most pure forms of the sport, I would rather keep the concept of winning = money, out of this form of Rugby. I think money could effectively be spent to promote school rugby in other ways. I would like to see a staff member of each rugby playing school made into a type of mini development officer. They could be paid a small amount on top of their normal salary to be the school's rugby development officer. Maybe something like this already exists? Just a thought.

Invictus I agree. Perhaps RA should look at doing something along those lines. It doesn't need to be a cash payment by the way. Think grants. Building, euipment and so forth. Say the Top 16 are giving enough for them to establish a proper Rugby program with scrum machine, pads, jersey's etc. As you progress further up to the Final the prizes grow to benefit the school as a whole. Say you have a $50,000 euipment grant has the grand prize. This would benefit the whole school and would be very attractive to Public Schools in particular.

Westy Have you joined RA yet. Although some have labelled accusations at you regarding your motives. It is clearly obvious at least to myself that you truly care about the health of the game, especially in Sydney's West. If you haven't and have a facebook page please do. Just look up "Rugby Australia". I'm sure many will find your ideas of the 'how' we can start to rectify the situation helpful. Bay Any idea where and when the first meeting of RA will take place, or is it a little early still.

Westy, easy fixed. West harbour gets told they have to field their juniors in their own district .... :) Go build one!!!

Yikes, thanks for that. fact is that using a blunt stick like funding is always a last resort. If you have to force someone to do something, they are always looking for ways out. Convincing them gets better results. I just can't see GPS ever choosing to give it up. What is the status at the moment with the private schools playing is their zones? They play GPS on weekends don't they? My old CHS school played their games on Wednesday arvos against other schools in their zone. Not on bl00dy weekends!!! That for juniors!!!!

In the beginning some "good" players may not be involved (keep in mind that wallabies players won't be involved a great deal regardless of what competition model is proposed). This may be a necessary sacrifice to get a competition up and running. Over time the concentration of "good" players in Sydney would spread out to other teams for the exact reasons you mention. A desirable outcome in my opinion.

OK, fair enough. Well, if you are not going to draft the best players into the teams that take part in the NCC, then you are left with a comp without the best players. And no matter what the benefits you outline of getting clubs involved and preventing players from having to move to further their careers, a national comp will never work without the best players in my opinion.

The problem with this is that the granting of additional franchises to australia is in the hands of other nations. Why should they help us??

Yikes before the emotion I hope constructive comments from me. All is not doom and gloom. What is required is a changing emphasis towards junior district rugby. Firstly we are starting to do so with a rejuvenation of the Shute shield . the ABC television ratings are good. Secondly with our limited resouces and exposure we need to heavily promote junior district representatives over private shool competitions. It is not in our interests to have ABC television broadcasters or the SMH commenting exclusively on GPS results to the exclusion of others. it would serve our interests to directly promote junior district rep competitions on such occasions. Thirdly the relative competitive position of rugby union in western sydney was stronger in the 1970,s and 80.s than it is now. Whatever resources we can garner need to be pushed into technically competent rugby union coaches at the junior rep level. this would not only be for western sydney but the whole state. I again maintain we are in a stronger position here and in the Hunter than we give ourselves credit . We simply lose out to private school raids/ club rep raids who basically have no juniors and the superior rugby league development pathway. Fourthly in any new points system for each club any club who is able to play a junior who has played 3 consecutive years for a junior district club in that club's geographical district prior to playing Colts sholud not be counted under that points system.if such a player goes onto play first or second grade. promote junior district rugby over all other forms. You will never lose the private schools . You need to reestablish community connection. The last comment is a barb. West harbour could do much for rugby by establishing junior district clubs in Burwood/Strathfield/ Rhodes/Five dock/Stathfield/ Concord/ Canada bay / Homebush etc etc instead of playing their rep teams in other peoples distict club competitions.

And if Warringah want to be in the NCC then they need to get their collective finger out and finish in the top 4 of the shute shield (meaning that the shute shield would suddenly have a whole new level of desperation added to it).

Yikes, Excuse me for using the word draft. It has entirely negative overtones in the rugby context of this country. No, the players would not be forced to relocate outside of their current competition, far too costly. Limited refers to there being a limit on the number of players any one team could bring in (ie players not registered at the club at the start of the season). Wallaby players released to the competition would be exempt of this but also limited in total number per team. The numbers of teams from any particular competition was for discussion purposes and not a hard and fast total. I don't see enough of any competition to be able to accurately judge the worth of any side - and neither do you. The point of my suggestion, other than to get the clubs involved, was to break the cycle of players needing to go to Sydney to further their careers. I liked the ARC, but it is tainted with failure and is unlikely to rise from the grave.

None of that amount from NSWRU goes directly to the individual private schools or their associations (CAS, GPS, ISA) to fund their rugby programs. There would be some funding for NSW Schools' representative teams in there, plus of course any activities run at those schools such as coaching courses or referee training could be considered of benefit to the private schools. But it's hardly "funding" that you would threaten to withhold! Re the ARU amount to ARFSU - That's a big number! I would have to check this, but I believe that would be funding to run both the Division 1 and Division 2 National Schools Championships, both big tournaments. I think there might also be some funding for the Australian Schoolboys to tour, for example the team is touring Ireland/UK in November this year. ARU could threaten to withhold that I suppose - bit of a big stick to wield though just to get some NSW schools into line! Generally, the private schools are accountable to no-one except their Headmasters. Several years ago, the GPS wanted to ban the clean-out at the breakdown from the game, thinking it was dangerous! I think it was only the fact that they couldn't provide enough referees on their own that stopped them...

I might add, without re-litigating ARC and the reasons why it was canned, it's very easy in hindsight for you to sit there and say this and that was daft. I agree the three Sydney teams would have been better placed in the the north, south and west of Sydney rather than CC. But the CC bid was a very attractive one. And I can't help thinking that if one team had played out of the east/south, like Kogarah or Coogee, and no-one turned up, the critics would have said "Why the hell didn't they go to the Central Coast!?" The thinking behind the venues was that the comp had to be in some ways professional. The feedback from the potential sponsors was "We don't want to support a tournament that looks like a scaffolders convention on TV", ie club grounds. They wanted small-ish, but professional stadiums. Bluetongue, Parra, NSO, Members Equity, Ballymore, etc fit the bill. Basically, if you think crowds of 4-5K are unrealistic (as you write), you will never get a national comp for rugby in Australia. Because without those kinds of numbers for attendance, you will never be able to afford the various costs.

As I said in a previous thread, I think private equity for a national comp would be great. But I just don’t see too many sponsors barging down the door to help fund a third tier competition. Let’s face it – you’re only going to get private equity for potentially profitable professional teams which play the whole season – allowing it to build a fan base and media profile and make (lots of) money. No 3rd tier comp will ever do that because of S14/S15 means it can’t form a full season. Keep in mind that SA and NZ have no major season-long football competitors like we have NRL and AFL here. The culture here is that you support your team for the season. This is why extending S14 to S15, going longer and playing a domestic conference is going to make it our de facto national championship.