Time to call on the club rugby ranks

I watched the ABC match of the day on the weekend and it was the worst quality shute shield match I've seen in 2 years, so perhaps not indicative of the general standard. Having said that I was a huge ARC supporter - I attended games, and at the time it felt like a winner, but apparently I was in the minority.

Mick, It has changed a lot more than once. It has changed from 22 Rounds to 18 rounds and back again, we have had finals series with 5 teama and finals series with 6 teams. The clubs have been broken into pools and played a large finals series. We have seen teams from Canberra come and go, we have seen teams from illawarra come and go. We went trhough a stage of teams being ordered to change the 1st grade jersey to make the competition appear differant. We have had no wallabies playing and we have had a plethora of wallabies playing. We had the introduction of the ARC and the demise of the ARC. Constant changes in the laws. Thats only the changes I can recall with 5 mins of thinking time - about the only constant has been 15 players on the field.

No, it has changed once with the introduction of the Tooheys New Cup or what ever it was. It has now gone back to the way it always was. Club Rugby in Sydney has barely changed since professionalism. The thing that is choking it is the S14, which is why we need to introduce a bridge between club rugby and S14. Like the ARC was

The Shute Shield is what it is, and I for one enjoy it for what it is. The recent Eastwood-Souths game was a cracker, likewise Randwick-Sydney Uni on July 3. Bewildering headline on this piece.

The Shute Shield will never evolve past what it is today. There is far too much self interest amongst the Sydney Clubs. I know this first hand as I have played in that system. A revisit to the ARC concept is certainly worth consideration.

In the 14 years since profgessionalism came into the game the format has probably been changed 7-8 times. NPC and Currie Cup did not change with the introduction or professionalism.

Shute Shield is almost one hundred years old. How much time do you need?

If you left the Shute Shield along for more than 2 years in a row to build some momentum then perhaps in another 50 years it will have developed into an NPC or Currie Cup competition. These competitions (as far as I am aware) have remained pretty much with the same winning concept for many many years. The Shute Shield / Tooheys New Cup / ARC and others have confused pretty much everybody over the last ten years. Hard to get excited over a competition that changes it mind more often than Julia Gillard. Give it some time to develop into something great. Rugby under S14/15 in Aus is never going to get the funds to run a 3rd professional tier of rugby. SA & NZ have one sport they follow and guess what it's Rugby. Instead of comparing Shute Shield to Currie Cup and NPC find out what the next tier (under the Warriors) of Rugby League is like in NZ or how well the amateur sport of Australian Rules goes in SA. Compare Apples with Apples and not Oranges. This is aunique sporting landscape and can't be compared to any other country unless you can name one that runs four professional Football codes in the one season. (Inc Hyundai A League which overlaps) - The countries that might come close do not have our geographic landscape. Ireland have Rugby / Football / Gaelic but Gaelic is completely amateur. Some parts of the UK maybe.

Before the introduction of teams like the force and rebels, rugby in australia needs to follow the lead of NZ and create unions by which the game is governed in all areas, where they have teams reresented in some way by the national competition. The reason the ARC failed to work was because there was no tribalism, no brand building, small crowds, lack of public interest and it inevitalby led to a major loss somewhere around 6 million. This time I'd like to see Australia split into 16 or 18 unions each with their own team in either the first or second divisions of an Austrlian league, exactly like new zealand. Unlike New Zealand there should be a nation 7's competition running after the comp has finished. The unions should include, Qld country (NQ, south western Qld),, Sunshine coast, North Brisbane, South Brisbane, Gold Coast, North and western NSW, central coast, newcastle, Illawarra, ACT, 3 in Sydney, Melbourne, Adelaide, Perth, NT, Tasmania With ten teams in the first division and eight in the second finally a code will cover the whole nation. Unions can become privately owned and unions can play gmes at local grounds, so powerhouse clubs can part own their union. The sevens competition is mainly aimed at taking advatage of the mini revolution. This would involve a salary cap of 250,000 or maybe slightly lower. Played over a 4 or 5 week period. Rugby needs to comete with the likes of AFL and League or even the A-league with free to air civerage and a national cometition.

Brett, I for one would would reprise the ARC. It would have a different role to the super rugby (SR), despite crossovers of purpose. 1. The ARC would be a wholly Australian production whereby SR is not. 2. It would be put up against the NRL & AFL finals series, being played mostly in Sep-Oct. 3. It would provide leading Wallabies an opportunity to refresh before the outgoing November tour. 4. It would allow the selectors to oversee any new talent coming through that might be taken on the November tour. 5. The ARC would be another primary vehicle to develop the game nationally, especillay those areas not represented by SR. 6. Sydney & Brisbane premier rugby (PR) by itself can no longer serve this purpose because the talent is too concentrated in some clubs, & too thin in most others. 7. The ARC would be semi-professional, played on free-to-air at smallish grounds to keep costs down, & perhaps played mid-week to ensure decent TV coverage & exposure. 8. I would initially have 10 teams - Sydney, West Sydney, North Sydney, Newcastle, Gold Coast, Brisbane, Perth, Adelaide, Melbourne & Canberra. Other teams like central Coast, Sunshine Coast, North Qld, Illawarra, etc could be added later. 9. It might be necessary initially to for each team to only play 6-7 matches (plus semis & a final). In other words, everyone won't play everyone else initially. But down the track you could have a 10 round home & away (including double-up local derbies). 10. The purpose would be to use ARC to develop new revenue streams, fan bases, attract new players to the sport & not least provide a tougher forum of competition than Sydney & Brisbane PR.

Brett " but I can be quite easily, as I have no club ties or leanings." Well, I have a club affiliation and I can tell you that I'm all for re-visiting the ARC. I would re-name it to the National Rugby Championship. I wouldn't go down the same route as the previous incarnation re: team names but it should certainly be investigated. So far this season I have been remarkably underwhelmed with the quality if the Shute Shield and an ARC like Championship is a must. There's little chance of it happening next year. Which is a good thing. The ARU could easily begin planning now and have everything sorted come 2012.

exactly. It's time the officialdom at some of the strong clubs pull their heads out of their own arses.

ok so we are accepting that the shute shield is a long way off test rugby. why then did eveyone jump up and down and get excited over drew mitchell scoring a few tries for randwick? he is a professional athelete playing against normal people who have normal jobs and play for fun! of course he should have been scoring tries. the media should not read into the form of pro players playing in an amature comp. imagine if this happened in tennis or golf? i do believe its fantastic that these pro players still turn out for their clubs, it gives their teammates a great thrill, but im sure that they are not doing it for free! if they were why arent the non sydney raised players playing for the struggling parramatas. penriths and west harbours and not the rich eastern suburbs, randwicks, souths and sydney unis? also some interesting reading online about quade cooper looking to play league for the broncos as soon as next season. unbelievable :(

Mick, I don't mind admitting that I was an ARC fan (and remain so), but I can be quite easily, as I have no club ties or leanings. I understand all the arguments put forward by the club types. but the more I see of club rugby (and when comparing it to the ITM Cup - you are correct, yes - and Currie Cup) the more I see the "greater good" argument winning out. Would Cameron Shepperd be better prepared for a possible Wallabies call up this weekend in Christchurch with half a dozen games for Norths, or some outings in an ARC-type comp??

Very good point Brett, A comment was made on another thread yesterday about the two games of rugby on TV at the same time on sat afternoon. One was the Sydney club Rugby match of the day, the other was the NZ ITM Cup (the new name for the NPC I think?) The comment was that there was a huge difference in the quality of the games. While he was right about the difference in quality he failed to understand the different levels of the competitions. The NPC is a provincial representative comp. Club rugby in Sydney is just that. The top level of club Rugby. If we are to develop our club players better we need to bring back the ARC. The worst thing John O'Neill did was to drop this competition after 1 year. It is foolish to think that some club rugby players are going to be able to slot into the Wallaby side.

A thought I've had over the last fortnight or so, is that if club rugby is as strong as it would have us believe it is, why have guys like Josh Tatupu, Luke Rooney, and Christian Lealiifano all headed over to the NPC, and Daniel Halangahu (this year) and Matt Toomua (last year) are having or had stints in the Currie Cup? What made me put this thought out there was going through comments made yesterday on various threads on the Wallabies' lack of depth (or perceptions of), and about the possibility of revisiting the ARC, or developing some kind of national comp to run at the same time as the CC and NPC. It's interesting that after so much opposition at various stages at the time, and since, it would appear that the need for something between club and Super rugby is still as strong as ever...

I'd be happy to not see Mitchell playing for the Wallabies again this year but i don't think there is anyone suitable to replace him. Turner is obviously not in favour, Horne, Ioane and Hynes are all injured and watching Cameron Shepard play club rugby on the weekend he looked slow and short of a run. Once again the Wallabis will be forced to start under performing players due to injuries and a lack of depth.

im sure mr turner has no time for you andrew.

You must be kidding about developing mitchell - he has over 40 caps to his name. He was dropped b/c of his attitude. I would hardly say Mitchell was 'brilliant' against the Boks. He scored a try, made one decent bust and made a couple of tackles. I would say he did his job.

Mitchell was brilliant against the Springboks...last week. I have no time for Turner, he is the Dean Mumm of the backline. If you have the luxury of carrying a guy who has nothing in his game except the ability to finish in a straight line, then he is worthy of consideration. Otherwise, we need to continue to develop and play the guys like JOC, AAC and the Mitchell.