IRB hail financial success of World Cup

Taking the RWC back to england is, as somebody described, just about $$$$ I have met many English people in recent years and many do not know the difference between League and Union, especially people from the North. That's pretty embarrassing.. People should stop bagging NZ in regards to the WC.... It's like the soccer world cup being in Brazil - whatever happens it will be fantastic as the nation LOVES the sport We should appreciate that.

Also interesting is that Barnes has been dropped and Rolland has been kept on despite two dreadful displays in the Six Nations. For all his criticism for THAT quarter-final, I still think he is one of the best referees around. He's almost in a similar situation to Joubert who will pick up a reputation for his 2011 final performance, but that one game doesn't mean he is a poor referee.

England will get the attendences, but it won't match New Zealand for pure excitement in terms of the attentions of the local audience. The whole point of going to England is purely financial and I would be surprised to see it capture the imagination of the local audience like New Zealand 2011 did.

Well no because New Zealand has a smaller population and even Australia 2003 was at a more suitable time for a European audience to wach which is where the bulk of the TV audience will come from I would assume.

It's funny, on the opening night, we hired a car and I was dropped off 15 minutes from the ground and the traffic was fine. Took the train back to the hotel, though, and didn't get back to the hotel until 2. I was actually fortunate because others at the station had been waiting for an hour.

I started searching for accommodation two/three months out from the event, for a one month stay, gradually moving down the country, taking in several games in the north island. We had to move about a bit (We had to stay in three different places when we were staying in Wellington for example), but the travel company who helped us was superb in finding us accommodation. As I have said persistently but is worth repeating, I had an exceptional time with hosts that were incredibly welcoming.

Don't know where else to put this, but interesting to see that Paddy O'Brien has stepped down as elite refs manager and Bryce Lawrence has been dropped from the international panel.

Crashy Sorry that you were abused by some idiot. I am glad that you enjoyed my homeland.

Whatever gets you through the night Stillmatic. Yes yes, sour grapes no doubt and I don't get out much so thanks for the tips re: bolting doors and the ugly fun world out there. Such insightful life lessons. I don't expect you to man up and own it but "very genorous public" and Quade in the same sentence ?Spare me. Love your work but you seem a bit offended from my comments and have lost all insight like "some people".

so quade got booed during the games and you cry about it? he didnt cry about it and played it all up in the media too. quade was treated like a rockstar by the very generous public wherever he went, but aussies fail to remind themselves of that. he wasnt treated with any disrespect whilst out and about in NZ, but like any sportsman, copped a lot from the fans when he was on the field. the sanctimony is laughable and to claim that kiwis are alone in thinking their excrement doesnt stink, sadly shows a few aussie posters here to be suffering from sour grapes. since its so easy for some people to be offended (and lose all insight), im just going to go ahead and complain about the poor sportsmanship from wallaby fans in hong kong and brisbane last year. but hey, its all subjective and thus with me being a kiwi, it mustnt have happened!! point being, if a little colour in your life affects you so much, then i suggest you bolt the front doors closed and never leave the house. its an ugly, fun world out there and even more ugly, fun and exciting at footy matches around the world. grow up and be a part of it, but just pray and hope you are supporting the right team!!

You were a scalper?

Jiggles, that would help explain why the rest of NZ doesn't like Auckland either!:-)

The NZRU were going cap in hand to the IRB over their loss of revenue due to the RWC Maybe if they had some proper stadiums they would have made more money. 1.35 million in attendance is a big drop on what Australia and France pulled in. Looks like the England RWC will be going from September 4 to October 17 in 2015 so SANZAR didn't get what it wanted in that regard

Lack of games, full stadiums, corporate sponsorship and global media coverage

I was abused at the Australia Italy game by some slack jawed kiwi idiot who was very keen to support the Italians. I told him to go get forked and by half time he disappeard. Despite that the week we had in no was one of the best holidays I have had in along time. Nz is a beautiful place. My wife got sick of me describing it as a rugby nirvana every 10 mins or so....

And also the world cup 2011 absolutely killed 03. You can not compare them for passion and attendance and overall support.

KOG back to his old rants about the reception his Aussies received during the WC surprise surprise. This seemed to be ramped up after the Semi final loss funny that.

Can you get anymore naive than to suggest that in stadiums filled with 10’s of thousands of passionate rugby fans, that there weren’t some unsavoury incidents. Please! Throw alcohol into the equation and it’s the nature of the beast. The facts that Australia had one of the largest travelling supporter groups, we were one of the serious contenders for Bill and a great rivalry already exists between Aus and NZ, and a lot of the crap that goes on at these sort of international sporting events was always going to be coming our way. The problem here isn’t disgruntled Australian fans finding something to vent about, it’s your misguided belief that any faeces originating from NZ don’t stink.

I tried hard to ignore all this. Other posters are correct, it's all been hashed over ad nauseum before. But Rugbug, your subjective comments are exactly that. I think it was a great Cup. I am very happy you guys hosted it and you did a fine job. But spare me the Quade deserved it BS and Mace's comment about NZ haters. Apologies if it wasn't you Mace and while I'm mentioning you I agree with your comments on the Digby tackle wholeheartedly. Just a bit busy/lazy at the moment to write a comment over there. Quade is a boofhead but he didn't deserve what he got Rugbug. That was poor behaviour and certainly became mob mentality. And it's not sour grapes. We were awful in the semi and didn't deserve any better and you guys played well and where certainly deserved winners. With the NZ hating comment, I firmly believe it's very much the other way round which explains the booing and ordinary behaviour to the Aussies who were guests in your country. Anyway, as I said, happy it was a good result and well done NZ. Just save the self ritcheous "quade deserved it" talk along with a lot of Aussie fans deserving it too for being an Aussie one could then also assume. No they didn't and it is blight on what was otherwise a fine NZ performance.

Well KOG, that is simply not true as I got given tickets to the All Blacks vs Argentina quarter final 1 month before the game and had no problem getting both flights and accommodation.