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Australian rugby is in the doldrums. As evidence, you only need to look at the level of excitement generated by beating the 10th-ranked side in the world.
Watching Australian rugby in the last 10 years has been much like watching a car crash in super-super slow mo. Why are we so rubbish now?
There are a number of theories, but the answer must surely be intrinsic.
Our playing roster is weak, and commercially in Australia, rugby is weak as well. The two are obviously linked.
If there is more cash to splash around, the game in Australia will clearly benefit within its playing roster.
In April, the ARU announced a loss of more than $8 million. They cited diluted broadcasting revenue due to a strong Australian dollar as a cause.
Maybe, but there was also no mention of the advantages of increased overseas purchasing power either. But that’s irrelevant.
In my opinion, this is a symptom of the problem, rather than the problem itself. Australian rugby league has no such issue, as most of their broadcasting revenue is derived locally from the NRL.
I would argue that a healthy game should profit regardless of currency movements. Equally, sponsorships and gate receipts contribute more than broadcasting revenue anyway.
Attendances at Wallaby and Super Rugby matches show the real problem – the game is on the nose with the average Joe.
The first Bledisloe Test this year, which you would have to say is one of the marquee rugby events in the world each year, attracted less than 70,000 spectators. There were more than 12,000 seats that remained unfilled.
Not so long ago I was part of a world record 109,874 spectators watching a gem of a game at the same stadium (albeit unmodified from its Olympic dimensions) – but I would counter that if there were 130,000 tickets to sell, they would have sold without a problem on that day.
The last live match I went to was the Waratahs vs Hurricanes last year, which attracted a bumper crowd of around 13,000 (sarcasm in case it wasn’t noted).
New Zealand and South Africa happen to wield more power and derive more income from SANZAR broadcasting deals due to their third-tier tournaments, the NPC and the Currie Cup.
Unfortunately, when a foundation team is pulling the kinds of figures the Waratahs have been managing, Australia is not in a position to successfully stage a third-tier tournament.
New Zealand and South Africa are extremely tribal and their provincial clashes generate interest in their respective markets. Ask a random Sydneysider, though, who the Force and Rebels are, and they won’t know.
They certainly won’t care about an even lower tournament. Third-tier tournaments are not the answer for Australia. For the moment.
Gordon Ramsay, love him or hate him, knows a few things about successful enterprises. His mantra is only to listen to the people who complain about his products and services, because it’s these people who can offer the best insight into how to improve.
Not the backslappers. Using this mantra, the people to listen to would be people who have chosen to adopt one of the competitor codes – NRL, AFL and A-League.
There would of course be large segments within each of these codes who are diehard and would never change, but there would also be a large pool of ‘swinging voters’ who could be convinced to start watching or playing again.
Just imagine snaring 10 percent of rugby league’s playing pool of 1.43 million participants – this would swell Australian rugby union’s playing pool of 323,000 by 44 percent!
And with rugby league, you are talking about people located geographically in the same general locations, with very similar base skill sets (catching, passing, kicking, tackling). They are the easiest ones to convert.
By increasing interest in the game, this will of course translate into higher gate receipts, higher sponsorships, and greater television audiences, giving the ARU more leverage when negotiating the splits in SANZAR broadcast deals.
Higher income equals more profit, meaning more money to distribute to grassroots, or talented, high profile Israel Folau types.
So an important question is then: What are the parts of the game that irk the people who are tuning into the other codes?
The repeating themes I hear from disgruntled people are the constant reliance on penalty goals, the constant kicking in general play, the confusing rules around the scrum and the breakdown, and the constant scrum resets.
I may be a diehard rugby fan, but I’d agree with all of these too.
I don’t have all the answers, but I could put forward a few ideas that are worth looking at, because we can either modify the game to make it more watchable for a bigger audience, or we can continue with traditional rules and remain on the fringes.
Many people are in favour of reducing the value of penalty goals. I am one of these people. Think of this from a mathematical perspective.
On average, kickers these days can probably knock over around 80 percent of what is on offer, from most parts of the opposition half.
Using some high school maths, this equates to an average expected return of 0.8 x 3 = 2.4 points for every penalty attempt.
The alternative is to take a tap or kick for touch for the attacking lineout. To score a try is worth about 6.6 points (keep in mind not all conversions are kicked). If you supposed that your team had a 1 in 3 chance of scoring a try from the ensuing play (which is very, very generous indeed), you’d still come up with 0.33 x 6.6 = an expected return of 2.2 points.
Of course you take the penalty shot. Keep in mind I used a 1 in 3 assumption of scoring a try (tell him he’s dreamin’).
You could reduce the penalty to two points, or one. You could make a try worth six. Whatever. I am just surprised that some variant of this change hasn’t occurred yet, because nobody in the entire world, even the English, would rave about games where 10-plus penalty goals are kicked.
People want to see the ball in play, and they want tries scored. In rugby league, goals are mainly used to break deadlocks. I dare say they have it right.
People rightly argue that by devaluing penalty goals, it would just encourage players to infringe more, and this appears to be the case from early trials.
Equally, it has been argued players would not increase their infringements if referees were more liberal with yellow cards.
You could also introduce other systems to deter deliberate infringements. Basketball may be able to offer a blueprint: in basketball, a team is allowed a certain number of fouls per time period. Past this, any further fouls result in an immediate free-throw attempt, regardless of where on the court the foul occurred.
Individuals players are also allowed a certain quota, and past that they are immediately ‘fouled out’, meaning they can no longer take part in the game (they are allowed a replacement).
The TMO could be in charge of keeping track of these numbers and alerting the referee when a team or player has reached their quota.
The TMOs don’t do much else so they may as well make themselves useful.
Scrum resets. A feature of the game I would like to see shelved permanently is the ability to reset a scrum once you have been awarded a penalty or free kick from the previous scrum.
I just don’t get it. It encourages further boring scrum resets, and eventually yellow cards for nothing more than being the second best front row on the paddock.
Don’t get me wrong, I value having a contest at the set piece, and I’m not suggesting we move to a league-style scrum (did anyone else notice Anthony Minichiello packing down in the second row in the NRL grand final?).
But unless we cater to the viewing public, we’re just cutting off our nose to spite our face.
The general population don’t understand the intricacies of scrums and don’t want to watch five consecutive minutes of fat blokes face planting.
On a related note, I can’t stand seeing scrums reset when the ball is at the number eight’s feet, and the scrum collapses. Just get the ball out and continue playing. Common sense, people.
I would also argue that on top of rule changes, rugby should think about increasing accessibility of their matches.
Currently Wallabies matches are on free-to-air, which should be applauded. But rugby needs to appeal to the masses, and in my opinion, Super Rugby needs to be on regular TV, in much the same way that I can come home on a Friday night and watch the staple league match (and watch 2 more games on a Sunday).
Maybe in the short term this may not be lucrative but by exposing a franchise like the Brumbies or Reds to the same kind of grassroots supporters that the NRL courts, it can only be a good thing.
I’m not party to the mechanics of TV deals but the ARU and SANZAR are at a major disadvantage on this point.
Should the rest of the rugby world care about Australian rugby’s woes? There are certainly plenty of people in New Zealand, the United Kingdom and South Africa enjoying Australia’s demise.
However, it would be my opinion that it is in the interests of the other SANZAR states at the very least to ensure that Australian Rugby remains viable.
We are an important Tier 1 nation. A strength of the Six Nations is that at least four teams could win it.
Imagine if The Rugby Championship was just perennially decided by New Zealand or South Africa.
Also, imagine that a marquee trophy like the Bledisloe continued to be the boring, foregone conclusion that it currently is. It’s time for the game to evolve to cater for consumer interests.
Join The Roar rugby editor Christy Doran, former Wallaby Matt Toomua and a cast of regular and special guests as they look at the biggest issues in the game on The Roar Rugby Podcast. If you’re looking for great odds on the next game check out Aussie bookmaker PlayUp. Chances are you’re about to lose. Set a deposit limit.