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I’ve been arguing for a long time that Australia and New Zealand need a regular three-match series every fourth year in the vein of the Bledisloe Cup.
With the Anzac Test, Four Nations Game 1 and now the final, effectively this year we’ll have had that.
So far the ledger for 2014 stands at one win apiece – however because there’s no unifying symbol to tie these matches together (unlike the Bledisloe) this fact will be lost on most people.
New Zealand is a small country with a smaller player pool, so the Kiwis should be expected to lose more often – if you were to use a direct percentage of population they should have a winning stat of around 20 per cent.
But since 2003 (the 100th anniversary game) the record for Australia versus New Zealand Test matches are as follows:
Kiwis
Seven wins (win ratio of 22 per cent)
Two draws
Twenty-three losses out of thirty-two games
But here’s the funny thing; here are the Bledisloe Cup stats for the same period:
Wallabies
Five wins (win ratio of 16 per cent)
Two draws
Twenty-seven losses out of thirty-four games
What insight can we gain from these facts?
The Wallabies are, well, the Wallabies. The Kiwis punch slightly above their weight. The number of games played is pretty close – 32 versus 34. If you take out the mid-season Test match (which heavily favours Australia) a series helps the Kiwis and sees the results draw even closer.
In short, the rugby league trans-Tasman rivalry is more competitive. So why aren’t the powers that be using these facts to promote these matches accordingly?
Smack bang in the middle of World Cups, 2015, would have been an ideal time to start such a four-year cycle. Instead the Kangaroos will be undertaking nap time.
I would suggest the first step would be dropping the mid-season Test match and replacing it with a guaranteed Australia versus New Zealand Test match two to three weeks after the grand final every year. This would also decrease the NRL season by one week. City versus Country should be replaced with a country round played in strategic regional areas.
The end of year Test match every season would stand alone, with the Anzac match becoming an event in its own right, but it would also be the base off which subsequent Four Nations and/or trans-Tasman series would be built.
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