- Video
-
Club Roar
Captured a great grassroots sporting moment? We want to see it!Content Collections
The Roar Community
- Join
- Login
Aussie Rules Football has long eyed the Chinese market as one of opportunity as has American football, but the oval game that could take root in the Middle Kingdom is rugby.
When the Chinese government said that it wanted to build a sports industry worth US$825 billion by 2025, football was the sport that captured the attention. Rugby, however, may make up more of that than originally thought.
Last week, World Rugby announced in Shanghai that there would be a professional league – for men and women and for 15s and sevens – by the start of the next decade in the Middle Kingdom.
It may sound like one of those false dawns/grand promises we see in sport from time to time but there are reasons to believe this will be different – $100 million of them in fact.
This will be invested to set up the league. And it is not just about the money but the source of it. The investor is AliSports, the sports arm of Alibaba.
This is what has people in Asian rugby excited. Alibaba is one of China’s success stories, an e-commerce titan with almost 500 million users that has close ties with government and has already been active in football and other sports.
The company will not only set up the league, it will broadcast it on its media platform, market it in China and then work with the Chinese government to start introducing the sport into schools. The return of the sport in its sevens form to the Olympics in 2016 is also seen as significant.
The question is not is it going to happen, but whether or not they will manage to turn 76,000 participants currently to one million over the next few years. That won’t be easy even with the schools getting involved.
There are opportunities for Australian rugby here. Some Asian rugby federations are going to work with the Chinese Rugby Union and help with setting up the nuts and bolts of a rugby environment.
Not least, there is a target to train 20,000 coaches and 15,000 referees by 2020. These are career opportunities for Australians and a way for the authorities down under to forge close ties with China and Asia.
If rugby makes inroads in China, it will be major step forward for Asia.
At the moment, the continental scene is basically this: Japan are far and away the best. The Brave Blossoms are the only Asian side to play at the World Cup and then famously defeated South Africa at the 2015 edition.
Japan now have a team in the SANZAR Super Rugby tournament – the Sunwolves – and will, of course, host the 2019 World Cup. The country’s professional league offers opportunities for other players in Asia especially South Korea. Korea along with Hong Kong, Sri Lanka and Kazakhstan, are the best of Asia’s rest. Another professional Asian league will provide more opportunities for Asian players.
China is nowhere but there are attractions in rugby. Football is obviously a great deal more popular and but then competition is also much greater. If China has a professional league, it will find that it qualifying for the World Cup is within reach.
While it may take years or even decades to get the league to a decent standard, it may well be that like their football counterparts, Aussie rugby stars will find that there are lucrative opportunities closer to home than Europe.
A Chinese league with money and strong media, marketing and sponsorship foundations can only be good for Australia.
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.