The easy fix for Super Rugby: Let more Kiwis play

kingplaymaker where are you? Come back to the roar!

The wf players got rid of john mitchell.not too mention dingo deans

There are 12 million people living in NSW and Queensland, this is the historical rugby heartland of our nation, spend not a dollar more on 'Growing the Game' in any other State or Territory, when will the ARU come to fully understand this reality, simply work hard to promote the game with a population base of 12million and our beautiful game will grow once again. Any 'True Blue' Aussie from NSW and Queensland knows this, I can only conclude we have few Australian patriots working and advising our union. I should add that a Wallaby jersey should never be for sale, there can only two eligibility criteria and that is to be born in Australia and or have learnt their rugby here with an age threshold of 12-14 years?.

Perhaps we implement a system where Kiwi players play for the Wallabies until they are good enough to play for All Blacks with underperforming All Blacks relegated to the WBs.... The last thing we want is Australian eligible players playing for Aus SR sides. Rather than following teams with which fans have a geographic connection, we could simply follow a set of shirts. The English national football side has gone from strength to strength since the influx of foreigners...not.

you specifically describe picking the ozzie while watching a game. is there something other than your skin colour that youre seeing that tells you whether they are ozzie or not, you further go on to state its a problem that creates role models there are a high proportion of PI heritage players in NRL. a much smaller proportion that arent ozzie. no diversion needed. you raised these points. if you dont want focus paid to specific parts to of your post maybe leave those parts out in future. a bit revealing that you see what ive said in response as particularly pious tho. would have thought it would be a point most could agree on even if debating its relevance to your post.

........its nothing to do with skin colour while your inference that I imply this, is a cynical attempt to divert the crux of my comment to suit your pious narrative. This is about tribalism because I thought sport was primarily founded for the purpose of loyal groups competing against other loyal groups. If you begin to saturate your code with overseas players from competing loyal groups, to the detriment of your domestic grass roots (especially in the context of a code i.e. Union, where it struggles for status and profile here), you stand to compromise tribalism and as such any premise of competition is rendered sanitised and obsolete.

..........because I ask those in my family who follow the code. We know that 38% of League players throughout the NRL are now represented by Kiwis while it is easy enough to research the profile and bio of respective team lists to confirm where they come from. I know plenty of people who support League in both Townsville, Canberra & Sydney who testify to this, while blind Freddy can see that this is the case. It is moot however, that this is proving detrimental to the code here, while I happen to believe it is........

I'm in two minds about this. Firstly, there is more the ARU can, and should, be doing. Why is country RU in NSW and Queensland increasingly sidelined (you also see it in the NRL)? How come the selectors' focus is solely on the metro competition in Brisbane and Sydney? Country players are having to come to the city just to be notice. We also see this focus in the fact that Waratahs and Reds games are concentrated on the same cities all the time. For gosh (NB: family site) sakes, move a competition game or two to Newcastle/Townsville et al. The ARU had a genuine national competition; it was called the Aust Rugby Shield (remember that??). Teams from Tasmania, NSW, Qld, South Australia, NT, ACT and WA took part. That's a national competition. The administration also needs a severe overhaul, managerial and coaching. Its worth noting that Digby Ioane never had any intention of returning to Super Rugby with an Aussie team; he wanted to join a Kiwi side and Robbie Deans (remember him?) helped make that happen. Secondly, I think NZRU has every right to be wary of helping the ARU simply based on their own constraints. Perhaps one way to help is to promote the game itself in Australia; say make those Boks-NZ games available on Aussie FTA TV. Those NZ-Bok games a few years back were absolute classics; did Aussie FTA TV show any of them or were they reduced to 15 second "bites". Likewise with the upcoming Lions tour of NZ; perhaps the ARU can negotiate for coverage of the tour? Players can also bite the bullet by joining an NPC side if they want to develop their skillsets, even if for just a season; a few years ago, I watched Beau Robinson (and Peter Betham) play in the NZ NPC. Worth noting that the NZ NPC has made an impression on league fans here in Sydney so there must be something in that game that they are watching, however briefly. In terms of a TT competition (much like the former Super netball set-up), jurisdiction becomes an issue especially when one party has governance woes. Perhaps NZ NPC sides can be encouraged to have competition games in Australia, like Newcastle, Wollongong or Canberra where the local competition games could be involved or worked around.

NSWRU and ARU imposed a salary cap after the QLD REDS won the title in 2011 so no Zew Zealander would be able to fit under the cap..

soapit This isn't a back-hander response mate but I just wanted to explain what the purpose of a sabbatical is, in NZRU's perception. You see, the NZRU are well aware that there is no magic potion to overcome, the extraordinary finances, of the NH clubs. In addition, they realise that whatever efforts they try to persuade their top players to remain in NZ, relies solely on the only "Ace", they hold being the Jersey. Hence, it is at the wishes of the NZRU that certain players, not all, who are in the top bracket of AB selection and identified by the coaching team as "keepers", are approached by the NZRU with an offer to remain in NZ but, they're granted an off-season sabbatical, to do what they want to do. Of course, the intention was really to give these guys an R&R in view of the next RWC and the fact, they weren't getting any younger. So, I know of 3 players over the past 5 yrs, who have been granted such an offer, being Dan Carter, Maa Nonu and Richie McCaw. Carter went and played rugby in France for Perpignon; Nonu went and played in Japan while RM, took a complete break from rugby and went sight-seeing. Kieran Read also has a sabbatical coming up but, everyone in NZ, is waiting to see if he'll take it and, what will he do - have a rest or chase some cash.

soapit Yeah I guess you're right.....Roo elligibility via SOO, doesn't apply to Fijians, Samoans,Tongans and probably Kiwis now....well, not until the next generation of true-blue aussie kids, graduate into the senior RL ranks and Roo consideration. But that's ok cos the RL scouts are now lining up outside NZ primary schools to encourage the kids and their parents, to move across the ditch. So, those true-blue aussie kids, will just have more competition, for a Roo or SOO position. Nothing wrong, with a bit of competition aye mate.....?? Especially when, the U-8's team includes a giant 7yr old weighing in at 50-60kgs and stands 2 storeys taller, than his own team and opponents. And his mama on the sideline screaming "That's muh boy.....!!"

or just teach youngsters not to only have role models with the same skin colour as them?

pretty sure nzru have come to help aru in the past, what was in it for them then?

shane surely this is the most dominant youve seen nz over oz tho since professionalism?

yep so called sabbaticals generally tend to be all about chasing as much cash as possible

to be clear you now have to have lived in nsw or qld since you were 13 or be the child of a former origin player to qualify for origin and you dont have to be eligible for origin to play for the kangaroos.

Maybe try something almost the complete opposite. Have a group of underage players who have the potential and get them into NZ schools, similar to what the RL do at Keebra Park etc, maybe as a scholarship or similar. Get them learning from a younger age how the future All Blacks are coached. Then come back for under 18's.. Also the cutting of 1 SL team from Aus is sensible because you then get more of the top line players playing together so they can evolve as one. Just a thought.

I can't help but think Cheika should shoulder a portion of the blame for his small but significant failings in all this. Refusal to play form players in their best positions, lots of 'debutants' excuses - fairly sure NZ and England have had similar amounts, and the god awful repetition of 'we want to make people proud' blah blah, the guy cant coach. If you'll indulge me, NZ went out of the 2007 RWC because playing the 'new zealand' way didn't work against France once and it probably cost them the tournament, so they did the right thing and became the best at every single basic boring aspect of the game, absolutely metronomic kicking, scrum and line out, and from that base they improved. They always secure possession from their own ball and build pressure and phases. This insistence on the 'band in hand' stuff wont win Aus anything anymore sadly because the players aren't as sharp as kiwi counterparts. England said after the RWC 'we're not good enough but we want to improve and become number 1' and since they've generally improved, obviously with a mountain left still to do. I've heard no such positivity and direction from the Wallabies. Would it kill someone in charge to say 'we'd like to win the next RWC, everything before then is an improvement exercise.

It's also amazing that people forget an Australian franchise won the super comp in 2014 or that the Wallabies played in the RWC final in 2015 or that the Wallabies are ranked 3rd in the world. I don't think it's time to hit the panic button just yet.

Shane! If a current All Black wanted a sabbatical with the blessing of the NZRU, I doubt very much you'd ever get an All Black with enough will to take the said sabbatical playing in Australia,