What a parlous state Australian rugby is in. The standout for another appalling season was the once-mighty Reds being thrashed 63-28 by… the Crusaders? Lions? No, the Sunwolves.
So what is the solution to this parlous situation?
Well, happily, Joe Roff – the former champion Wallaby and current CEO of this year’s next worst Australian team, the Brumbies – provided the answers this season.
“We need a new stadium,” was Joe’s solution to the pathetic state of Australian rugby.
Nothing do to with substandard players, it is the shocking state of the concrete mausoleums.
I grant you, as any regular paying guest of Canberra Stadium can vouch, the majority of the seats are not within the warm confines of a heated executive suite offering free grog, freshly cooked, edible food, and tasty desserts. But for watching footy, there’s really nothing wrong with the stadium itself.
The best place in Australia to watch footy – Leichhardt Oval in Sydney – is quite possibly the most antiquated elite sports facility in the world. It still has wooden benches and a grass hill. The subterranean toilet block fills up to the knees every time it rains. The ground is hard to get to and has bugger all parking if you drive. But it gets filled every time the Wests Tigers play there.
The Leichhardt Oval scoreboard (Hpeterswald via Wikimedia Commons)
So it’s not the stadium that matters. It could be the overbearing security and safety fetish that all Australian sports seem to have. It could be the inability to buy a decent beer, and having a stone-faced cashier tell you that your $20 note isn’t good enough to buy four watery tins of slightly-alcoholic brown soda water.
It could be the confronting spectacle of paying $7.50 for a pie, nuclear-treated so as to provide a hardwood-like base, rendering the contents hot enough to strip the lining from your tongue, plus 50 cents for a dollop of sauce to kill the taste. Or even worse, being told there aren’t any left just before kick-off, while over the loudspeaker comes an announcement exhorting the crowd to give thanks to today’s sponsors, the pie company.
It isn’t the stadium that’s putting people off going to the footy, Joe. But looking at the crowd figures this year, Joe may just, ever-so-slightly, be talking through his kick. Because the crowd for the Brumbies games was often 5000 people. And the graph of attendance numbers over the past few years is looking rather similar to the graph of the number of jobs in manufacturing in Australia. Or funding for science.
So Joe’s formula for improving rugby crowds, and rugby in general, is to build a new stadium. Perhaps the money could come out of the (former) science budget, because it certainly won’t be coming from rugby gate receipts.
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But there is something you can do, Joe, to get people back to the footy: have a good think about how you treat those in attendance.
One of the best stadiums in the world to watch footy is Rugby Park in Invercargill. There, you can stand up along a whole side of the stadium if you wish, or sit on a grass hill, you can drink as much full-strength beer as you like, the pies are warm and you don’t lose the skin on your tongue. Mr Whippy sits in one corner, and while you wait with hundreds of others in line for an ice-cream, you can still watch the footy.
The program is available in exchange for an optional gold coin, and if there are ‘security guards’, nobody notices them.
It is fun, the ground is full for every major game, the kids enjoy running around madly on the grassy hill, jostling for position on kicks at goal, treading on pies and kicking over beers as they go, and the ground announcer limits his remarks to announcing facts.
Yet everyone, a cross-section of New Zealand society, enjoys the experience. Compare that with how we’re treated at Canberra Stadium and other grounds in Australia.
Fix that, and you might start getting more than 5000 people to a do-or-die Brumbies match. No matter where it is.
Chris
Guest
So true and the yellow coats stewards should be volunteers from the Brumbies Rugby club etc hence they should be nice and polite.
Bakkies
Guest
Good point about concerts Canberra struggles to attract concerts as there is no suitable year round venue. An indoor stadium venue would attract concerts in the Winter when some acts are touring. I believe that Pink is touring around Australia she does do smaller stadiums (she has performed at Thomond Park which has a similar capacity to Bruce) no chance of getting her to perform in Canberra where there is no big enough arena. The AIS Arena is too small these days for high profile concerts and you would need to put on special buses to get people home. Bruce Springsteen may have come to Canberra as he has performed at smaller stadiums like the RDS and Thomond Park. This is why Racing 92 built an indoor arena as it gave Paris a concert venue that is suitable in Winter. I think the Stones played the first concert at the venue. Shame Laporte canned the national Rugby stadium project as that would have been an indoor 80,000 seat stadium that could host concerts year round.
Cugel
Roar Rookie
I've been to 340+ games at Bruce. You go through the turnstiles, sit at your seat and watch the game, get up and go home. Nothing difficult or challenging to it.
robel
Roar Pro
I was getting wet in row Y of the eastern stand, just a dozen rows down from the highest, driest point in the stand. My son and I felt really sorry for the Samoan performers at 1/2 time and Apia Samoa players when the wind chill was around 3 degrees.
Redsfan1
Guest
Definitely agree. You need to go and watch the Hospital Cup in Brisbane to see a real game of rugby. It's fast, referees make decisions and it's pretty friendly. As opposed to the slop of Super Rugby where everything is replayed and stopped for ages.. It's not a sport anymore it's like waiting in traffic.
Bob
Guest
Also if you are really battling for spare change or are bringing the whole family you are allowed to bring your own food. Just take a cooler bag full of pies that you can buy a Coles or woolies. It's not that hard and if you are serious about a budget.
Ad-O
Guest
If University of Michigan can get over 100,000
Melburnian
Roar Pro
Yes andrew, a very one sided fixture but the two WA tries got a deserved reception. Can't recall who scored for either side tbh and from the hill I can't say I got much of a view either. ?
Minz
Guest
The problem with Canberra Stadium is that it's too flat! Needs more angle to get a decent atmosphere. Indoor would be an enormous bonus; more under-cover would be a sensible cheaper option. It's just a bit rubbish right now. Oh, and they should serve hot toddies rather than cold beers... Anyway, I suspect that Canberrans have just fallen out of love with live sport, or with sport at all. We were all a bit half-hearted anyway, let's face it.
andrewM
Guest
So you remember the roar of the crowd when WA scored those two tries then! Never mind about the 15 or so that they scored! :)
Midfielder
Guest
Mate best read I have had in a long long time.... So sovery very very true
concerned supporter
Guest
TWAS, ''If a ground is easy to get to, that’s a much bigger drawer for attendance than the quality of the facility.'' The smartest comment from you all year.
Bob
Guest
The point about the new stadium is to attract new fans (not the due hards who go regardless) as fun Leichhardt Oval is lining up to have a pee west's don't play all there games. I never thought Subiaco oval was that bad until I went to the new Optus stadium and you quickly realise the difference. Also don't see how Australia's for super rugby teams are made up of substandard players. As much as every one lives to hate on the wallabies they are still ranked 5th in the world and were a whisker from knocking off Second.
Geoff Foley
Roar Rookie
No aversion to a new stadium at all- the Govt were almost there to build on the old Civic Pool site and then the Feds came around and said they weren't paying for any of the Mr Fluffy compo. So that put back a new stadium by 10-15 years. But now, somehow, the money will be found if we can #bringbackthecosmos
woodart
Guest
some good comments. stadiums can make or break a city, forsythe-barr in dunedin has done huge things for the city. concerts, indoor drifting, rugby have all had good crowds. watching the league world cup from england a few years ago, it was interesting to see (and hear) the crowds. not big crowds, but sold out, fantastic atmosphere, the crowds right up close to the action, no need of of a big screen. the trend is away from huge concrete mausoleums, the cost of hiring them with the required security and cleanup costs have seen many of them constantly needing subsidies and shonky deals to keep going. eden pk in auckland is a good example of how to do it wrong. its no good for any sport, no carparking, no atmosphere until there is 40,000 crowd, no after match local entertainment. maybe 25000 is still to big a ground. better to have a smaller indoor stadium thay ALWAYS sells out.
Broadmeadow
Roar Rookie
The Walrus is right, my apology to Joe.
piru
Roar Rookie
Perth seemed to have it in for Rugby this year - weather has been atrocious!
Train Without A Station
Roar Guru
That's what frustrates me about people pushing for major stadium upgrades which are not based around increasing capacity. If a ground is easy to get to, that's a much bigger drawer for attendance than the quality of the facility. In the case of Canberra, you can understand the case for an enclosed stadium. But a lot of issues are universal stadium issues that apply to all sports.
Ballymore Brumby
Roar Pro
Except it doesn't make sense. Without totally rebuilding it from the ground up, with proper easy access and transport links. Because at the moment its not fit for a professional, super rugby level competition. Its a run down, tired hole. I talked with a fair few ordinary members this season in the bar, there was little enthusiasm for a 'return to Ballymore' unless it was totally rebuilt and with decent transport links. Boutique means smaller, with quality.
Orange Fuhrer
Guest
Drinking a $7.60 beer from a plastic cup is just wrong. I don't care how cheap and nasty the food is at the stadiums.