Would bringing back Wallabies from overseas actually make a difference?

if there are hardly any that would walk back into the Team.. then whats the point of having this Artificial Rule?.. if there are Heaps that walk back in and God knows we are not competitive.. then whats the point of having this Artificial Rule?.

Ewen McKenzie

we almost need to forget about the wallabies and focus massively on clubs, schools and youth development and get that yielding 5x the quality player base - and make a team of players with the core skills and some x-factor rather than all x-factor who can't throw a lineout, cant pass left and right, can't execute a legal tackle, can't kick, can't catch, can't scrum, etc

drop hooper then

So A-League and all those SR results are actually an irrelevence then? As bad as they all might be, they aren't going to be improved by selecting Wallabies from overseas. If anything, only made worse. Insanity may be expecting different results from doing the same things, but not as much as thinking a useful thing to try might be blowing your own brains out. Perhaps RA could be looking at options that might improve both SR and the Wallabies, but this sort of thing shows just how unwilling they are to look past quick fixes.

No it will not. Will making OS based players ineligible for Wallabies selection strengthen SR? The evidence from the last few years indicates no.

I did ask Nicholas Bishop whether Skelton could have been an 8 and he didn't embellish his response, just said no. I think that also rules out being a 6.

South Africa have a bigger pool of genuine SR and test level players, whether playing in Europe, Japan or SA. I can't say whether player numbers are increasing or decreasing but they are obviously producing more than enough test quality players. We are not, there are not that many you would bring straight back into the test team. The most obvious difference is that like New Zealand, they have a long established 3rd tier competition, the Currie Cup. Also like New Zealand it is also a dominant sport. I could not answer whether they have better coaching and development pathways at all levels of the game, but I can't believe they don't. Hopefully someone will see this and answer the question. The result is a constantly refreshing pool of players with the skills to advance to the next level. I believe our lack of proper coaching and development programs from the earliest grassroots means we have a diminishing pool of appropriately skilled players moving through the game. The next big factor with SA is they are in the same time zone as Europe so travel logistics and impacts are significantly reduced. Lastly money. Again some SA expert knowledge might appear, but right from the start of professional rugby my understanding was that the international class players were paid significantly less than Australians and New Zealanders. Also back at the start Kiwis were paid less than their Australian counterparts. A bit counterintuitive given the relative values of the markets and the strength of the rugby teams. Perhaps they simply require more money to fund the rugby infrastructure below Super Rugby. My recollection and impression was that the SARU decision was not based on strengthening the talent pool and high performance system, but rather it was impractical to stand in the way of players earning more money. Also subject to SA intervention, I think the players were originally not available for selection either. Frans Steyn might have been the first to be brought back. Bringing back overseas players now might improve our 2023 campaign. Unless we improve development pathways it won't really matter post 2023.

Morahan, Rona, Kerevi and the Arnolds would certainly push for selection in our squad. It's unfortunate that we don't seem to have a five-eight in the mix... Although, I am keen to see QC get some redemption. I am all for opening the game up. After all, it might herald the final piece of the rugby puzzle. A global game needs a global calendar, and a global calendar means more lucrative broadcast rights, thus, greater revenues for all the participating unions... Budgets would increase by at least an order of magnitude.

Once the NH were embarassed at RWC '15 they hired SH coaches EJ and Schmidt. That's why ...

Here is the backlash. If European clubs are better than Aus clubs and arguably better than NZ who gave the former a thrashing at TT, I hate to imagine how Aus players will fare against in EOYT or the RWC.

Has that kind of big back been snapped up by other rugby codes? Or was that just a golden generation.

Skelton has been impressive for La Rochelle. To be good for WBs you need a 6 who is an option at lineout as he wouldn't do much there other than lift. He would be very good at gainline forward play like Toupou.

Rugby and Cricket- only ways for Australians to make themselves known on the true international stage

Curtis Rona is someone going under the radar. Looks very sharp

Nicely put Faithful, I personally see the greater issue is not lack of players but lack of coaching depth. Rebels and Waratahs have left many in the squad just not firing on all cylinders. If you take the brumbies who benefit from a worthy coaching team they have produced wallabies that would struggle to get a start with a NZ franchise. Lolesio, Ikitou, Swain, Lonergan come to mind. Player drain is hurting Australian rugby but lack of competent coaches is killing.

4. Arnold 5. Skelton 6. McMahon 7 Hooper 8. Wilson So the lineout options are Arnold & Wilson? If you play Skelton, in my opinion the team will require 2 loosies that are top lineout options.

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We have very small rugby public (which I’m part of) who watch and care about Super Rugby in Oz. That isn’t going to change. There just isn’t the appetite for Super Rugby in Oz. You couldn’t pay my old man to watch Brumbies vs Tahs. However, he watches every Wallabies game religiously. If the Wallabies are winning we have a better chance of converting more eyes/interest onto the sport, that in turn will lead hopefully to a greater investment like you say into pathways for young players to strive to play in a national domestic comp and u/20s/wallabies in the future. If Super Rugby teams are going well, that’s great us in the rugby public, we will be stoked, but the general public won’t know about it. I firmly believe we’re crazy to pump anymore money into Super Rugby until we get private equity investment. Super Rugby in its current form doesn’t make money. It loses money. SR AU this year was seen as a commercial success and it was for what it is compared to the years of it being on foxsports dying a slow painful death. However, it has also has not grown the rugby fan base. In fact crowds are well down where they were when SR was at its peak when it was a 12-team comp. I love SR don’t get me wrong, but I know I am in the minority in Oz. I think a national comp somewhere between the NRC and SRAU is where we should head. Then the top couple sides can qualify for a Heineken Cup-style cross-border comp against the Kiwis still exposing our guys to that level of rugby each year.