Australia’s navel-gazing is well underway after an embarrassing 40-6 defeat to Wales, which leaves the Wallabies pondering an early exit from the Rugby Union World Cup for the first time in their history.
Naturally, it has lead to much soul-searching around the game’s purpose in Australia, and decline since the period in which they could have been considered among the finest exponents of the 15-a-side code.
It was particularly ironic for those with a memory of rugby union’s story to see them eliminated by successive defeats to Wales and Fiji respectively, two of the few nations in which rugby union could legitimately be called the sport of the masses, a title that the Australian game has never remotely sought to claim.
While the short-term bluster will focus on this group and their coach, Eddie Jones, the truth is that the sport has semi-deliberately sabotaged itself for over 20 years, dating back to the rush of enthusiasm around the 2003 World Cup, when Jones was last in charge.
Semi-deliberate is the appropriate term, because, despite words to the contrary, the sport has consciously maintained a pathways system designed to exclude the bulk of athletes and prioritise those with more cash.
In rugby union, being from a good family is still the most important thing. In rugby league, being good enough is. Until the link is broken with schools for the elite, this will continue to happen.
Jones is an obvious lightning rod for criticism, it is telling that his main strategy to prepare Australia to host the next edition of the World Cup is to loot players from the NRL.
It’s a smart plan. Rugby league has better technical rugby players of either code, better athletes, first pick of those athletes and first refusal on when they go. Moreover, rugby union has handed this advantage to them by its own attitudes.
As with everything in rugby union, it will inexorably come down to what school you went to. Three quarters of this squad attended fee-paying schools, and tellingly, that could be the same in the NRL but it’s totally irrelevant. Nobody is counting. They don’t list their schools on their Wikipedia pages.
Occasionally, sitting in Sydney Roosters press conferences, the thought arises that both Trent Robinson and James Tedesco are both graduates of St Gregory’s Campbelltown, but only in reference to how unimportant it is.
When thinking about Hamish McLennan and Phil Waugh, the dynamic duo atop Rugby Australia, the fact that both went to Shore School is in the top three things that anybody thinks about them. Two previous CEOs went there too, which is not something one can say about St Greg’s.
Eddie Jones. (Photo by Chris Hyde/Getty Images)
Australia is far from unique in this – Ireland are world number ones with a select from Dublin and Belfast’s expensive schools – but they are the only nation that has a legitimate contender in league and as long as rugby union prioritises private schools, it will never be able to compete for talent.
Jones himself knows this, having previously butted heads with the English RFU over their reliance on elite education to produce players.
In Australia, like the UK, the response is to put good athletes into the private school system rather than to figure out a way that stops rich kids from getting priority access to the sport.
Currently, all they are doing is giving young rugby league players better life chances. The NRL is full of players who get to go to rugby union’s posh schools, achieve an expensive education that they never otherwise would get, then go back to playing league anyway.
All the power in the world to them: those that don’t make it get a leg-up in a society that values what school you went to and they get access to elite facilities paid for by other people’s money.
Once they exit the schools, the financial disparity kicks in and they switch back to league immediately because of the greater rewards on offer, and not just for the best players.
Here’s the reality: rugby union can only offer 150 full-time jobs in the areas of Australia that care about rugby of either code, and can only offer $85,000 basic and around $150,000 on average.
There are at least 600 professional rugby league players in Australia, and as of the most recent NRL collective bargaining agreement, the entry level top 30 player is on $125,000, making the worst player on the roster better paid than half of a Super Rugby squad.
For the record: it’s even worse if you’re female, with the Wallaroos, the elite of the elite in women’s union, getting what the worst player on an NRLW roster gets. No wonder they’re swapping in droves.
The disparity in wages and talent pool is both self-created and self-limiting. Super Rugby can’t pay more because they haven’t got the cash, and they haven’t got the cash because they deliberately limited access to their sport for over a hundred years.
Much as McLennan likes to talk about the international opportunities on offer with the Wallabies, he’s pitching an argument based in 1993 rather than 2023.
Spoiler alert: players who get paid better can travel wherever they want on their holidays.
Noticeably, despite Australia’s C-suite currently drowning their sorrows in France to the point that it slowed the ASX, those NRL players not featuring in the finals are spread around Bali, Los Angeles and the Pacific Islands. The travel argument doesn’t work.
(Photo by Matt King/Getty Images for Rugby Australia)
It also speaks to the mentality of the organisation. The international opportunities are all there is, because there’s no point in Super Rugby. Nobody notices.
They’re all watching the Swans, who have taken the mantle of the preferred sport for the expensively educated Sydneysider.
Rugby union has the game back to front, with no ability to gain attention via their club game, which pales as a spectator experience compared to the NRL, and thus a reliance on international fixtures to pay the bills.
The public have voted with their feet, or more accurately, their eyeballs. Since Jones returned, the bulk of his headlines have been in the rugby league’s reflected glow.
The signing of Joseph Suaalii was trumpeted as a great get for the sport, but only served to remind the current cadre of rugby union internationals that there was cash out there, only they weren’t getting it, and to reinforce that rugby league could simply replace the winger with another elite athlete without any bother.
It was said that in the 1930s, if England needed a fast bowler, they could just whistle down the coalmine and another Harold Larwood would emerge. The NRL has roughly the same relationship with Western Sydney outside backs.
Since Suaalii’s signing, the likes of Jahream Bula and Sunia Turuva have emerged, with both on the shortlist for Rookie of the Year in this week’s Dally M Awards.
(Photo by Mark Kolbe/Getty Images)
They’re young, of Fijian descent and, first and foremost, supremely athletic. Had they been born on the island that their parents left, they would certainly have been rugby union players. There’ll be a shedload more where they came from, too.
With another World Cup to plan towards, Rugby Australia will doubtless now have to rethink their policies from top to bottom.
It’s existential now, with that tournament and the Lions Tour of 2025 the great white hope for the sport.
That tour has gone from being an opportunity to grab attention of sports fans across Australia to a potential nightmare, given that the Wallabies were just thrashed by Wales and will have to face the Welsh, plus everyone else from the UK and Ireland.
The strategy of walking across Driver Avenue to throw money at NRL players might be their only hope: currently, there are hundreds of excellent rugby athletes in Australia, but very few of them are playing union.
Given that Rugby Australia can’t fix its endemic structural issues in the next four years, asking the NRL to bail their pathways out might just be their best course of action.
Macky
Roar Rookie
Membership is a joke . Melbourne storm had 40k last year and could only get 19k to a final . Have you seen AFL Sydney numbers ? They average under 50k a game in Sydney it’s embarrassing. GWS struggle to get 25k on tv for the season .
Macky
Roar Rookie
According to AFL tables a attendance website the NRL had 19640 average attendance for the 2023 season , The next best of all time is 2005 -16468 ???????????? I do not work in the NRL , I read the articles that can be found at the top of your fingers . Try typing : https://www.nrl.com/news/2023/04/19/rugby-league-celebrates-club-participation-growth-nationally/amp/ You have no idea what your talking about , Rugby league just had its greatest year of rugby league in Australia of all time . The figures and statistics can’t be denied, And are easily found . If the statistics weren’t in RL i would support you to the hills but you’re clearly wrong and can’t be told anyway . Here’s the attendance website : https://afltables.com/rl/crowds/summary.html By the way the NRL made 60 million last year and not one team made a deficit . Read the NRL annual reports they are all on the nrl website . But hey sstid
criag
Roar Rookie
Myself, I hate the quick rucks. They lead to endless phases and nothing much happening. For me, I found it gripping watching teams trying to outmuscle each other. You could feel a real buzz in the crowd when the Wallabies got on top of the All Blacks. Then, when the ball got out to the backs, they had space - not like now.
13th Man
Roar Rookie
Brisbane and Sydney get sold out stadiums regularly. The Sydney Swans have the highest membership of any sporting team in NSW - in rugby league heartland - they are doing something right.
SSTID
Roar Rookie
Lies, Damned Lies And Statistics. I will just take one - crowd attendance. 2023 average game attendance: AFL 38,100; NRL 18,404. Participation rates are a bit dodgy on both sides so I won't go there, other than to say a high % increase always sounds impressive when you are coming off a low numbers base. You most likely work within the NRL to access to those sorts of details, so possibly defending the nest here. As I mentioned I worked for a local government in RL heartland (Logan) and we had a full time staff member whose role was to liaise with local sporting clubs (of all sports) to help develop these clubs so they could succeed, as well as get kids participating in sports. She was always saying that the AFL were banging on her door, looking to help her develop that sport within that LGA, whilst she hardly heard boo from the NRL. Someone clearly has their eye on the future and winning hearts and minds. And just to use my previous example of my nephew having to play games 76kms away in a major metropolitan city - that is ridiculous. As a kid I played in the St George District and there would be 8-10 teams in that district where the most I had to travel would be 10 to 15kms. If a district in Brisbane requires a area of 76kms - then that should be telling you something. I don't think pubs are a good parameter of success. One time we had Wayne Bennett and Michael Hancock come to Council Committee meeting spruiking a Academy of Excellence, but listening in on the sales pitch, it was conditional on Broncos getting access to more licensed clubs (i.e. pokies revenue). This was in a LGA that has one of the poorest socio-economic profile in Brisbane. Again what does this say about the mindset of the big clubs and the NRL. Feed the hungry beast at the top of the food chain! Don't get me wrong I am a strong RL supporter, but I also have both eyes wide open and currently the operations of Phillips Street is going the same way as RU. To misquote "The Wire" - RL has a problem: It just doesn't know it yet.
Macky
Roar Rookie
That isn’t really the case is it , NSW AFL participation is struggling, it is going backwards in the west . Only place it sees growth is the east , RL NSW participation is up 10-14 percent . People don’t realise ,AFL qld only has 30k community players across the state . The other 30k is Auskick and Auskick means zero , If Auskick worked then why hasn’t the AFL exploded in qld . It hasn’t
Dionysus
Roar Rookie
AFL might be ahead in Australia but even League whoops its ass internationally.
Dionysus
Roar Rookie
I think we are arguing the same thing. I was saying that few AFL stars switch to and are successful in Rugby of either code. I don't know of any who have been though there have been plenty of Rugby players going the other way as you say. I don't like AFL and tend to ignore anything to do with it. Consequently anyone who has been sucked into that vortex would very quickly disappear from my consciousness. By the way, I live in that Victorian Vortex.
Maddi Davis
Roar Rookie
Mate the player struggle to count to 5 let alone spell their names
13th Man
Roar Rookie
Hate this code clash. Am I not allowed to enjoy Rugby, AFL and Soccer? I genuinely like and follow all three - who said you had to pick one and hate the other codes? It's a ridiculous attitude.
13th Man
Roar Rookie
Max Gawn - Melbourne captain and ruckman was over 2m tall - a lot of these guys could play either. Family originates from South Island NZ and his old man was a rugby nut and he played junior rugby the whole way through on rep teams and everything. Yet rugby lost him to the machine that is AFL
13th Man
Roar Rookie
Not sure the AFL would be too worried about Cairns - they are starting to win the battle in Sydney and Brisbane - that'll mean a whole lot more.
13th Man
Roar Rookie
That there just sums up absolutely everything is wrong about Rugby Union in this country and just reinforces the stereotype as an elitist private school only sport. I know a lot of fans hate this stereotype but when you have the CEO talking like that - what do you expect? Forget which school you went to and work on having proper pathways across the country - not just in the north shore of Sydney.
13th Man
Roar Rookie
Yeah the American sporting landscape is on a whole different level - it's almost impossible to understand it if you aren't from there. Everyone calls us insular for having AFL and NRL but these guys take it to a whole other level - American Football is just as limited to one country as AFL is - and a whole lot more confusing, but even bigger in terms of support, whilst Baseball call their own domestic finals the 'World Series'. It's a bizzare old place - but that is where the money is.
13th Man
Roar Rookie
Great point about Perth - whilst AFL does dominate it does so to a lesser extent than Melbourne and there are significant expat communities from strong Rugby Union nations - particularly South Africa, England and NZ - the untapped potential there is huge. I guess Twiggy was trying but never go support from the ARU?
13th Man
Roar Rookie
Oh I completely agree - but this is earning money outside of Australia. If you are good enough at Football you go overseas and whole new world opens up. This could be the same for Rugby but the archaic rules limit players doing this whilst still playing for the Wallabies - something that doesn't occur with the Socceroos or Matildas. Football is getting a lot right - but the big money is overseas and if a kid wants to stay in Australia and play professional sport the biggest money is actually in cricket first (if and only if you get a CA contract so not many spots) followed by AFL then NRL.
Tom G
Roar Rookie
8 not 20
HittingGapsWithNoGas
Roar Rookie
Ultimately it’s different strokes for different folks. I’m not enamoured with soccer yet it’s the most popular game on the planet. I like scrums, lineouts, counter-rucking, pilfering and that you’re not entirely sure whether they’ll run it through the hands, chip and chase, kick for position etc. A lot of the world likes these elements of the game too, hence packed stadiums throughout Europe and South Africa. I also like running rugby and Sevens offers that in spades unlike any other format. In total I don’t think the game needs to change but if it wants to remain competitive and relevant in Australia, given we only like stuff we’re the best at (which in most cases is stuff no one else plays like AFL or League) it seems prudent to try and change some things around the edges to appeal to local audiences in a way that doesn’t diminish our ability to compete globally.
HittingGapsWithNoGas
Roar Rookie
It’s not without precedent. Super Rugby trials rule changes all the time and they’re often picked up by World Rugby if they’re successful. I’m only suggesting small changes.
KenW
Roar Rookie
What an amusing rant. That's not how geography works though. South of the Victorian border is only a small slice of Australia, it doesn't delineate North/South. Just because you're terrible with maps doesn't mean the players are.