WRU’s new chairman Richard Collier-Keywood has announced a six point plan to turn around the fortunes of the game in Wales, as outlined in an open letter to union members.
While the women’s team enjoyed improved performances throughout 2023, the men’s team took time to adjust to Gatland’s return, coming second last in the Six Nations before recovering to make the quarter finals of the Rugby World Cup.
Despite this, Collier-Keywood admitted openly that 2023 was “a year to forget” for Welsh rugby.
(Photo by Odd Andersen/AFP via Getty Images)
The governing body in Wales has had a comparably dismal twelve months to that of Rugby Australia, with provincial sides underperforming and the removal of Wayne Pivac as coach and reinstatement of Warren Gatland.
It also had to deal with the results of the Rafferty report, following allegations of sexism and misogyny being rife within the organisation surfacing in January 2023.
Adopting recommendations from the report is high on the list of goals for the new chairman, alongside greater collaboration between the provincial teams, encouraging an inclusive culture, player welfare investment, streamlining of the body’s governance model, and a new ‘One Wales’ strategy for investing in the professional and community games.
“We are committed to building improved relationships with regions and community clubs that should help with this process,” the chairman wrote in an open letter to rugby fans.
“We need to work together across the regions and clubs to deliver a One Wales plan. A key part of this will be ensuring that rugby in Wales is put on a sound and sustainable footing so we can invest in the game and the communities that support it across Wales.
“The goals of this plan are clear all our national teams – men’s, women’s and age grade – need to compete with the best in the world. For this to be achieved we need strong domestic teams and a pathway that includes our clubs with a passionate and inclusive fan base.”
SBW a fan of Manu’s Japan plan
Joey Manu’s rumoured link to move to Japanese rugby from the Roosters has received a ringing endorsement from fellow cross code hopper Sonny Bill Williams, who believes Manu would flourish in the 15-player code.
The Roosters star is set to come to the end of his contract after the next season in the NRL, and has had plenty of interested parties vying for his signature, with the Dragons reportedly offering a long term deal, and his management also in talks with the Roosters to continue on.
The third option of playing in Japan in 2025 could see Manu pick up a $1.5 million paycheck, more than he could earn at the Roosters. However, should he be cleared to return to the Roosters for the second half of the NRL season, he could end up with a massive $2 million pay day for the year.
Joseph Manu. (Photo by Hannah Peters/Getty Images)
Many have called such a planned season for Manu as an ‘SBW-like move’, and the man himself thinks the Roosters star will thrive there.
“When you’re an elite player like Joey is, that’s what you can do,” Williams replied when asked by the Sydney Morning Herald.
“As long as it’s done respectfully, he deserves a chance to see what’s there for himself.
“I’m proud of him for stepping out there and doing his thing. When you have that talent, that talent deserves to be seen.
“[Japanese rugby has] a fast tempo and great skills. It’s like the Samurai movies where they train from dusk until dawn.
“These lads are at training two hours early working on their skills and finer details of the game to make up for the smaller size and different physicality.
“The beauty of Japanese rugby, and it shocked me, is how fast the game is.”
Revok
Roar Rookie
So if they make the play offs he will refuse to captain Australia. Anyway i hope his team make the play offs as the Wallabies go better without him.
kingplaymaker
Roar Guru
Firstly, how can you say a larger footprint isn't a winner when it doesn't exist, and in the other country's Australia's strength in rugby they have 10 or 14 teams? How do they fill the teams if they have similar talent levels to Australia? Of course Newcastle and Adelaide could support a team, very easily indeed. Southern Australia is near 2 million and Newcastle clearly could.
kingplaymaker
Roar Guru
It did, and whether there had been separate leagues and a European style cup where they then played each other, or Super Rugby as we know it, it should have at least been double the size in number of teams and would have been much more successful.
Brendan NH Fan
Roar Rookie
That was one of the flaws of Super Rugby, it took away three countries ability to grow their own market how they wanted.
Muglair
Roar Rookie
Are you serious? Soccer has a smaller historical footprint in Adelaide than rugby? Adelaide has the same level of support for rugby as Perth, 1.5 times the population and full of expats from rugby regions? Newcastle has a very proud rugby history and still has a strong local competition. Its Shute Shield side though is largely drawn from other places and is not that well supported. Having said that though, there is no doubt that could be done better. I would be extremely surprised if rugby has had a bigger footprint overall than soccer. The overall strategy of spreading the available talent more thinly and dramatically increasing salary and competition costs is not a winner. In fact it should be embarrassing to claim it as a strategy.
kingplaymaker
Roar Guru
Well, here's a question for you. How does soccer, with a far smaller historical footprint than rugby, support professional teams in both Adelaide and Newcastle? And how did Perth, similar to Adelaide in presence of rugby, support a team the past twenty years?
Muglair
Roar Rookie
Are you referring to his role as a director of ARU/RA, his commercial interests tied to rugby events or his directorship of Platinum?
Muglair
Roar Rookie
I have no idea what problem you are trying to address with your solution. I can't speak with much knowledge of the gold coast, but you cannot be seriously suggesting that Adelaide and Newcastle can support a tier 2 team?
kingplaymaker
Roar Guru
That seems to be the way the Welsh look at it. They just wanted all the clubs to be unchanged.
kingplaymaker
Roar Guru
And look at just how many professional sports teams Sydney can manage....but only one rugby team we're told.
Brendan NH Fan
Roar Rookie
But why would a new club be able to get more than the existing one. As I said the Blues were Cardiff RFC.
Brendan NH Fan
Roar Rookie
Wales has about 2.5m people in South Wales, which is about half that of NZ. They aren't very wealth so the fact they have run 4 teams shows what could have been possible in Oz or NZ. Llanelli has about 42k population. Cardiff is just about 500k.
kingplaymaker
Roar Guru
They didn't take over the identity of the old clubs effectively. I don't know why this wouldn't work, but it didn't.
kingplaymaker
Roar Guru
But these aren't the new clubs but newly created entities in these cities. They aren't the same identities which is apparently what the fans want. These were the oldest, original rugby clubs and the WRU haven't succeeded in promoting new versions to them.
Brendan NH Fan
Roar Rookie
So what are the Scarlets and Cardif excuses as both were stand alone clubs who played in the same stadium with the same players with the same owners and same fans. Both also took over the history of those clubs in Europe. How do you think that Scarlets aren't Llanelli and Blues weren't Cardiff. How would the other clubs have magically been able to earn more money and more fans when those two teams couldn't. It was losing by 100 points. the drop in stand from 01/02 to 02/03 was drastic. Llanelli topped their group, Neath came second just 1pt ahead of a Top12 Italian team and were the worse second place, while the other 3 teams took hidings finishing last in their groups. If they had carried on they would have ended up like the Top12 in Italy as semipro with very few test players in it. As it was they struggled in the Celtic league except for the first year.
Brendan NH Fan
Roar Rookie
Yet people from place that have welsh Premiership clubs still go to them. The debate in Wales is why should they support the 4 Super Clubs as most call them rather than their own club, many do not have the same problem when it comes to soccer where they support both Clubs. If the arugment is that if they had called the 5 teams Llanelli (already did and they were the team everyone supported in West Wales anyway), Cardiff (this is what they are called now), Newport, Swansea and Ponty they would have got more fans is laughable. When Bridgend gave up their part of the Warriors to Ponty, Ponty stopped sharing games with Bridgend so the fans from Bridgend stopped coming. Ponty couldn't support a team for one season so why would they have been able to as being Ponty as smaller fanbase than Warriors had. Scarlets were already like a Region before Regionalization (family lived there for a period of time) and they and Carddif were Clubs in all but name, played in the same stadium and the same colours and owned by the same people yet they have stuggled to make money. Then we have Newport who added Newport, then dropped it to try get more support yet didn't make a difference. Ospreys saw growth as they had a rich owner who spent alot to win things. In the 02/03 champions Cup Llanelli got about 4k per game, Swansea 3.5k, Bridgend 3k, Cardiff 10k, Newport 10k. None of Newport, Swansea or Bridgend could afford to run a professional team by themselves and Bridgend could even afford half the Warriors for half a Season and Newport couldn't afford the other half of the Dragon when Ebbw pulled out. So how was a professional team going to work.
Brendan NH Fan
Roar Rookie
Not true. Back then you had to play in NZ to play for the ABs. When the season finished with Toulon he played in the NPC as he had no other team to play for. ABs don't pick players who haven't played SR and even DMac was not picked to play for the ABs when he returned for Japan. Once he started playing SR it was obvious that he was good enough to be an AB. I doubt the NPC made it such a better player than he had been with Toulon. Same happen with Whitelock who made his SR and Test debut in the same season meaning he was probably a year to late being promoted to SR.
whistleblower (retired)
Roar Rookie
I would be surprised if Eales and others are not quietly influential behind the scenes and do not crave publicity, unlike some others.
Jacko
Roar Rookie
Im happy they dont as the Warriors arnt exactely a well run organisation and arnt New Zealand. They should never have been allowed to call themselves the NZ Warriors. Also they suffer from being treated differently by the NRL than all other teams.
Far Queue mate
Roar Rookie
Yes a very good team now. It`s unfortunate most of the really good Kiwi rugby League players in the NRL don`t play for the Warriors.