In the latest of his exclusive
columns for FRC, Pau captain Paul Dearlove reflects
on the diminishing health of rugby union in
Australia as it struggles to compete with Aussies
Rules, Rugby League and Football...
Having just got back from a
holiday back home it is interesting to see the stark
contrast in the health of rugby union in Australia
and France. What struck me is that rugby in
Australia is dying while in France it appears to be
going from strength to strength.
For those of you not familiar
with the complexities of Australian sport, “dying”
may sound like typical journalistic hyperbole,
someone trying to whip up interest in an issue and
generate headlines. But I assure you that it is not.
Australia is unique in that it
has four established football codes, all played at
the same time of year and all competing for the
eyeballs of only 25 million people. Rugby league
edges rugby union in New South Wales and Queensland,
AFL (“Aussie Rules”) completely dominates in
Victoria, South Australia and Western Australia and
soccer is the sport of choice for youngsters and
women.
To give you an idea of how hard
it is to take market share from the other codes –
the Melbourne Storm is a rugby league team that has
played in the last four grand finals and has existed
since 1994. It has some of the best rugby league
players in the world and yet average attendance in
2008 was just over 12,000. The AFL, by contrast,
over the entire competition in 2008 (176 games),
averages 37,000 spectators. Rugby union, by
contrast, has seen it’s market share slip from a
high of 22% in 1995 to a 13.7% today – the lowest of
all four codes.
Rugby is
only consistent in that laws are consistently being
changed
Complexity is also a problem for
rugby union. All three other codes are relatively
simple – if you watched a game for about 10 minutes
you’d pick up pretty quickly what was happening.
Rugby is only consistent in that laws are
consistently being changed. Referees should also
take some of the heat here. In efforts to enforce
the laws, many have forgotten that they are also
responsible for the spectacle. Rugby, if it is to be
genuinely competitive as a world game, can’t be a
kick-athon whistle-fest.
At the end of the day money and
the fan base are going to be deciding factors in
whether rugby union remains a niche sport in
Australia, and it faces huge hurdles. Rupert
Murdoch’s $30 billion Fox Corporation has a huge
interest in rugby league (Quade Cooper, a potential
superstar in Australian rugby has an offer to play
league that is double – yes you heard me, double
– what rugby union has offered), football is the
only genuine world game and AFL has an enormously
passionate and loyal following (a bit like rugby in
France now that I think about it).
What is the conclusion? I don’t
really know. It pains me to think of the force
Australia could be in the rugby world if we took
away rugby league and AFL, but that is not going to
happen. At the end of the day rugby is not really
dying in Australia (so yes there may be a bit of
exaggeration in the headline) but it is certainly
becoming a niche sport. Getting onto the rugby 7’s
bandwagon early should be something the
administrators think about (just look at the
enormous success of 20/20 in cricket) but having
seen the head-in-the-sand approach they’ve taken
until now – I have my doubts.
Oh I have a solution – let’s
start a rugby team in Melbourne... staggering!
Previous columns:
18.08.10:
Age Shall Not Weary Them - The
Importance of Experience, Pt 3
29.07.10:
Age Shall Not Weary Them - The
Importance of Experience, Pt 2
17.07.10:
Age Shall Not Weary Them - The
Importance of Experience, Pt I
13.05.10:
"It's been a good couple of weeks - in fact
it's been a good six months"
11.09.09:
The down sides to being a professional rugby player
27.08.09:
Where do you draw the line
with cheating?
07.05.09:
The Merry Pranksters of
ProD2's Section Paloise
24.04.09:
Only four British and Irish
Lions would get in my World XV
10.04.09:
Opinions and a***holes - Stop giving the ELVs
a bum deal
26.03.09:
Home truths, and the struggle
to perform when playing away
13.03.09:
A week in the life of a professional rugby player
06.03.09:
Me and my 'lucky undies' - Why
are sportsmen superstitious?
19.02.09:
Drugs in rugby - Part II:
The 'recreational' debate
12.02.09:
Drugs in rugby - Part I:
Performance enhancing
05.02.09:
Are 'les
etrangers'
good for
French rugby?
28.01.09:
Do the French deserve
their reputation for foul play? - Part II
15.01.09:
Do the French deserve their reputation for foul
play? - Part I
08.01.09:
Is professional rugby going to be credit
crunched?
18.12.08:
When two tribes go to war -
The local derby
11.12.08:
The
game they play in heaven, but who is playing God?
05.12.08:
The Unknown Soldier - Life
as a journeyman professional in France's ProD2
