ARU Responds to luminaries letter with stakeholders summit

[ranga]

If the Shite Shield was the best in 20 years , then their funding and acknowledgement must be the right amount

[jargan83]

Disgruntled Sydney and Brisbane Premier rugby clubs are planning a breakaway eight-team interstate club championship to run in direct competition with the National Rugby Championship.

In a move designed to wrest the fate of grassroots rugby back from the hands of the Australian Rugby Union, the presidents of the Sydney and Brisbane clubs will meet next month in Sydney to discuss the rebel tournament, which would be made up of the top four clubs from both premier club competitions


It is being proposed to run in direct competition with the NRC, which is in its third season and will welcome a team from Fiji next season. The NRC starts in August at the end of the Sydney and Brisbane premier club competitions, which were shifted forward to accommodate the NRC. The NRC grand final will be played this weekend in Tamworth between the NSW Country Eagles and Perth Spirit.

The plan comes on the back of a host of Australian rugby greats from the game's amateur era penning a letter of protest to ARU chairman Cameron Clyne and his board members this week. The letter, signed by former Wallabies Nick Farr-Jones, Simon Poidevin, Peter Grigg, Anthony Herbert, Mark McBain, Barry Honan, John Ballesty, Peter Falk and Brett Papworth, as well as former Australian coaches Bob Dwyer and Alan Jones, prompted ARU boss Bill Pulver to agree to a summit of stakeholders to review the union's strategic plan.

Emboldened by the support and aggrieved at the ARU's refusal to directly fund them, a group of club presidents are taking matters into their own hands, scheduling the meeting in Sydney next month and a follow-up in Brisbane in February, to coincide with the Australian Club Championship match between Brisbane premiers Brothers and Sydney premiers Norths.

All club presidents will be invited to the meetings, in a big push to strengthen interstate relations between the Brisbane and Sydney club networks. Both groups are deeply angry with the ARU and Pulver, who has reduced direct funding to zero during the past three years and accused the clubs of mis-spending the money they did receive.

within the rugby community at the ARU's failure to acknowledge – and fund – the work of club rugby volunteers and administrators across the country.

"Our deep concern is the total imbalance between what is spent at the top of the game, both on players and administration, versus what is allocated to the grassroots. This is unsustainable and a total disgrace," the authors wrote.

"There is a war going on in sport in Australia and the ARU's most vital asset, the grassroots players, coaches, managers, mum, dad and volunteers in all tasks required to run a club are being shafted by the ARU and the state unions they oversee."

Pulver has agreed to sit down with the club leaders but rejected outright figures quoted in the letter.

"Apart from misquoting a $2.4 million investment in the community game – when it's actually $9.2 million – there's nothing else tangible in that document that specifically tells me what variable to our current strategy they would like to see," Pulver told Fairfax Media. "So I would like to have a conversation about where the game should go."

Poidevin said Pulver was off the mark suggesting club figures had no viable alternatives to offer.

"I'd really challenge that. I don't think Bill's getting it," Poidevin said. "There's going to be a lot of signatures on that letter. Bill and the board have to take note. If you don't respect the experience and the hard yards put in by those Wallabies and the Wallaby coaches and you want to hide an ivory tower, it's going to end in tears. I wouldn't be trying to bat it away."

http://www.canberratimes.com.au/rugb...20-gs70cw.html

[chibi]

That's an interesting idea they have, but why it has to run as a breakaway is the question. Maybe they could look at a cross-over series instead?

[DazloT]

So they are crying poor yet want to spend money on a breakaway comp? I'm sure that will make the ARU more than happy to start direct funding them again.

[Tazzmania]

Break away comp story appears to be driven by Georgina Robinson.

This journo really seems to love poking the hornets nest and stirring negativity, it must of been in the job Description when she took over from Grumpy Growden

[beige]

Break away comp story appears to be driven by Georgina Robinson.

This journo really seems to love poking the hornets nest and stirring negativity, it must of been in the job Description when she took over from Grumpy Growden

The first time I read about this was in a Growden article early in the year.

[travelling_gerry]

So they want to start a competition using no money and only half of the resources on a competition with an established competition in protest about not getting any money, that should be a good learning curve.

[shasta]

I'd love to know how many former Wallabies/coaches refused to sign that letter. I heard Papworth on radio trying to get Andrew Slack around to his point of view - Slack put the idea down straight away, saying there is no way of going back to the way things once were.

As far as the club Presidents are concerned, the only two I can see on that list are Papworth and Dwyer, although Beastie Boys' Patron Peter Falk has signed.

I'd also love to hear where the funding for a breakaway comp would come from. IIRC they have to pay to get the Shite Shield on Ch 7 these days.

[GIGS20]

So they want to form a breakaway comp with no money, a player pool that is already contracted to nrc, no guaranteed pathway to super rugby, no TV deal when fox is in bed with ARU and no history.

Good luck with that. All the ARU has to do is direct the super franchises to offer nrc places to any young talent that they might want to give a contract and the premier clubs breakaway competition will become a six week extension of Shite shield without the good players.

Way to bring a knife to a gun fight!

[WF2404]

John O'Neil sent an email to Papworth that's been published on the Roar, which is a fascinating read. Suggesting that Papworth is right in the current administration getting it wrong, but not supporting that a lack of funding of state comps is the issue.

This from John O'Neil's letter:

As I applaud your campaign: needless to say, I like many others with great affection and affinity for the game, am very concerned about the perilous position the game is in across most of the relevant measures of success (win/loss ratios, viewership, attendances, finances, participation at club level) and realise that much needs to be done right across the board to restore rugby to its former glory both on and off the field. However, it is the collective that will achieve this renaissance not sectional interests.

Improved attention and emphasis to the community game is a given: however, one must be equally intense in scrutinising the performance of the professional game. If the Wallabies and at least 2 SR teams are firing, then the financial and general health and well-being of the game is more sustainable for all participants. The fact and harsh reality is that we are under-performing badly and have been for too long. A brave performance at RWC 2015 may well have wall-papered over the cracks which are getting wider!

The article has the email from Papworth to former Wallabies and the draft letter to go to the board. An interesting insight into the whole mess.

http://www.theroar.com.au/2016/10/20...aby-champions/

[Tazzmania]

As a good player does not always make a good coach, a good player may not always have the best opinion on how to administer a sport. ( and as we have been subjected to recently commentate on a game)

I suspect that most of theses signatories are old school rugby players from the pre or just post professional era and most likely pre Super rugby in its current (being last ten years, not last year only) format.

Like Kearns and Marty commentating we need to take it with a pinch of salt.

Defence rests its case your honour.

[Alison]

John O'Neil sent an email to Papworth that's been published on the Roar, which is a fascinating read. Suggesting that Papworth is right in the current administration getting it wrong, but not supporting that a lack of funding of state comps is the issue.

This from John O'Neil's letter:


The article has the email from Papworth to former Wallabies and the draft letter to go to the board. An interesting insight into the whole mess.

http://www.theroar.com.au/2016/10/20...aby-champions/

Would that be the same no-mark John O'Neil who pissed all the money up the wall, jumped ship with a massive golden handshake, and left Australian rugby teetering on the edge of bankruptcy?

[valzc]

JON has got a pretty thick skin to comment on "...the perilous situation of rugby" considering he's the one who contributed the bulk of the issue, in addition to the dollars he managed get away with! What a tosser!

[Kalahard]

Looks like the broadcasters and main source of income and the Brisbane clubs are against a rival comp to the NRC.

http://www.smh.com.au/rugby-union/un...21-gs7s9s.html

Fox pays $285 million to broadcast NRC, Super Rugby and the Wallabies. The Shite Shield clubs lost $360 000 on a bad broadcasting deal and are blaming the ARU for not funding them when $300 000 of the $360 000 loss was covered by the ARU. Looks like the Shite Shield clubs have their priorities straight and the best interests of the whole national footprint in the front of their thoughts. NOT!!

[beige]

Looks like the broadcasters and main source of income and the Brisbane clubs are against a rival comp to the NRC.

http://www.smh.com.au/rugby-union/un...21-gs7s9s.html

Their position makes sense - it could be a great part of the club season but absolutely disastrous as a rival to the NRC.