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Thread: Nathan Sharpe Shutting Down the Western Force Like Dropping Atom Bomb on Rugby in WA

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    Senior Player Herbasimplex's Avatar
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    Nathan Sharpe Shutting Down the Western Force Like Dropping Atom Bomb on Rugby in WA

    FOUNDATION captain Nathan Sharpe says shutting down Western Force would be like “dropping an atom bomb” on rugby in Western Australia and will push families to the AFL.

    The Force are one of two Australian Super Rugby franchises fighting for their future after the ARU announced this week it would shut them down or the Melbourne Rebels.

    The Rebels’ private ownership set-up put the Force in the ARU’s sights but legal threats from WA Rugby against a rushed decision — the club will pitch its case to the ARU next week — has given them confidence they can still fight their way to survival.

    With the ARU open about saying the decision will be mainly a financial one, the Force are understood to be on the verge of announcing a big cash windfall through a public shareholding issue. After getting almost 5000 expressions of interest in $1000 shares, the club had hoped to raise between $5m and $10m.

    Rugby WA has the third highest playing figures, behind NSW and Queensland, and Sharpe — who played 96 matches for them from 2006-2012 — said the Force getting cut would have catastrophic consequences.

    “It would be similar to dropping an atom bomb on the rugby landscape in WA,” Sharpe said.

    “There are obviously people here who love rugby and they’d continue to be involved in some way. But the community here, they’d be pissed off. Really pissed off.

    So you’d have the initial devastation and a lot of angst, and long-term I don’t think you’d see people encouraging their kids to play rugby when there are other viable aspirational opportunities for them to follow in AFL and other codes who have an established footprint here.”

    Sharpe’s successor as Force skipper, Matt Hodgson, emotionally said on the weekend he would face such a dilemma for his kids.

    Sharpe said the fertile pathways from junior and community levels to the Force — and other national teams — had shown expansion to WA to be a success. The Force have nine homegrown players in their 2017 squad, and this year contributed eight Wallaroos, and four boys and four girls to Australian junior sevens squads.

    With little fanfare, too, Force academy products Jermaine Ainsley and Richard Hardwick were invited to Michael Cheika’s Wallabies camp in Canberra last weekend, along with Curtis Rona and Dane Haylett-Petty.

    It’s starting to take flight and speaking to a lot of people involved, particularly in club rugby and development pathways, they want their kids to grow up and aspire to play for their team. The amount of passion and effort that has gone into establishing those pathways here, I think it’d be tragic to see them eradicated,” Sharpe said.

    Asked if extra ARU funding for WA Rugby and an NRC team would mitigate the impact, he said: “​I am sure they probably hope that would settle things down but I think it will potentially go the other way and be seen as a bit of tokenism​, really.”

    Money will talk loudest when the ARU makes its culling call, driven by the millions of dollars spent annually bailing out franchises.

    The Force believe they’ll be able to demonstrate they can be self sufficient, with the money banked from public ownership scheme and ongoing sponsorship guarantees from the WA Government.

    The wildcard in the picture is Rebels owner Andrew Cox, who met Bill Pulver in Melbourne on Wednesday and has held discussions with numerous parties in Australian rugby about the value of his licence. Whether he would sell it for a rumoured $4.75m — and who would buy it — remains unknown but Cox has not publicly ruled it out.

    ARU boss Bill Pulver said the Force’s fan passion had to translate to revenue.

    “With more competitive depth of playing talent in Australia, you’d see better results and that would create a bigger groundswell of support,” Sharpe said.

    “The Force are a state-based organisation. It’s not just about Perth. It’s all up and down the coast.

    “When the expansion was first tabled (in 2004), there was a tender process put forward and the Force were chosen ahead of other areas to grow the footprint here in Australia. Obviously there are commercial implications involved but why has that fundamentally changed?”



    http://www.foxsports.com.au/rugby/na...5ed4a457728377

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    (Previously WFDS) WFDom's Avatar
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    So many coming out in support.... quite humbling.

    Where's the badge??? 🤔

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    Great game, Fucken battled right through to the 80!

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    Immortal Contributor shasta's Avatar
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    I'm not ragging on The Rebels, but I'm yet to hear anyone coming out screaming what a terrible thing it would be for them to be axed when it's down to two. Apart from the doubtful premise that they are less risk financially, it's hard to come up with much. I keep coming back to the only thing that makes sense to me. Get rid of the Force, wait for the Rebels to implode, resume the licence when the owner walks.....then what?

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    Legend Contributor Alison's Avatar
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    Quote Originally Posted by shasta View Post
    I'm not ragging on The Rebels, but I'm yet to hear anyone coming out screaming what a terrible thing it would be for them to be axed when it's down to two. Apart from the doubtful premise that they are less risk financially, it's hard to come up with much. I keep coming back to the only thing that makes sense to me. Get rid of the Force, wait for the Rebels to implode, resume the licence when the owner walks.....then what?
    Like someone else has said (can't remember if on here or elsewhere), such a scenario would likely be exactly the end game the ARU wants - remove both of the bothersome expansion franchises and go back to the cosy threesome that existed prior to 2006. As the Force is less likely to implode than the Rebels, it's strategically better to shoot us in the head at point blank range now and just let the Rebels die a slow and painful natural death in time for the next TV broadcast deal in 2020. Boom.

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    Proudly Western Australian; Proudly supporting Western Australian rugby

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    Immortal Contributor jono's Avatar
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    Quote Originally Posted by shasta View Post
    I'm not ragging on The Rebels, but I'm yet to hear anyone coming out screaming what a terrible thing it would be for them to be axed when it's down to two. Apart from the doubtful premise that they are less risk financially, it's hard to come up with much. I keep coming back to the only thing that makes sense to me. Get rid of the Force, wait for the Rebels to implode, resume the licence when the owner walks.....then what?
    there is a bit on GAGR. interesting stuff to listen to the other side of the equation.

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    It's great that Sharpie and Canno and other ex players are onside but I wonder if any of them would be willing to buy shares. If anybody who is into Twitter can look them up and sent a message to those two and any others who might have played for us. James Stannard, Matt Giteau etc

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