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can someone sum up the pros and cons for me ?
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You generally find them both on the streets of Northbridge!!
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:iconrofl: :iconrofl: :iconrofl: :iconrofl:
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TLH don't encourage him ... seriously - I dunno anything about this 8 team comp. Is it a good thing?
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My observation of the main concerns against the proposal has been that they all revolve around the future relevance of the Sydney Clubs Comp and the ego's of those involved there being further lowered from their current third tier status.
Currently the order of "the Rugby World" in Australia is
1. Wallabies (and Australia "A", U/21's etc)
2. Super 14
3. Sydney Premier Clubs
4. Brisbane Premier Clubs
5. ACT Premier Clubs
6. Sydney & Brisbane Suburban and Perth & Melbourne Premier Clubs
7. The rest....
The Sydney traditionalists can see that this new comp will knock them down a peg on the food chain and not only question their relevance in the scheme of things but also put into jeporady their commercial arrangements which will also make it harder to maintain their current player lists etc.
It is interesting that the Brisbane Premier Clubs haven't appeared to have expressed the same concerns.
Another school of thought being used by the Sydney blazer brigade is that no-one will have any sense of alliegance to these new teams. This does have some merit in Sydney and perhaps Brisbane, at least in the first couple of years however, if they are careful in how they dice up the feeder clubs I thnk they will soon draw out loyal followings as the concept takes hold.
I understand that while Brisbane are not apparently going to follow the more obvious North v South (of the River) divide they will be pushing for both of their teams to be on the same Home and Away roster so that they can hold double headers every two weeks. Personally I think the idea is a good one however, I would have also used the ingrained North/South rivallry to encourage parochialisim in the supporter base.
The argument for the Comp is quite overwhelming though in that it will expose far more junior talent to a higher level of competition and allow those coming to the end of their Rep career to keep their hat in the ring (or maybe prolong the agony of retirement) for further selection.
The maths is simple, 22 in the Wallaby Squad on match day, 88 in the Super 14 Squads on match day and 176 in the APC Squads on match day. I can see the Comp expanding to at least 10 teams which will then have 220+ players playing at a semi professional level for ten weeks. The Squads are to be set at 28 players each in the first instance so obviously these figures are the minimums involved. 224 for next year for starters.
The season will allow for the Premier Comps around the Nation to still perform as they are currently, they will simply have a shorter Premier season while their better players are on board and then during the APC they will have the equivelent of their pre-season comps to continue on for the same period as the current Australian Rugby Season and further developing Australia's talent pool.
With this greater competition on offer, I feel we will see an increase of Rugby Immigrants coming to Austalia in the short term to fill any void in the local clubs and via for higher honours once they have attained Residency.
This will further raise the standard of competition across the country and speed the development of our local players.
In the first instance this comp will have little draw on the WA comp as the players will be mainly sourced from the Force Squad however, as numbers in that Squad increase from local players then obviously more impact will be felt.
This can only be seen as a positive for Western Australian Rugby.