Rugby: In sevens heaven

Nigel Hunt and Onosa'i Auva'a celebrate winning the sevens at the 2006 Commonwealth Games. Photo / Getty Images

Rugby's entry to the Olympics has the boss men rejoicing - talking now about a sport poised to be taken up around the planet.

They are right, kind of. Sevens will now grow in popularity in such countries as the US, China and Russia as a consequence of making the 2016 Olympic line-up.

The funding stream for sevens, now that it is an Olympic sport, will gush rather than trickle in some of the major nations whose sporting budgets are substantial.

Nations with little or no history of sevens may also witness a growth of playing numbers. Entry to the Olympics does that - people with athletic ability are drawn to 'obscure' sports where there might be an easier route to the big occasion.

Even the established rugby nations should see a boost in funding and interest in sevens in the next few years.

Analysts have estimated that rugby sevens will easily double its current sponsorship money of about US$15 million-US$20 million ($20m-$27m) by joining the Olympics.

No wonder rugby's boss men are reaching for the champagne. It is celebration time for sevens. But is it celebration time for rugby? Will the inevitable rise in its profile lead to a boom in the 15-man game? There's hope that it will but the evidence so far is light. Very light.

Take Kenya as a classic example. They are now heavyweights on the world sevens circuit. They have beaten New Zealand and are regulars in the quarter-finals of the big tournaments.

They can muster a good sevens side and the more success they have, the more ingrained they become in the abbreviated form of the game. Kenya don't seem to possess the ambition to translate their basic grounding in sevens to the original form of the game.

What is more likely to come out of the elevation to the Olympic Games is a wider talent pool of raw athletes, equipped in the business of running, passing and tackling.

Some might go on to play 15-a-side rugby, most will be happy to stay with sevens. And why not? It's a lucrative circuit in its own right these days. It is no longer a means to a bigger end. A full-time sevens player these days could end up at the Commonwealth Games, the Olympics and travel the world in between doing just fine, thanks very much.

Why see the 15-man game as the bigger goal? There is no need, particularly when the current rules and current style of play in the longer form is moving further and further away from sevens.

"I think what we will see is some real athletes playing sevens," is the view of national sevens coach Gordon Tietjens. "It is a game where you can see all the qualities, where you can identify a player's skills."

By that he means, if you want to find out if a player can beat people one on one, if he can find the space, if he has top-end speed - then let him play sevens because there is so little of that in 15s at the moment.

Sevens is now in a strong enough position, just like Twenty20 in cricket, where it can survive, indeed thrive, independently of what purists see as the real form of the game. Sevens and rugby are two different codes now and entry into the Olympics will exacerbate that. One will grow stronger - not necessarily both.

"We have already seen massive growth in the popularity of sevens through the world series and Commonwealth Games," says Tietjens. "The pace of the game and having real athletes out there scoring tries - that's what people want to see; a fast, exciting game."

There is also the possibility that the carrot of the Olympics will prove hard for even seasoned All Blacks to resist.

"I think of Doug Howlett," says Tietjens. "At school, he had the goal of representing New Zealand at the Commonwealth Games at athletics. He chose to play rugby instead but then all of a sudden he had this opportunity to go to a Commonwealth Games to play rugby.

"He made himself available for the Melbourne Games but was unable to play because of injury. I think it's possible we will see a lot of players make it one of their goals to go to the Olympics."