Editorial: IRB finally opens its cheque book

Opinion

The rugby-playing nations of the Pacific Islands have been a remarkably mild-mannered lot. With much forbearance, they have endured shabby treatment from the game's international governors and their near neighbours.

Countries that contributed some of the stand-out performances of the early World Cups have been routinely denied financial succour and deprived of many of their best players. The upshot was apparent on one weekend early this season when the All Blacks ran up 90 points against Fiji and Australia humbled Samoa 74-7.

Those results might, as Michael Jones has suggested, have been a blessing in disguise. They may just have galvanised the world rugby community.

Finally, the International Rugby Board has loosened its purse-strings, pledging to give nearly $8 million for high-performance initiatives in the Pacific, and to fund an international competition that is appropriate to the island nations' present status.

Tonga, Samoa and Fiji are to play the Junior All Blacks, Australia A and Japan in an annual Pacific Six Nations tournament, which is scheduled to kick off in June-July next year.

The initiative is part of a $78 million injection by the IRB into second-tier nations (also involving the likes of Romania, Canada and the United States). The worthy aim is to improve the competitiveness of the game worldwide; to reach a point where more than a handful of countries have a realistic chance of winning the World Cup. In the case of some of the second-tier nations, that is a pipe dream. The pull of traditional sports in those countries is simply too strong.

In the case of the Pacific Island nations, however, there is already a record of performance. The talent pool has not dried up. There has not, however, been the financial underpinning to develop coaching and other aspects of an infrastructure that will harness this ability.

The Fiji Rugby Union's reliance on a $2 million grant from the Fijian Government to keep itself afloat sums up the extent of the plight.

Regrettably, the Pacific Six Nations tournament has not received an unreserved welcome from Australia. Maybe it is irked that its plan for Tonga, Samoa, Fiji and Japan to play its Super 14 franchises was rejected by the IRB in favour of New Zealand's proposal.

Clearly, Australia foresaw a financial windfall in its concept. Now it says that it would prefer Australia A to be competing against the likes of Argentina and second-string sides from strong tier-one nations.

The reaction smacks of the off-handedness and arrogance that has dominated Australia and New Zealand's relations with the Pacific nations throughout the professional era.

With cash, especially from television rights, calling the tune, neither has gone out of its way to take top-level rugby to the islands. But both have been happy to lure the best of the islands' talent to their own national teams.

It is time to recognise this must stop if the islands are not to become feeders to other national sides or to the strictures of professional rugby in Europe. The IRB's preferred tournament is the right one, if only because it will expose Pacific players to New Zealand, as well as Australian, rugby. The standard is also likely to be higher than that of a Pacific Rim contest.

The Pacific Six Nations tournament will be the yardstick against which the redevelopment of island rugby is measured. Hopefully, it will not be long before that rugby is again demonstrating the elan and expertise that Samoa and Fiji brought to the 1991 and 1995 World Cups. The international game needs Pacific rugby as much the Pacific game needs it.