John Hart's article on the state of New Zealand rugby yesterday highlighted the malaise in our game - the obsession with the World Cup, the damage done to the All Black jersey and test matches over the Henry era, pampered players and the dire financial threat. Today, he proposes some radical solutions.
KEY POINTS:
New Zealand rugby's greatest challenge is not to win the 2011 World Cup; nor is it to win the Bledisloe Cup and Tri-Nations each year - it is the very survival of the game.
Rugby needs to re-engage with its key stakeholders to ensure its financial security and popularity. There is a widespread view that the NZRU, with its obsession with the All Blacks and winning the 2007 World Cup, has become arrogant and lost touch with its key stakeholders -provincial unions, sponsors, media, and media rights holders and, most importantly, its fan base.
Many provincial unions are in financial strife, the advent of the semi-professional Air NZ Cup adding to their woes, and fans are being turned off the game.
I'm going to make some suggestions that will shock some - a vastly revised national provincial championship which includes Australian teams; the possibility of opening up our Super 14 franchises for public or private investment; and making the 2011 World Cup a global event -and not just the platform for an All Black win.
I'd also suggest that the NZRU needs to acknowledge that the game is in strife and get rid of its perceived arrogance, and provide the governance and visionary leadership the game requires.
AIR NEW ZEALAND CUP/PROVINCIAL RUGBY
Our domestic game has to be revitalised with competitions that are financially affordable and exciting and attractive to sponsors and fans.
We cannot continue down the path of having so many professional teams (19) or players. We do not have the income streams to make this sustainable as costs keep rocketing. Many of the provincial unions cannot afford to spend up to their salary cap - a sure sign we have got the revenue-expenditure equation wrong - and will go broke under the current structure.
We have to cut the number of teams, amalgamate unions, and come up with a competition which is even and attractive.
We should have seven teams in the Air NZ Cup, and bring in a new element with three teams from Australia - NSW, Queensland and ACT.
A 10-team competition with a round-robin, then semifinals and finals would be attractive and radical, yes, but we have to get the crowds back; and provide something sponsors want to invest in.
The Heartland competition should run on a amateur basis among remaining unions, played on weekends, with training runs during week nights so that players are able to work or take education opportunities.
The antis will say that this will strengthen Australian rugby. So what? The more competitive Australian teams are at national or provincial level, the better our competitions will be.
Opponents will also suggest that fewer opportunities at professional level will lead to players going overseas. Initially, perhaps, we will lose some but there are only so many opportunities overseas and those who want to make it long-term at professional level will have their opportunities here at home.
Remember, rotation of players at All Black level has already encouraged mobility. Rotation saw a lot of people named as All Blacks who would never have been so in other times. The upside for them was that their value on the overseas market increased probably by as much as $100,000 - that's what being a former All Black means in Europe, helping people to make the decision to leave, some of whom may have been discarded as All Blacks, thus robbing them of that passion and drive to be All Blacks in the future, but rewarding them for going overseas. Rotation has damaged the integrity of the jersey and our game.
The game here is over-administered. Every union in New Zealand (there are 27) probably has a CEO, a marketing manager, accountant and a coaching structure. We are overloaded - and we need to consider sharing services. If you owned a company that stretched throughout the country, you wouldn't have 27 CEOs, you'd have 27 branches.
Other sports and enterprises like the racing industry have had to cut their cloth and amalgamate to survive - or shared admin-istrative services with resultant cost savings and improved systems and efficiencies. The whole issue of amalgamation is a difficult pill for unions to swallow. They should take the first step now in helping to secure their financial viability by having shared administrative services.
SUPER 14
This is essentially a good competition that was damaged last year by having the 22 All Blacks removed.
Maybe the time has arrived for the franchises to be opened up for private or public investment.
When Super rugby was first devised, that was the game plan - to sell off the franchises and begin to create a New Zealand version of the great football franchises in the UK, for example, Manchester United or Liverpool.
New Zealand rugby went off that idea when professionalism intervened and the game opted for central control; contracting the players to the NZRU and controlling the Super franchises.
There is no doubt that at the time this was the right decision as the British, for example, had club-country issues while we were able to control player availability. However, it's not looking quite such a great idea now.
The English premiership rugby clubs and their billionaire owners have brought a lot of money into the English game. The Rugby Union has now settled its differences with the clubs and agreed payments for clubs losing players to international commitments. The French have done the same thing.
Suddenly, their model is looking far superior as they are beginning to evolve the partnerships that will take their game forward, while ours stagnates. Cast your eye back at the money coming into the Northern Hemisphere game, as discussed around the recently held Integrated Season Forum in England.
Our June test season in the Southern Hemisphere generates $46 million. In the north, their comparable November test window earns three times as much - $162m. The Six Nations generates $233m; the Tri Nations $66m. You can't ignore income disparities like that - and they will only get wider under current structures.
The clubs are also wealthy - and the money on offer is, of course, part of the reason over 30 former All Blacks and Super 14 players have gone to Europe this year.
Here in the Southern Hemisphere, in search of the almighty World Cup, we have damaged our main showcase, the Super 14; we have toyed with the friendship of sponsors and rights holders; we have played too much rugby and too many meaningless test matches with devalued All Black jerseys; and we have allowed our provincial game to stagnate and leak fans.
Maybe, from a revenue point of view and to generate excitement, we need private interests to own franchises. European football has proved that money can be made from the club game and there are now billionaires from the US lining up to buy their way into British football.
Also from a revenue point of view, the only area where the Southern Hemisphere out-performs the north in relative terms is sponsorship - and that's solely because of the pulling power of the All Blacks brand.
Maybe, then, we need to drill down a level deeper with that pulling power and set up our franchises for private investment and, perhaps, the time could soon come to take them public. Then the New Zealand rugby public as well as institutional investors can become 'owners' - and in so doing, generate the revenue which will help keep the game live.
The NZRU could help finance the franchises by giving them a share of the income generated by the TV rights from the Super 14 competition.
With ownership of the competition the NZRU could, in setting up the franchises, clearly establish the rules for player availability for the All Blacks and national teams. Players and coaches would then be contracted to the franchises with an NZRU contract covering national honours.
The NZRU, while continuing to run the competition, could significantly reduce some of its costs and risk and invest back into the amateur game at administrative and competition level.
ALL BLACKS
On the field I think the choices are clear:
* Our players need to play more, always acknowledging the need for welfare - but on an individual basis, not collective.
* They need to play in intense matches so they become seasoned and know how to win 'tough'.
* We should ditch rotation and reconditioning as a strategy and use it only when it is really needed for player welfare. Players should play in the national competitions unless required for national honours.
* We should organise more tours - including midweek games. The Lions tour showed us what could be and we need more tours like that, incoming and outgoing. The midweek games means we do not have to use test matches to experiment with players and devalue the All Black jersey. Such tours become huge events - looked forward to and they become the big occasions in the game. That's what we need - not tests against second-rate teams or All Blacks playing in a test side selected for reasons other than playing our top team.
* Fix the rules - globally. Sanzar has agreed to trial some new laws in this year's Super 14 competition. But any new rules should be agreed and introduced across the worldwide game from an applicable date.
We now have the ridiculous situation where NZ players will play under the new rules at Super 14 level, but for the test matches against Ireland and England immediately following the Super 14, will be conducted under the old rules.
If the rules are supposed to be so different and designed to change the game, we are putting our players and All Black coaches at a clear disadvantage in the short term.
Off the field:
* Players need to do more for themselves and develop more life skills, not just rely solely on rugby as a life.
* The players must be kept in touch with the game. The longer we have had professionalism, the less available our All Blacks have become. That led to my comment last week that some players have become takers rather than giving to the game.
In other codes, I see the players giving their all to community activities, supporting sponsors, the sort of activities that the All Blacks used to do. But I have noticed the All Blacks being more distant from their fans, controlled, and cosseted. They are over-managed.
They can't even talk for themselves. The way they are controlled suggests that it will not be good if the players are seen to be making a mistake in public that might upset a sponsor or stakeholder. So we get controlled speech, except in the case of guys like Andrew Mehrtens, and more recently Anton Oliver, who say what they think and get away with it by the force of their personalities and the way they say it.
ALL BLACK COACH APPOINTMENT/WORLD CUP REVIEW
I am amazed that the NZRU are going to spend a lot of money and time on evaluating our failure at this year's World Cup.
Supposedly the report will show up the lessons to be learned. I would have thought the answers were clear, and most are associated with the way the All Blacks were prepared in terms of reconditioning, rotation, lack of game time together, and leadership.
We don't need a costly inquiry and report to tell us that. We should move on.
ALL BLACKS COACHING APPOINTMENT
I was surprised Graham Henry decided to stand but, from the moment he did, it was clear that he and his team would be reappointed.
The board endorsed his World Cup strategies and have now reappointed him, so must have been satisfied that he was the person to take NZ rugby forward.
Four years is a long time to be an All Black coach, given the intensity that focuses on the position. Given the impact of some of his World Cup strategies have had on the wider game, Graham will come under intense scrutiny over the next two years.
Public following has also tended to support Henry over Robbie Deans. However, the most telling poll for me was the one conducted of 50 former All Blacks who supposedly came out 84 per cent in favour of Deans over Henry.
Is this yet again another case of the NZRU being out of touch with some of its key stakeholders, this time many of the former legends of the game?
There is no doubt that Henry is an excellent coach and I wish him well. Whether this decision is in the best interest of the wider game however remains to be seen.
However, now that Henry has been appointed we should get in behind him and hope that he can bring further success and credibility to the All Black jersey.
Deans was a worthy contender. He could not have done more in domestic rugby. I hope he is not lost to NZ rugby, but Friday's announcement clearly tells him that he will not be the All Blacks coach during the next four years.
Should he decide to take any offshore role we should totally support him, although he would be a very sad loss to our game at a time when our coaching ranks are clearly depleted.
After all, the NZRU incoming CEO Steve Tew has often said that our current coaches, Henry, Steve Hansen and Wayne Smith have all benefited and become better coaches from their overseas experience. They can hardly now stand in the way of Deans should he have offshore aspirations.
2011 RUGBY WORLD CUP
We need to stop thinking about winning it and start thinking about how we are going to make it a world class event - an event which showcases the uniqueness of our country, as well as being a great rugby nation. The recent NZ Golf Open in Queenstown was a great example.
We owe Jock Hobbs and Chris Moller a great debt of thanks for securing this event. Now we have to get behind it and support it and embrace the opportunity as a country, not only as a game.
CONCLUSION
Rugby is a great game and of undeniable importance to the social fabric of our country. There is no doubt however that the game has significant challenges if it is to develop and sustain its special place in our hearts.
The board and executive of the NZRU have many challenges ahead of them.
What we need today is enlightened, visionary leadership which listens to and embraces its stakeholders and, while respecting the history of the game, is prepared to confront the issues by making some of the tough calls required.
