OPINION
Elliott Smith dissects the intricacies of recent rugby events, from the Hurricanes’ entertaining triumph to Melbourne’s controversial Super Round. Delving into the disparities between Melbourne’s rugby spectacle and the NRL’s Las Vegas kickoff, Smith questions the motives behind these ventures.
A question...
What’s the difference between the Super Round in Melbourne and the NRL’s Las Vegas season start? About 30,000 fans through the turnstiles to be fair, but not a lot otherwise. Most of the fans in Vegas seemed to be Australian (Super Round looked like existing rugby fans), the US TV audiences were poor and like the Super Round, locals didn’t really seem to get behind it. The biggest winner might be Las Vegas tourism with Australians going over next year - rather than the sport itself.
Whether either event converted any new fans on the ground is questionable and it’s hard to figure out what the aim was other than hubris - the American sports market is heavily saturated, as is Melbourne. The actual difference is Peter V’Landys - a man who is loved or loathed - is a sledgehammer who is a big thinker and doesn’t seem to care who gets in his way. Think back to 2020, when he basically set a date during lockdown and decided that was the day they’d resume. If you listen to him being interviewed before and after the round, V’Landys seemed to think the NRL touching down in Vegas was a historic achievement akin to the moon landing. In reality, it failed to launch.