Clearly, every retention decision is being made with a hard-nosed attitude towards a player’s worth and the depth in his position, and the flexibility being shown to Len Ikitau, who will spend some time with Exeter before returning to Australia ahead of the Rugby World Cup, is a reflection of the latter.
The absorption of the Waratahs and the Brumbies into RA also clouds the longer-term picture. While RA was keen to point out the “one-off costs” involved in bringing them under the RA umbrella, it remains to be seen whether they’ll be a persistent cost burden.
Drua players perform a Cibi before kick-off against the Waratahs in February.Credit: Getty Images
Who makes money in Super Rugby? The Reds, the Drua (with healthy support from DFAT, NZ Rugby and World Rugby) and whoever hosts the final, which was the Blues last year.
Apart from that, it’s a yearly challenge for the clubs to wash their faces – the Hurricanes have lost $NZ2.1 million ($1.97 million) in the past two years, so it’s possible that the Waratahs and the Brumbies will weigh heavily on RA’s bottom line in the coming years.
The solution to this is as elusive as it is simple. In its annual report, RA reveals that Stan audiences for the Wallabies’ end-of-season tour last year had jumped 40 per cent, a marked contrast to the 9 per cent decrease in the free-to-air audience for Super Rugby Pacific.
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Joseph Aukuso-Sua’ali’i can take some of the credit for this, but the figure also points to the vast pent-up demand that exists for a winning Wallabies side.
To that end, RA should be grateful to an admirable group of players who have stayed loyal to Australian rugby, clearly aware of the extraordinary privilege of being able to host the British and Irish Lions and to play in a World Cup in front of friends and family.
Harry Wilson set the tone earlier this year, almost taking umbrage at questions about why he didn’t want to go overseas. Rob Valetini, Fraser McReight and Ikitau have espoused similar sentiments, while Nic White has been consistently vocal in recent years about his desire to push through to the Lions.
But they all also carry the enormous responsibility of making the Wallabies successful again, an outcome that is not only desirable but explicitly linked to the financial well-being of the game.
The new broadcast deal and the pending Lions millions are of course good news, particularly alongside an encouraging Super Rugby campaign to date. But it’s hard to see Australian rugby getting off the financial tightrope any time soon.
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