Bye-bye: The Kiwi player exodus continues
This week we will mostly be concerning ourselves with regeneration, D-days, quantifying support, and a deafening silence...
Anybody wondering how it is that New Zealand manage to consistently produce so very many excellent young players?
We reckon it's through necessity. As Sona Taumalolo revealed his departure for the sunny shores of Languedoc-Rousillon and the fervour of the Catalan masses of Perpignan (was there ever a match more made in heaven), analysts counted the likely departure rate of New Zealand's Super Rugby playing stocks at somewhere around 30 per cent at the end of this year.
That's a bit more than usual - and no doubt fuelled by the fact that there's no World Cup looming for some time to come, but it's a scary stat: pretty much an entire Super Rugby squad.
Yet every year, the Kiwi teams manage to bring through another generation of youngsters. Jimmy Cowan is off to Gloucester, but there's no doubting the talents of Aaron Smith. Taumalolo has spent his last year in Waikato mentoring the imposing Ben Tameifuna. Beauden Barrett has been stellar at times in a stuttery Hurricanes team, Matt Todd is heir apparent to Richie McCaw, Tom Taylor likewise to Dan Carter, Mils Muliaina leaves behind not only Israel Dagg, but now the emerging Andre Taylor as well. The list goes on.
Necessity does fuel the speed at which these players come through, but there's little doubt that at the level just below High Performance, the Kiwis have created a system for youth development, one which is doing something spectacularly right.
Meanwhile in South Africa, well though many players are being developed, the politics is still rife.
Sometime in mid-late May, SARU are going to sit down and resolve, once and for all, the thorny issue of the Southern Kings' ill-conceived accession to Super Rugby next year. Unless something monumental is lurking under the surface, that will mean an equally ill-conceived goodbye to one of the existing franchises: most likely the Lions or Cheetahs. In turn, that may mean a boycott of the competition by the SA franchises.
Back in February the existing franchises sent a joint letter sent to SARU, one which made pretty clear one of the entry criteria for the Kings: "That none of the existing franchises shall be prejudiced by such inclusion [of the Kings] in any way whatsoever; That none of the existing franchises shall be eliminated from the tournament in 2013 or at any stage thereafter as a result of the inclusion of the Kings."
But with SANZAR refusing point blank to entertain the notion of an extra team, there's little other choice, beyond turning to the Kings and saying 'sorry'.
The undue pressure the whole scenario has added to that already on a battered and out-of-form Lions team has been immense, while the Cheetahs have been nobly fighting the perennial struggle against scepticism. But for either of those teams to be cut would cleave South African rugby in two. Africa's financial capital without a Super Rugby team? No top-level rugby in the Free State?
Whoever made that promise to the Kings is going to find a number of chickens home to roost in the next couple of weeks...
How do you measure support for your team? According to a group of boffins tasked by Premier Rugby, it's through measuring heart-rate, anxiety levels and hormone levels in saliva.
Fans of the Aviva Premiership teams have been tagged and tested all season long for an experiment run through the University of Bath.
Director of research for psychology Dr.Mark Brosnan said: "All the tests were formulated and set up to give the best indication of the stresses and emotions fans go through when watching a game of rugby.
"There's no doubt that the more passionate you are about a team, the more involved you will be on an emotional level - and this is exactly what this experiment found. We were surprised by just how passionate some of the fans were. Some of the surges in heart rate and testosterone are the biggest we have seen.
"Previous research has examined these factors in players - and it's fascinating to see that fans go through similar psychological and physiological processes as the players on the pitch".
According to the tests, the most passionately-supported team is Gloucester (which must have stuck in the throat a bit at Bath Uni) while the least was Saracens.
But was it down to just passion? Or was it Gloucester's late-season collapse that raised the tension levels, Saracens' monotonous kicking game which pacified their spectators? Either way, it was a surprise to find those Tigerish masses from Leicester languishing in sixth... expect a response when Saracens come to town this weekend!
Finally, a lot of people have mentioned this in conversations over the past month or so, but there's been so little press: what's going to happen to Argentina?
The Pumas team consists almost exclusively of players in Europe, meaning that contracts all over the place are going to have to be re-written, asked for exemption from or torn up if Argentina are going to have a competitive team in the looming Rugby Championship.
We know only thus far that Ignacio Mieres is staying at Exeter despite his probable commitments, while Horacio Agulla could not agree terms with Leicester and so is leaving Welford Road. Juan Martin Hernandez and Juan Imhoff have signed a three and two-year extensions respectively at Racing-Metro.
French clubs with Argentineans in - Montpellier in particular - presumably have the squad depth to make a plan and accommodate, but there's been scant information to be found on the Pumas' structuring of their squad and player availability for the months ahead.
Given the hope with which the news broke that Argentina could now have meaningful annual competition, we are now left hoping that all is indeed under control and we'll see the strongest possible squad in August and September.
Loose Pass compiled by Richard Anderson
Comments
kybone says...
gn100 i was working it out the other day and i found that if we tried to organise the NH season so that internationals and the domestic season didn't overlap then all in all it would be a 60 game season (roughly). Obviously that can't be achieved. Personally i love international rugby, but i still maintain that we play too many games and we're in real danger of becoming over familiar with certain fixtures. We've already seen below capacity crowds to a lot of autumn internationals and its down to the fact that the same teams play each other over and over again (combined with the economic problems of course). The obvious issue with chopping fixtures is lost revenues to unions that are already struggling financially. Exactly what the answer is im not sure as for me international rugby is still the most important thing, but the club game here in europe has an increasingly loud voice.
Posted 13:20 11th May 2012
gn100 says...
@kybone - I understand the challenge for NH clubs, but the coordination across all forms of the game is required - The Super 15 is shorter than NH competitions, due to internationals - the SH countries have ensured the windows exist. The ITM cup and club rugby does now get comprimised in NZ, but the approach is that everyone wants their players in the international match, even if it compromises their local team. As for NZ clubs, they do unfortunately go years sometimes without seeing their international players. Overall both the administrators and fans seem more in unison in SH countries in trying to reach an appropriate compromise
Posted 21:51 10th May 2012
fozza says...
I love this comments string. Learned so much about the situation in South Africa.
My pommy's input on club rugby is that it is a fine, fine balance but right now we seem to have a decent balance. As our players are not contracted to the union, it's their clubs who pay them and the get additional money for international games. In the not so distant past this caused issues and I'm sure it will in future but right now the agreement between the RFU and clubs is holding.
Ii's impossible to be critical of the SH for including Argentina in the upcoming 4N. Let's not forget how long it took the 5 nations to bring in Italy and the fact that they ignored teams such as Romania when they were strong. I would like to see relegation in the six nations but understand that this could do as much harm to the lower level of the six nations compared to the good it would do for teams such as Georgia et al what I mean by this is it more important that a team gets a hiding every year or that we lose Scotland as an honest international force? Hopefully, the Scottish fans start coming back to internationals but you can guarantee they won't if they're playing portugal for the right to get back to the 6 nations.
Digressed slightly there sorry!!!
Posted 14:06 10th May 2012
kybone says...
Stellenbosched2 i don't think you need have any such worries about the club v country debate in England. At the moment international rugby takes complete presedence over the club game to the point where its possible that some seasons an international player will play as many if not more games for England than they will for their club. IMO there are too many international fixtures at the moment i.e. i think that both France and wales will have played 20 times between the start of the World Cup and the end of the autumn internationals (22/23 if you include world cup warm up games). Thats far too many!
gn100 i get your point but a point that i would make is that apart from the summer tours, all our international fixtures in the NH are played during the height of the domestic season meaning all the best clubs are without their best players for large chunks of the season. Someone correct me if im wrong but i believe that the SH international callender is arranged so that it doesn't disrupt the 15. So of course they're going to be glad when they get call ups because it doesn't affect them in an adverse way.
Posted 05:03 10th May 2012
melkdave says...
@Stellenbosthed2
Your concerns concerning the english clubs are not really justified .The RFU foresaw this problem a few years back ,and contray to impressions the clubs are limited in the amount of non english qualified players a club can have The focus is on developing good quality class players here and having some class marquee players to learn from .The impression comes i think because alot of NZ-Ozzies -SA and Scots -Welsh ect do qualify for England thru ancestry or residancy giving us a big pool of players to chose from
Posted 17:25 09th May 2012
Stellenbosched2 says...
Hi BokAvenger
Well done on a move away from the bitchy post. At first I suspected that the Catt got your tongue.
Hi JayStarr
I agree with your posts about the Cats reforming and the player drain. What concerns me to a degree is what I see as English rugby following in the steps of English football. Perhaps in ten years time we will have the situation where English club rugby is paramount and the national team is an irritating drain on club resources. Any comment from our Pom friends?
Posted 06:20 09th May 2012
gn100 says...
One thing I notice in NZ is that losing a player to international duty is an honour and the super 15 franchises or provincial unions are happy to free up players. I'm a bit disappointed with some NH clubs who seem to think club rugby takes priority over international. I have been impressed with the coaches in NZ who seem to think beyond just their team - they are constantly looking at the teams that feed their team, and the opportunities for their players to aspire to. All is not perfect - rugby is not as big in participation numbers as some may think (more play football than rugby), and some apathy within the fans spells concern for the future. The NZ structure is slightly different - every club is represented by a province, which in turn is represented by a super 15 franchise - this allows a path for every player regardless of club ....... Southbridge may be a tiny country club, but is still the club of Dan Carter.
I also believe there is great depth in South African rugby but politics seems to be too prominent and a conservative approach to back play is diminishing the importance of a complete all-round skill set.
NZ Rugby will always struggle to pay like the NH, as our population is only 4 million - while the All Blacks brand is excellent, the core support pool is small by global standards. NZ supports 5 Super 15 franchises and 14 ITM semi professional provincial unions. While a first world country, wages in the NZ economy are low, so the discretionery income is limited. We are becoming too accustomed to sitting in front of the TV instead of attending games. Yes rugby is the most popular spectator sport in NZ, but there is plenty of competition from other sports and activities within a small population.
Posted 20:13 08th May 2012
kybone says...
tha_mai Iv just had a look at a map and i can completey see what you're saying. Argentina is miles away from NZ and Oz (i thought it was a fair bit closer than it was to Europe). Ideally they'd obviously play in some kind of south American Championship, but they've got no competition. The point that im coming from is if you're going to have Argentina in a southern hemisphere competition at international level then surely it stands to reason that their club sides play in the equivelant club competition. If Argentina don't get a team or two into Super Rugby at some point then basically WHATS THE POINT!! Theres no point in having the national team playing in a high level competition if theres no clubs in Argentina to create and develope the players. They're always going to struggle in terms of player quality and the logistics of getting the squad together and will almost inevitably get kicked back out of the Tri nations at some point.
StunTheMullet what are you going on about. Of course Argentina joining the 6N wasn't a good fit for several reasons- It would have created a 7 team tournement which would take a minimum of 7 weeks to complete (with no weeks off other tha your bye week), almost the entire tournement would be played on the other side of the world ( there is obviously a fair amont of travel involved in the Trinations, The last point is that the long term aim for Argentina is surely to get the majority of their players playing domestically and to generate the public interest to grow the game there.
Posted 16:34 08th May 2012
Sasquatch says...
@Bok Avenger:
For sure, there's nothing wrong with our schoolboy rugby. The BabyBoks are always highly competitive in the Junior WC. The Varsity Cup has been brilliant, we really needed a tournament that would provide the neccessary stepping stone to the higher leagues. My concern has always been with our club rugby, I don't think that there's nearly enough funding or interest, and the general atmosphere in my experience is overly aggressive and brutish.
@adsbon09:
Another club you might consider in Cape Town is Hamiltons in Green Point, nice bunch of guys. I started there when I finished at UCT (another good club if you're a student) because my uncle was a member (he played 1st team with Keith Andrews) and I've only had good experiences there. They've also managed to produce a few Boks namely Keith Andrews, Toks van der Linde, Carel du Plessis, M. du Plessis, K. Burger, Andrew Aitken, Tiny Naude, Sean Povey (Coach).
Posted 16:09 08th May 2012
melkdave says...
@Jaysatarr
Your suggestion of the Lions and Cheetahs reforming into the Cats has alot of merit and advantages,it would certinally produce a better team and one less uncompetative team in the championship.As well as saving SARUs blushes.I hope this idea is being seriously discussed as the championship really needs as many teams able to challange for honours as possibly ,thus raising the championships whole standard of rugby .Which i feel has slipped im the last couple of years .I do point out though this is due mainly to new teams not yet being competative even those from the S12 expansion
Posted 14:16 08th May 2012
BokAvenger says...
@Sasquatch - Agreed, things are certainly changing and SA teams are learning that to beat the likes of NZ you need to use all 15 players. Some of the Varsity Cup games and even the school games that are televised also give me a lot of hope about the future - some of those kids have got real skill and like to swing the ball wide. I just hope they don't get the flair/attack coached out of them when they graduate to higher honours.
Posted 13:54 08th May 2012
Sasquatch says...
@Bok Avenger:
Ja, very true. The traditional Afrikaner mentality is centered around the old bash 'em up smash 'em up, and then kick the ball through the poles approach. I d think that it's begining to change though, we're seeing far more dynamic rugby from SA teams (though the Stormers don't score enough tries and the Cheetahs concede too many).
The 1 000 000 figure is both registered and unregistered. The figure was an estimate that I read about in an interview with Regan Hoskins a few years ago.
Posted 13:39 08th May 2012
Sasquatch says...
@Jay Starr:
Absolutely, I coukldn't agree more. Look at players who have gone over there and are now world class in their positions and they have plenty of experience (and money) in NH conditions. It means our pool of players expands, whats the issue?
Posted 13:27 08th May 2012
BokAvenger says...
@Sasquatch - what Sasquatch says is absolutely true re: SA's population make up and who plays rugby and which population group's are generally more interested in the game etc. - although I'm not sure where he got the 1million figure from. To me it sounds a bit high. I know a while ago there was a report claiming that most of SA's registered rugby players where black - the media made a meal of it but I personally spoke to a high ranking Saru official (who wasn't white by the way) who told me that it was nonsense and that there was a political slant to the report (ie. govt wanted more non-white representation in rugby).
At any rate, I think Sasquatch's point actually reinforces what I said re: cultural effect in rugby. It's absolutely true that in English-speaking schools in many parts of SA you play soccer at primary school and only start playing rugger at high school. That puts you at a huge disadvantage when suddenly you have to shift sports and play against Afrikaans kids who've been playing since they were 8. When I was a kid rugby was considered an Afrikaner game. I happened to grow up in rural SA and although I went to an English speaking school we still played rugby. However, I had to complete the last 6 months of primary school in Joburg and it was a huge shock to me to suddenly be thrust into an environment where everyone played soccer. People even mocked you for liking rugby as it was considered a "Dutchman" game (considered a slur to Afrikaners in SA). The point of what I'm saying is that culturally SA rugby is dominated by white Afrikaans influence which tends to favour size, aggression and a strong kicking game (eg. the Bulls). The effect is that people with a more open-minded approach are marginalised in SA which puts them off playing. I'm not necessarily talking numbers when I compare SA to NZ - I'm comparing intellectual approach to game.
Posted 10:40 08th May 2012
JayStarr says...
As for the Kings debacle:
I read in the paper this morning that John Mitchell mentioned the possibility of the Cats being reformed.
A lot of people have been critical of this in the past - very eagerly saying that it didn't work - but the fact is that the Cats were pretty strong when Laurie Mains coached them... and made the semi-finals twice! It was only with the sentimental appointment of Chester Williams where the wheels started coming off.
Some people argue that it is a logistical nightmare to combine two rugby teams, etc. - but what are the Cheetahs at the moment? A combination of the Free State and Griquas. And what about the NZ Super Rugby franchises? They are all combinations of more than one team - and play their home games in more than one town. Also, just look at national squads - combining players from multiple teams and playing in multiple cities... So I believe this argument is a lame one.
If one then also considers the obvious lack of depth both the Lions and Cheetahs have, it stands to reason that by uniting they can solve this problem too. And since John Mitchell took over at the Lions, they have been playing a similar brand of running rugby as the Cheetahs, so it won't exactly be the culture clash it was more than 10 years ago...
I am of the opinion that if this is done right, if the Cheetahs and Lions are united again to form the Cats, and they employ the right coaching structure, etc. the Cats will be a force to be reckoned with. From the current players contracted to these unions you can construct a formidable team, for example:
1-Coenie Oosthuizen 2-Adriaan Strauss 3-CJ vd Linde 4-Izak vd Westhuizen 5-Franco vd Merwe 6-Heinrich Brussouw 7-Juan Smith 8-Josh Strauss 9-Piet v Zyl 10-Johan Goosen 11-Willie le Roux 12-Andries Strauss 13-Waylon Murray 14-Lionel Mapoe 15-Jaco Taute
If they do it right, it will work.
Posted 08:14 08th May 2012
JayStarr says...
Regarding SH players leaving to ply their trade in the NH:
I really wish the SANZAR countries would start opening their minds regarding this. I can understand why we don't want our players to leave - I've been in this camp for a long time - but then I really thought about it:
Firstly, these rugby players, whose careers are only 10 years short on average, have the right to think of themselves and their families and make as much money as they can in this period...
But more importantly, by keeping them in your country and in their positions, you are preventing young players from coming through. Alternatively, by dropping your international selection policies and allowing your players to go play overseas (and still be elligible), you are creating a situation where you have FAR more players playing top class rugby...
Instead of having young guys sitting on the bench most of the season, you have them playing Super Rugby every week, while the older guys are playing Heineken Cup or Japanese Cup (or whatever their tournament is called...) So when you select your All Black or Springbok side, you'll have, for example, 9 or 10 top class fly-halves to choose from, instead of just 5...
In 50/50 situations preference should still be given to home-based players, but don't cut off your nose to spite your face by not selecting a top player just because he's playing abroad...
SH rugby can only get bigger and stronger by following this approach.
What do you guys think?
Posted 07:48 08th May 2012
tha_mai says...
rugbyphile says...New Zealand ... whole population regards it as the no 1 sport
? 2010 Sports Team of the Year - The All Whites (football/soccer). The All Blacks have won the TotY award just five times since it was introduced in 1987.
Four ABs have won Sportsman of The Year in the same timeframe.
Twelve TotY awards have gone to rowing and yachting, and eight SotY awards too.
There is a whole lot of other sports, and sports achievements, going on.
Posted 07:40 08th May 2012
ruckingkiwi says...
I agree, South Africa are starting to strike a nice balance of brute force and skill but they very rarely last a whole season with regards to physical and mental fitness, so it will be interesting if they can bring that to the table at some point. This is not a slur against them but looking at results they are bloody brilliant in Super rugby and start to lose it during the 3N and often get knocked over in the end of year tours. With longer and longer seasons it will be interesting to see how they go, possibly their top guys will forgo Currie Cup completely to stay fresh.
pierredelot1, rugby is the one sport in NZ that receives a proper level of funding, coupled with our cultural make-up, attitude, coaching, love for the game etc then the talent will keep on coming. Everyone has a crack at rugby at some point in their life but we still produce a lot of other quality athletes, I believe NZ is like 4th overall in history for Olympic success (per capita), I think it's just down to attitude and the outdoors, people here love to have a go, Aussie are the same.
Posted 07:35 08th May 2012
tha_mai says...
kybone, peewee . . . re Argentina in Super rugby; two items - look at a map and the distances (by the way, France is closer to Buenos Aires than Auckland is), and as Aerolineas Argentinas has cancelled direct flights to NZ as of 30 June, the option now is via Chile, or fly over NZ to Sydney then back to Auckland - with stopovers this can take 64 hours then there would be another wait to catch a flight to eg Dunedin, another 2hrs flight and an hour by bus to the city.
It's a nice idea but physically impossible for them to play in home and away round robin matches - haven't even considered the options of them flying to South Africa, and of course the reverse would apply for the 3 current SANZAR teams.
Only option would be for them eg to be based in Oz and have no home games at all, hardly fair.
Posted 07:29 08th May 2012
Stellenbosched2 says...
I think the traditional difference between SA and NZ rugby players has been cultural. From the outside it appears to me that the NZ rugby player is brought up believing that winning is absolutely vital for the nation, and all aspects must be considered. NZ players handle the publis relations far better than SA ones. Traditionally the SA rugby players would go into a mental laager when interacting with a ref or the media, and show a very surly face. It was a by-product of the Apartheid thinking, which was that everybody out there hated us, so don't even try and be nice.
I think the modern SA player is adapting and catching up. However, it appears to me that a New Zealander will always believe in the virtue of the local player, and always believe that the South African is a nasty bully who is always the guilty party.
In closing, I have the utmost respect for New Zealand rugby and what it has given the game we all love. However, as a South African I look upon New Zealand as an equal in rugby terms.
Posted 06:43 08th May 2012