ARU eye Newcastle as venue for Super 15

[munross]

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Newcastle could come into the reckoning as a host city for a Super Rugby expansion team when SANZAR meet in Dubai next week to consider the future of the southern hemisphere provincial series.

For those that don't know the Newcastle metropolitan area is the second most populated area in the state of New South Wales and is 162 kilometres north of Sydney.

Next week SANZAR executives will meet in Dubai (coincedentally the location and time of the Sevens World Cup) in order to discuss the way forward for SANZAR and Super Rugby.

ARU boss John O'Neill has already described the meeting as "make-or-break time".

"That's not an alarmist statement," said O'Neil.

The ARU boss knows that they have until June the 30th to agree on a proposal to put forward to the broadcasters for the next five years.

The new broadcast deal will decide how the TriNations, Super14, Air New Zealand Cup and even the Currie Cup will look from 2011 onwards.
Super Rugby is the big issue as it will decide how the road ahead looks. If Super Rugby is expanded or moved to start in March it will have a knock on effect on all of the tournaments that follow it in the calendar.

The Air New Zealand Cup and Currie Cup could even fall away if one idea is taken up as SuperRugby could be extended to 23 weeks leaving not enough time for other tournaments.

Expanding the Super 14 does not appear to be in the player's interest though as 15 All Blacks failed to get through the first two rounds of the Super 14 due to injuries from the increased amount of rugby being played.

"We need to get our ducks in a line as a joint venture. The world economic environment is a whole lot different to what it was 12 months ago, and we have to be very realistic about the market," O'Neill told the Australian.

Last week South Africa expressed their commitment to SANZAR but the Australian says that Australian and NZ officials will still head to Dubai next week uneasy about what surprises the South Africans might spring on them.

It is believed that South Africa have their hearts set on expanding Super Rugby but not to Japan where Australia have been pushing hard. SA Rugby plan to launch a sixth Super Rugby team in the Eastern Cape against the Lions on June the 16th.

South Africa have committed to doing their best to get that 15th Super Rugby team into Super Rugby which will not please O'Neill as it would mean that South Africa have six teams and Australia four while New Zealand have five.

By rights if any expansion is to take place it should be in Australia as they currently have the least amount of teams and they are in the middle of New Zealand and South Africa.

O'Neill said the decision made would be in SANZAR's best interests.

However speaking with his ARU hat on, he said a whole range of options opened up if Australia's push for the inclusion of Japan was accepted.
"The team could be Tokyo-based or based in Australia, from the Gold Coast to western Sydney to Melbourne. And with the Energy Australia Stadium in Newcastle set to be boosted to a 40,000 capacity to support Australia's FIFA World Cup bid, who knows, you might end up with a Super rugby team based there," he said.[/b]

Super14.com

23 weeks of SuperRugby and no Air New Zealand Cup and Currie Cup...?I would miss the Currie Cup very much if this happens, but 23 weeks of SuperRugby could be fun to watch and there will still be the Vodacom Cup here in SA atleast, but still, loosing the Currie Cup that has so much history and tradition in this country...I don't know..., what do you other SANZAR guys say?

 

[Fushitsusha]

Are there any cities remaining that JON hasn't name dropped for another Super side?

 

[Prestwick]

With all the kerfuffle with Saracens and their new South African overlords, I'm surprised a London based franchise hasn't been mooted

 

[Canadian_Rugger]

expanding to Japan is so stupid not only is it going to increase travel time, the poor south africans then will have to travel to Japan which is even further then Aust NZ, why the hell don't they just can the ANZ and the Currie Cup or make them farm team competitions much like we have in North America, aka American Hockey League, Minor League Baseball etc.

Strengthen the homeland before anything else. Australia should be looking to increase its foothold on its own territory and not put its marbles in Japan

 

[snoopy snoopy dog dog]

Perhaps the ARU should be looking to field 4 competitive teams in the Super 14 before they further dilute their player base with a new team in Newcastle, western Sydney, Adelaide, Melbourne, Gosford, Gold Coast or wherever. The only way a 5th franchise would be feasible would be for foreign players (be they from Fiji, Tonga, Samoa, Argentina or their Sanzar partners) to be brought into Australia en masse in order to boost squad depth. Alternatively they could raid the NRL for talent but are the finances there to do it? Not any more.

 

[candybum]

A spokesperson from Auckland rugby spoke at our lecture last year regarding the extended super rugby serioes (23 weeks or what ever) idea. He said that that super rugby will take top priority and that air nz cup will still run at the lower end of the year and would be a lower tier competition mainly use to bread new talent, develop players who aren't super rugby ready and would not insists of any all blacks/top players as those will begin EOY tours etc. Of course he sold it better than i just explained but yeah...

I didn't like the NPC/Air nz Cup being reduced to something like this but to me it wasn't a bad idea.

 

[QLD]

Its just media but a super rugby side wouldn't build interest in Newcastle. If JON had a brain he'd push for a GPS school in Newcastle which plays union. Look at the Gold Coast, without The Southport School it would just be a league city like Newcastle is.

 

[gho]

A Japanese team should probably be based in Japan, so that it would build interest in the japanese market. How many australians would care about Union if our teams were playing in NZ?

 

[gho]

http://www.foxsports.com.au/story/0,8659,2...5002381,00.html
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Rising sun dawns on rugby's future with new Super 15 competition

By Jim Tucker
February 28, 2009

A bold Super 15 blueprint, loaded with local derbys in a three-conference format, will be unveiled next week as rugby's biggest makeover since the code went professional.

The intrigue will centre on just where the 15th team is based to complete the vision to expand rugby to a 22-week season running March-to-August in 2011.

A Japan-based outfit, built around imported stars, may be the magnet for broadcasters because it opens a new market, whereas a Melbourne-based side is merely preaching to the same TV audience.

Australian rugby supremo John O'Neill, his board and their New Zealand and South African counterparts have kept details secret during meetings over the past week.

The centrepiece of the package that will be presented to broadcasters in June will be discussed in Dubai on Wednesday at a SANZAR meeting of the nations' three rugby chiefs.

The proposed 2011 competition format revolves around five teams in each of the Australian, Kiwi and South African "conferences".

Each team within the conference would play home-and-away (eight matches) as well as a single match a season against the 10 remaining sides.

The positive spin-offs for Queensland rugby are immense:

* Nine home games every season rather than six or seven.

* A home-and-away interstate series against NSW enshrined in the new format.

* A money-spinning match against NSW at Suncorp Stadium every season.

* No "soft" crowd-pulling seasons like 2009, in which New South Wales Waratahs, Crusaders, Blues and Western Force are all absent.

* Potential for increased match revenue.

* More chance of a finals blockbuster with a six-team finals series introduced.

SANZAR offered broadcasters a content upgrade from 69 to 95 matches in 2006 when the last multi-million dollar deal was struck in the leap to Super 14 with the Force and South Africa's Cheetahs.

Just what the broadcasters will pay in this tougher economic climate will be a pivotal outcome of negotiations when they start in late June.

"The situation is that Super rugby will be expanded if the economics stack up," O'Neill said earlier this month when talking of the broadcast dollars that will settle rugby's future.

The scrap to be the 15th team will come later. A sixth South African side from the largely black population of the eastern Cape will become a project in June. Rugby offers a broadcast "in" to another untapped market.

Both NZ and South Africa already have five-team operations in Super 14 so a Japanese team would neatly round out the Australian conference at five.[/b]