@@lachness3578 Absolutely. I would think that the NRL would prefer to have union as a smaller rival (and not struggling), as it provided source of talent to poach from.
The take at the end of this video is delusional. Union is nowhere near League in Australia. Rugby League is the people's game., Rugby Union is deliberately kept in the wealthy private school elites circles
@@titoelcolombiano _”Rugby League is the people’s game”_ I expect that an awful many of “the people” you speak on behalf of do not agree with that, and might even take issue with it. I have to travel a lot to Sydney and Brisbane as part of my job and meet with colleagues there. There’s a fair few big NRL fans among them, but an awful many of them also seem to have a very negative opinion of the NRL. I think it might be _some_ people’s game, something “the people” either love or loathe…
Oz and the yanks share a similar ideology regarding sport: "if we can't beat the rest of the world at their sport, we'll invent our own". The only reason Cricket is still popular in Oz, is because they'd lose to the US if they tried baseball.
Honestly, i think Rugby League will become the dominant Rugby code in the Australia/Pacific region. Rugby is hanging on by a thread in Australia. Samoa and Tonga will become tier 1 nations, and the game is only going to get bigger in NZL, especially if they get a 2nd team. The Kiwis side has never been so stacked, and I believe that tests between the Kangaroos and Kiwis will become the biggest games on the RL calendar. Obviously The All Blacks will always be the biggest drawcard in NZL, but i think the gap has started to narrow because kiwis want a genuine rivalry with Australia, and they arent going to get that with the wallabies. Also, Rugby has gone stale. Its no longer the exciting attacking game it used to be in the 90s and early 2000s. The All Blacks and Wallabies dominated this era because they were attacking oriented sides that could score points from anywhere on the field. Rugby has now shifted back to being more defence orientated, hence SA and Ireland being the 2 best teams.
@@stevvvvveperry And I think that you’re another clown Aussie league fan with no clue about the world and yet another assuming know it all. A second NRL team in NZ would die within 5 years. The warriors have always lived a shaky existence.
@@stevvvvveperry And I honestly think that you sound like yet another Aussie know-it-all with very astray perceptions of the world from your little bubble. Another NRL team in NZ would fold within 5 years. The Warriors have lived a life on the brink their entire history.
@@danieleyre8913 Yeah but they are killing it now and are in many aspects the number 1 sporting franchise in NZL, so I'm not sure what you are trying to argue there. A second team could easily be successful over there. I work with a couple of lads from the South Island and they have all but ditched Super Rugby and only follow the All Blacks and Warriors, and they have both said to me if a South Island team came into the NRL they would support them. The growth of the game over there is going great with record audiences, crowds, players. Seems like you just hate Rugby League.
Well only Australia and PNG prefer the NRL. Every other country prefers union. So there's nothing wrong with union and everything wrong with Australia.
@@chesterdonnelly1212 - I don’t care if you prefer union over league. One of my best mates loves the game I love giving him shit over the woeful Wallabies and the woeful Waratahs, lol.
Your more or less covered it but Rugby grassroots is dogshit. Its a high school game here at best and then Rugby Australia wants to claim those players as their athletes when those players play league every weekend and have been doing so since they were 4-5 years old This isnt new either, its always been this way. NRLs wallet has just grown enough that Union cant poach talent anymore It wont get better either as league is heavily pushing those private schools to jump to league and i expect they will achieve that in the next 20 odd years with the way things are going. That will be the death of union here
Many good points made. I was born in the 1950's. I knew from a young age growing up in Sydney that union was the poor cousin of league. I knew that if you were any good you played league. Union was known as the amateur sport played by a few unfit, private school types. In 1997 union turned professional, but in Australia it has struggled to shake off the amateur mindset. Union has suffered from years of internal conflict and poor business decisions. On the other hand, league under the NRL banner has burgeoned into a fully professional form of family entertainment. I look forward to the NRL expanding to 20 club teams and regular international games against the Pacific island nations.
I look forward to NRL expanding also. Because all of those expansion teams will flop and fail, and leave big fiscal holes that that phoney sport cannot fill, and it will bring the NRL back down to earth of just what a small-time rinkadink money drain it really is. And those pacific Island nations are all third world hell holes with pathetic economies. A financial dead end and indicative of just what non-existent long term future rugby league has.
Has the NRL ruined rugby in Australia? No. Has it capitalised on its failures? Absolutely. International rugby fans don't realise how big the NRL is. The only club rugby comp that comes close for crowds, revenue and tv figures is the Top14 and even then there's daylight between them. One big factor not discussed is AFL. Despite launching an attack on Rugby League 20 years ago it has actually only really made ground in traditional Rugby Union areas of Sydney and Brisbane. Furthermore the traditional breeding ground for Rugby in Australia, fancy private schools, have next to no loyalty or connection to the ARU or top level rugby in Australia. On the other foot the breeding ground for Rugby League, junior clubs where everyone can participate and join, all feed in to the NRL system.
@@ClutchRugbyXV a Swans' game these days is basically a Waratahs game from 2003 as far as the crowd make-up goes. In Sydney AFL is strongest in the east and northern suburbs which have never been huge Rugby League hotbeds.
@@holcable That said Roosters are getting record crowds these days and have the highest average attendance of any Sydney team which suggests it's taking Union fans, given the state of Super rugby these days I think many in the east have just ditched it.
NZ done hitched their rugby cart on the wrong horse....and Oz in turn believes NZ rugby is their only hope for saving union in Oz. Talk about a toxic cycle of self destruction: Oz dragging Nz down, yet Nz having to save Oz from drowning.
@@vanrensburgarchitecturebim1641 Absolutely. I so wish the NZRU would face reality, cancel super rugby and just go back to the inter-provincial competition. It wouldn’t be as good as the super rugby of old with South African, but it would be better than the status quo. Australian rugby sucks and is run by clowns, let them suffer their own incompetence.
For roughly a century, English RL clubs wasted resources on Welsh RU players. League in England is not in great shape. In the early noughties, ARU wasted resources on NRL players. Union in Oz is not in great shape. Prima facie proof that relevance derived from a rival sport is fool's gold.
15 players vs 13 players (no breakaways in League). Limited tackles (6) vs Rucks and mauls. Line outs vs Scrums for plays into touch. 4 point trys vs 5 point trys. 3 point field goals vs 1 and 2 point field goals. I’ve mixed up the order there a bit. Hope it helps. Essentially Union is the sport of the private school world, older and more a part of the establishment. League is traditionally working class as it was prepared to pay players and insure them against injury. Look at the traditional clubs in Sydney and the relevant geography. League - Souths (Redfern), Balmain, Newtown, Glebe, Wests (Ashfield) with two clubs in the wealthier areas Easts (Roosters / Bondi) and Norths (lower North shore). Union - Manly, Randwick, Northern Suburbs, Eastwood, Epping, Gordon, Warringah, University with Wests and Southern Districts in working class areas.
@@rmoz2729 i know the difference myself because i did some research many years ago but half of australia or perhaps more wouldn't know this I wouldn't say either codes of rugby captures the whole nation
@@anthonypang7927 Correct, they don’t but the NRL is clearly much more popular at the moment. Union gained ground during the super league era but the NRL has superb marketing. No code in Aus claims the entire attention of the nation. The AFL Swans fans are a particular breed of Sydneysider, also usually part of the well to do. They didn’t grow up in Sydney’s suburbs with a local league team you supported through thick and thin. They are those that either moved to Sydney or come from the Union suburbs. So AFL isn’t huge in big NSW areas, there’d be no chance of a team playing at a national level in Newcastle.
Rugby league is everywhere in public schools and communities rather union is mainly a private school thing. More public schools than private and cost less to play league. Playing league in school is a big competition in SEQ but also small because you know names and play against the best then you see them on TV. All starts in grass roots.
The ARU never bothered to expand beyond their old school tie base & with that talent pool shrinking because of demographic reasons (because of the big increase of Asian & Indian students in these private schools who have no interest in Rugby) they've withered on the vine.
In the 2023 financial statements NRL had over $255 million in net assets on its balance sheet but most importantly it made $58 million profit for that year. Peter V’landys the ARL chairman is an accountant and had transformed the NRL’s finances since he took over in 2017. Rugby Australia had net assets of -$12 million and lost $9 million I think. Those events you listed at the end will boost RA finances, but they are one time events, they’re not gonna make RA profitable every year. Does RA start to lose money again in 2028? It’s plausible. By 2037 for the next Aussie lions tour I think it’s possible to think that RA will be back insolvent whilst the NRL will be a multi billion dollar organisation. The ‘travelling the globe’ argument is all well and good but it doesn’t pay the bills, Union has lost in Australia,NRL/AFL expansion into each others states will affect Union the most, AFL has taken over traditional Union communities in Sydney/brisbane, NRL expansion in Melbourne/perth will target Pacific Islander/kiwi communities. Australia is too small a market for everyone to have their share.
@@HURLINGHQ-oz2yv If the NRL has so much in net assets then why has the NSW taxpayer handed them out fancy stadia? Hmm? And that V’Landys greaseball didn’t take over until the COVID pandemic, pushing out the Jewish guy running it prior (sorry forgotten his name) because V’Landys would flaunt lockdown regulations. Like you’d expect of a crook from the racing industry. We’ll see how well the NRL is really doing in years to come when it all comes out in the wash…
New Zealander here, All Blacks supporter, and I'm so sorry to see Australian RU in such trouble. I recall the days when the Bledisloe Cup was a real contest, it's sad to see the once-mighty Wallabies adrift.
@@murielpainter4839 I’m a Kiwi and I played rugby when I was younger and did some coaching for my club. And I couldn’t care either way about the Wallabies and Australian rugby. Yeah they were good opponents until about 15 years ago. Long time ago now. Their rugby Union made its own bed with their trash decisions. And after enjoying Nz welfare in the 1970s and early 80s; they wasted no time in stabbing our backs over hosting the World Cup in 2003. We don’t need them we still have our true rivals in South Africa and the rising European game.
It's interesting because I'm from Melbourne and rugby league went successful down here where as rugby union Had no chance. I believe union failed because sponsors don't really see any point in dumping money into teams. Where as Melbourne storm have been successful for 20 years now! Melbourne rebels on the other hand well they never really recruited any talented players that had a chance of winning super rugby competition. The grass roots is a problem here. Most fields are either cricket, Aussie rules or soccer. You will be lucky to find a rugby field in Melbourne.
interesting to note, but as Rugby fans, a sad story…Melbourne Storm do have a strong history, but Melbourne Rebels kinda don’t got it….common factor dual international Marika Koroibete PS Melbourne is an awesome city🔥
Its crazy that oz has won 2 world cups and is now on its knees. Im not sure joe schmidt can save this one like he did with Ireland. Could be a very whitewash lions tour.
I think the main reason Union has struggled here in OZ is they neglect the club game and focus on the internationals, the club game has to be the bread and butter of any sport to thrive, the internationals can build from that.
@@Zion-Bear Yeah, the South African school system pumps out hundreds of players that could play top level club rugby in Aus or NZ every year. Most of them stop playing if they don't get a Currie Cup development or URC track contract.
The lions tour and world cup will be a sugar hit for union and then back to obscurity after both events. Unless they can fix up the issues domestically (grass root engagement, super rugby etc) the sport will continue to decline here and given the sport administration reeks of an old boys club I doubt they'll achieve anything.
Rugby’s nursery is limited to private schools. ARU spend nothing (comparatively) to the other codes on junior development thinking all their elites from schools will go forward into Super Rugby franchises. However NRL have a significant portion of these players all tied up by the time they reach First XV level. There are a massive amount of private schoolboys in the NRL. When you add that to the State School system which is all Rugby League ~ it is a no brainer why the NRL succeeds.
@@ClutchRugbyXVa lot of them start of playing league as juniors, get offered scholarships to play union in the private school system for a few years, and go back to league once they leave school. Not saying that’s all of them, far from it, but it happens on a pretty regular basis
The two reasons I have zero interest is NRL is more free-flowing while rugby union has too much stop-start for my liking. The other thing is we never win anyway. Even in finals when we've had the kiwis on the ropes they still come back and beat us. The kiwis are basically invincible, so what's the point?! Maybe if they weren't allowed to intimidate the opposition with their haka, it might make it a somewhat fairer, but I doubt it would enough of a difference. In my 40-odd years, I've known 2 people who follow it at all, and 1 of whom really enjoys it.
I can’t stand rugby league in general. I find the game tedious & low-dimensional and much of its trash support base repulses me (and I’m a working class kiwi background, state school educated, etc). I hate all the tacky merchandising, the association with sports gambling, the whole “big fish small pond” attitudes of its thug player base, it’s inferiority complex, etc. But the NRL does appear to have bounced back from the pandemic to a position of strength. While Union in Australian seems to be in terminal decline. Is this success of the NRL all smoke and mirrors? Is it actually sustainable growth, and not just setting itself up for another big crash? I don’t know, and frankly I’m not really that interested enough in that sport. But Union in Australia is back to sliding into minor sport status, like it was back in the early 1970’s. Being a New Zealander; I never really cared that much about Union in Australia myself. But if you do care about Rugby Union in Australia; then you need to do something about the ARU and their general incompetence.
Worth noting aswell that touch football which is NRL linked has 700,000 participants in Australia while Oztag is also very popular and is another variety of rugby league
The ARU refused to budge in 1907. Serves them right. Both rugby and NRL are only watched north of Canberra and east of Broken Hill. Both niche sports from a pocket of Australia. We have ice hockey and 'real' tennis too.
Rugby across the world is strong when Australia and New Zealand rugby are strong. I believe it’s past time that World Rugby steps in, bring an end to Bill’s disastrous tenure.
What you say was the truth in the early 2000s. Now that rugby professionalised for 30 years. We have slowly found our way here in Europe, South Africa, Argentina and Japan. Aus and to less extend NZL must accepted that the demographics of rugby has changed a bit. Rest of the world are catching up.
Super rugby ruined Australian rugby by diluting the player pool. The fact it was only available behind a pay wall didn’t help. This guy seemed to have no idea when talking about Australian League or Union. You can tell by the some of the players he lists among other inaccuracies.
@ClutchRugbyXV Campese is a textbook example of Aussie and Kiwi commentators that seem to be fixated on game speed because of the NRL threat. There's also an outdated view of the northern hemisphere game being slow and set piece dominated. You've highlighted a lot of the issues in this video, exclusivity, games behind a paywall, lack of grass roots focus, player access/personalities and the gameday experience
What I don't understand is where your School Boy Wallabies go? They've been competitive over here in NZ and some standout players don't seem to make that transition to Super Rugby...I mean some Wallabies Schoolboys e.g Joseph Suali'i ,Will Penisini,Angus Chricton.... although I think Suaali'i is going back to Union.
As an NRL fan,i always looking forward to watch the Bledislo Cup every year..last time i watch the Bledislo Cup were 20years ago when the Wallabies Empire started crumbling😢
A big problem with rugby is that when the play stops for a scrum, it is completely normal to spend 2.5 minutes resetting those scrums, only to end in a penalty (which the crowd doesn't understand as they can't really see what caused the penalty), meaning there is either more stoppage as the kicker goes for 3 points, or the ball is kicked out and there is more stoppage setting up the line out. It doesn't make for a great spectator sport. In a crowded sporting market like Australia, it just doesn't cut it. The rules need to change to get more ball in play. But the powers that be are so afraid they will be accused of turning the game in to league, they don't do what needs doing.
How do you change it and keep the scrums a contest or without fundamentally reducing the accessibility of the game? Yes league is faster, but it's also far simpler, with no set pieces. Some of the Union set pieces take time and there are new rules to try and speed up the scrum in particular but I can't see how to change them without changing the fundamentals of the game. I think maybe some better communication around the reasons for scrum penalties would be better as the rules there seem to change frequently and it's very often not clear why penalties are awarded. I think stopping the clock if a scrum is reset is also a good idea, so at least we don't lose match time to resetting of the scrum when it is necessary.
@@Narapoia1 I don't think stopping the clock is a good idea as it still means spectators have to sit through what seems like endless scrum resets. I would like to see the only penalty for scrum infringement being tap and go. It would at least give the crowd something to get excited about after 2.5 minutes of failed scrums. Yes, NRL is actually a boring , repetitive game, but bottom line is people like watching running rugby.
@@munttube2647 It's hard to justify taking away a team's ability to capitalise on scrum dominance that way though. I've watched a lot of rugby this year and refs are far more likely to penalise teams now that reset the scrums, often that means less time resetting and more time with the ball in play and there are time limits for formation of the scrums. What irks me is that if the scrum does collapse we waste game resetting. There has definitely been a recognition that audiences don't want to spend time on resetting.
Be interesting to look at the scene in 20 years. Union in Europe is going gang busters. Certainly not plain sailing but apparently the TV viewers in Ireland for the Leinster Munster game were off the charts and rugby is regarded 4th in Ireland. France has 3 professional divisions doing pretty well and it aint the top sport. Japan is gaining momentum as are Spain, Chile, Brazil, Argentina etc. The US is a hard nut to crack for both League and Union but I believe union has the edge there. No need for union die-hards to get depressed. Majority of people world wide far prefer Union. Union will still be around in 20 years time, and thriving. May not be the major sport in OZ, but who cares?
@@jeffbetts9420 Oh yeah. As a kiwi, it’s hilarious seeing these Aussie loig fans and their idea that the sport of rugby union is dependent upon them being a part of it. Rugby was doing fine in the world before we in NZ helped prop up the game in their country. We don’t need them, the ‘boks and the rest are still there. We can just put the Bledisloe cup away in the cupboard until the day their rugby union can get it together again.
I think the issue that union fans can see though is the money in NRL is growing faster then any union league and eventually it will have the funds to take unions best talent, many Clubs in the NRL could do it now as they have higher revenues than even the biggest clubs in France, but the Salary cap keeps them in check for now.
@@DabDabGoose But how has it grown when its market remains the same one in those same two states of Australia? If it had made inroads into a big market such as (hypothetically) the UK, the yeah it might make sense. But it’s just the same people as always. I’m not one for wishful thinking; but I strongly suspect that NRL’s finances are all smoke & mirrors. That oily little man they got from horse racing to run their game has low integrity even by their standards. Why did they need the NSW government to pay for their stadia?
This is misleading NRL has always been more attractive to Australians; the fact that they win back to back world cups is due to no one else in the world taking League seriously;
is attractive, maybe, but yeah mate, not too much by way of numbers, off hand RL WC has 16 teams(???) indicative of the small niche it takes up. Case in point Fiji Bati has reached the semifinals of the last 3 RL World Cups!!!! Rugby League doesn’t even qualify to be a minority sport in Fiji, like you rightly pointed out, no one else in the world takes League seriously apart from a handful
there's a combination of things, firstly ARU don't invest their money in the right areas, bandages don't fix things that are broken. secondly, if ur a 17, 18 yr old kid ur more likely to make a nrl than a super rugby team which is fair but it's put off for many kids. thirdly, the rugby league game has grown so much, the speed in which it is played at makes it so much better to watch than union and it is proven through the rule changes in union over the past couple years. lastly, there's no doubt island kids are talented in rugby and rugby league but the international rules for league make it more enticing, the chance represent both australia and ur pacific heritage makes those kids with pacific heritage choose league over union, for example, isaiya katoa talented first five currently playing nrl and for Tonga, heamasi makasini who's signed to the tigers who most likely will play for tonga. The fact that the island nations are building in the game of rugby league and the support they get from fans especially Tongans and Samoans makes the prospect of becoming an nrl player even more enticing. We've been saying this for ages if you want to grow in rugby you need to help the pacific grow they bring the excitement to the game not just the players but also the fans. i believe it will only be a couple more years till rugby in nz crashes as well because there are more and more kids getting picked up in nz to play nrl also because of the point i just made, ik of probably at least 20 kids who have been picked up from nz who were some of the best 1st XV players who are now currently signed with nrl clubs mostly because of the growth of the game within the pacific community. it speaks volumes as the pacific were once staunch rugby union supports now most tongans and samoans are fans of rugby league because of what it has done for our island nations. people may not see why that matters but when your family and community are parading around aus and nz over their island nations it makes you want to play that sport. but in saying this as a proud Tongan and league fan i ain't complaining keep doing u ARU, NZRU and IRU cause the more you stuff up the better it is for the great game of rugby league and our pacific nations .
@@ClutchRugbyXV saying what? I only stated facts look how shi Aus and Nz r rn if y'all really wanted to maintain/sustain rugby y'all should've invested in the pacific and not really on SA to stay in super rugby. if the island nations were developed and able to compete with NZ and AUS both internationally and at super rugby level the game would grow in AUS and it would help NZ to sustain their dominance internationally. NZ and AUS has always looked to the northern hemisphere for answers when the answers has been right in front of them the whole time
Someone explain to me why Rugby organizations always want to model themselves on American football when soccer is the number 1 sport worldwide, the number 1 sport in most of their markets and by far the best and most successful club competition is the French Top 14, which has a soccer like structure, with promotion/relegation and pro clubs that do player development from early age themselves?
Now with the 3 clubs in England is coming back next season. And development in Japan is growing steadily. It's easy to understand that financial success comes with commercial leagues. What Australian need to do is to put those Shute shield and QPR clubs in premises. Those clubs are the grassroots, the community. Not some hypocrisy franchises not one ever care.
you can only have promotion relegation when you have 2 or 3 tiers (1st division,2nd division etc, not necessarily a soccer thing, but then again thats one of the strength of French rugby-top 14, ProD2...) on the other hand which league just went to play in Las Vegas.....hint-not rugby😜
@@ClutchRugbyXV Still, the NFL has been a bust everywhere but the states. FIFA are a bunch of corrupt old sleazebags, but they do have a proven track record of growing a sport. They may own the USA in a generation. Rugby keeps treading water...
@@danieleyre8913 🎯🎯 Bullseye. It's probably old men protecting legacy clubs at the expense of growing the game, that's the real pernicious legacy of amateurism in Rugby, no other.
@@angusmorrison8113 …”better to watch”… …if you’re desensitised to the game stopping and a guy get in g up,and rolling a ball backwards with his foot every time he’s tackled.
@@danieleyre8913 I couldn't watch league, not unlike soccer/football, it's pretty one dimensional, basketball has a similar feel about it. But not everyone has the cerebral faculties for appreciating the various aspects and specialist requirements of rugby proper. If you like watching kangaroos hop, skip and jump, then league and breakdancing's your sport.
@@vanrensburgarchitecturebim1641 Oh I agree I can’t stand league personally. And I laugh when I see these Aussies claim “it’s better to watch”. It might be if you’re desensitised to the game stopping, the defence lining up, and a guy getting up and rolling a ball backwards with his foot every time there’s a tackle. It’s so tedious and repetitive that big hits are among the game’s highlights! And I hate all the tacky merchandising, the association with sports gambling, the borderline criminal players, I can’t think of a single good thing about it. But hey I’m not against it, if people like it, I’m not going to yuck their yum. I just have to laugh when they proclaim that it is better than anything else. And I’m applied at how this supposed professional sport has had hand outs from the taxpayer.
@danieleyre8913 thank you for pointing this out tax payer is paying for rugby league. That 600 million dollar 💵 for that team in PNG will never gonna pay it back but Australia will going to do that for league not union that is the difference 🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣
i am from Australia and their is no grass roots for rugby union pretty most every rural or country town have a rugby league team that is juniors and seniors and some times the whole town will go to watch a rugby league game while rugby union is different like their is sometimes a small town that has a rugby union team but most of the time its just seniors not juniors and even when you get to the city or near the cost there is rugby union junior and senior teams but kids are more likely to play league but most kids that play rugby union in Australia go to posh private schools and also kids watch the NRL more because it is on the main channel of channel 9 and fox sports but super rugby is on 9 gem or 9 go which is still under channel 9 but people are not going to watch those channels and like you said most kids in Australia can name most NRL players but not a single rugby union player but rugby league has always been bigger than rugby union in Australia.
As it stands, rugby league is a vastly superior television product - it's faster, with more ball in play time and less technical rubbish. Rugby union need to liven up the game with faster scrum times and less penalties if they want to win back Australian fans.
Rugby union is so much bigger than league across the globe so clearly the people are still enjoying the game. NRL is closer to the American sports leagues than European. It’s widely accepted that State of Origin and the NRL is the pinnacle of rugby league, where the international game is quite underwhelming. Where Union is much the opposite. If you want to be known in Australia play league. If you want to be known in more than one country play Union.
Only South Africa and France have done anything to strengthen the game. Just look a the history SA have had in the development of rugby in Argentina since the 60's. South Africa has expanded their player base and demographics. France by developing their lower levels. The others, lead by the the inept and contemptable Bill Beaumont & Co, have gone down the VC parasite root, others such as ARU showed complete disregard for their traditional structures and thought they could just worship at the feet of the multicultural gods and campaign for never ending rule changes.
League is so repetitive and boring. That must reflect Australian sport fans.. Union is so much better regardless of bad reffing and South Africa turning it into the NFL with their substitutions.
League is for the lower socio/economic and really only played in Australia - Union is global and recognised all over the world . Leave Australia and no one knows what league is . Rugby World Cup is the 3rd biggest sports tournament in the world, watched by BILLIONS. League internationals are a joke ... ARU needs a huge wake up ; they’re messing up a good thing
The problem Union has in Australia is that League is HUGE there. Because League is obviously the better game to watch, no one apart from the private school crowd bothers with Union. The European countries are pretty safe from this problem as League is not a big sport at all there, so Union can rest on its laurels there.
@@stevensmith8876 _”Because League is obviously the better game to watch”_ If you’re desensitised to the game stopping, the defences lining-up, and a guy getting up and rolling the ball backwards with his foot every time he’s tackled…
League is "better to watch" because it's getting all the best players. Just watch the Brumbies from the 90s and watch how good rugby union was when the NRL wasn't trying to pilfer young players.
There are 5 major reasons for the decline. 1. Unlike international rugby, rugby-union as a club sport is not that popular in any part of the world anyway, due to too much scrum stoppages, touch kicks and line-outs and 15 men instead of 13 men (remove 1 center and 1 wing during scrums). Because of the issues issues, , it'll be difficult to match AFL, NFL, Soccer leagues or NRL. Changing the structure can cause issues to international 15-aside-rugby standards. 2.Australian Rugby Union Clubs lack - City level rivalry. Super rugby killed the national level premier rugby rivalry they are supposed to have. There is no die hard spirit to support teams in Super Rugby . 3. Terrible pre-game marketing and promotions of players and teams of super rugby and premier rugby. Poor quality also. 4. Union Club season must start soon after the NRL & AFL season ends and make the comp short and popular with better promotions. NRL and AFL overshadows the premier club season. 5. Rugby must be popularized in the 2nd largest city Melbourne Victoria somehow, Fix the last 4 points above nad Wallabies will be the top rugby nation for the next 50 years and Australian rugby union will be the most profitable in the world.
@@danieleyre8913 Its funny how a clueless troll like you, who has never took a tackle in rugby replying without researching world club rugby union stats when compared to NFL, AFL, NRL popularity and the technical reasons behind it.
@@danieleyre8913It' funny how a clueless person like you who never took a rugby tackle in your entire life replying without researching world CLUB rugby union comp stats compared to NRL, NFL and AFL and some technical reasons behind it.
@@danieleyre8913 It''s funny how a clueless person like you who never took a rugby tackle in your entire life replying without even researching CLUB stats compared to NRL, NFL & AFL and a few technical reasons behind it.
Well it is because rugby union is played on every continent. Rugby league world cup is just Australians, Kiwis, Poms, and a load more Australians from immigrant communities.
Rugby are going ahead with the 1.6 billion dollar deal with Qatar. This will pump significant funds into the game. The NRL spent 40 million on their first Vegas exhibition game and lost 25 million dollars and actually lost club numbers in the USA. They had 20 teams and at the end of the 2024 season there were only 16 left compared to a 14% increase in union numbers and around 200,000 players
@@lynettefisher6052 Oh yeah that game in Vegas thing was a miserable flop, as was inevitable . The Sydney media (who’re all unprofessional pro-NRL hacks) put a hilarious spin on it and even misreported that the stadium was half full (it clearly wasn’t even 1/3 full). And I expect that as the novelty wears off; the future events will flop harder. But the funniest part are the delusional NRL putting on a pantomime that it was the proudest day of their lives. No-hopers…
@@danieleyre8913 There was nearly 40k at th stadium though so it was roughly half full, I agree the idea of bringing it to the US is stupid when they don't even have teams in Perth or Adelaide yet.
Austrlia is just as insular with thier sports as the USA. No one plays Aussie Rules and only a handful of countries play league...and the aussies are fine with that. Internationals don't excite them.
I don’t know, we get quite rabid over cricket during the summer months, and while we’re one of the top nations, England, New Zealand, South Africa and India all give us a solid run for our money
NRL is shit, bunch of dirty hacks!!! I love Union, I live in Australia battle to name the Aussie players but can probably name the whole Springbok team. They play for something, there inspirational. Would love the Wallabies to be good again
The rot set in about 7 years ago with the appointment of Raelene Castle and Aussie rugby decided to go woke. They got woke clowns from the universities to promote the game at grass roots level but their incompetence only made the youth join other sporting codes. Aussie rugby couldn’t afford to make that mistake but they did and are now paying the price.
Rugby is cheaper than league I know because I tried to play league this year and there weren’t enough clubs in league that I had to play union and I didn’t regret it because it was so much better quality compared to when I played league
@@ClutchRugbyXV here rugby is doing very well for popularity just struggles to get people to games because the stadium is on the other side of Canberra like this year I wanted to play league as i prefer playing it but I couldn’t even get into a club because there weren’t enough divisions but union I could play division 3
@@darkstars-torpedoes-of-truth I could be wrong but I get the overwhelming impression that the NRL is a big house of cards dependent upon a generous broadcasting deal & taxpayer prop-up and will inevitably collapse (as it did in the past). How big a market is two states of Australia?
@@ClutchRugbyXV It would have to be you would think. The logistics are unreasonable otherwise, not to mention the ability to attract players to live in PNG.
@@darkstars-torpedoes-of-truth I promise you it would flop hard. There is almost no league played in the entire Island except in the western suburbs of Christchurch and these tiny towns on the west coast like Greymouth. No presence in Dunedin, Invercargill, Nelson, Blenheim, Timaru, Oamaru, nor Queenstown. And it is almost a minor sport in Christchurch, well behind Rugby, Soccer, and even field hockey! It’s had a boost due to Auckland Māoris moving to Christchurch in the last 25 years, but it is still not much. At the end of the day; NZ is country where most people don’t really get heavily into sports that they haven’t played themselves. Maybe they’d get some initial interest though hype and promotions, but it would soon fade especially when the team starts losing. Be aware that Warriors fans in Auckland used those games being hosted in Christchurch and Wellington as an opportunity to take a trip and support their team there.
When they kick out the Force out I said i will never go to anther union game and i have not and i blame Raelene Castle. Every thing she has touched it has taken 10 years to fix go woke go broke
NRL games are free to air union isn't that's half their problem. World wide is irrelevant if one Sport is more exciting to watch then it's more exciting to watch, and NRL is far more exciting to watch.
come on Rugby Australia you have got to push rugby in the grassroots ares of all Australia cities from Brisbane Sydney Canberra Melbourne Hart bolt Adelaide Darwin Perth to public schools and private schools all aspects of Australia
@@jonathonwhitiora8102 Easier said than done, they need money for that. Better to start where there is a rugby history before even thinking about the Aussie rules states.
@@danieleyre8913 Rugby Australia needs money invested into a long term grassroots rugby programmes at the kids and youth rugby level than onto high schools rugby level that onto university and senior club rugby level building from the ground up a plan like this will take 10 or 15 years to work for establishment of a rugby eco system and professional rugby and test rugby will fellow rugby Australia is gotta start being more open and making rugby open to all classes of people's and back grounds like working class people access for both public and private schools and in every city of Australia this system is working in both NZ and SA that's why NZ and SA are good its slowly underway in USA no matter were on the globe this system can work there's a lot of handwork put into it the problem with such a system in Australia Australia dont want to wait that long Rome was not built in a day these things take time
@@danieleyre8913 rugby Australia is gotta stop poaching players from league and other sports codes and focus on. there own back yard and sports code like investing money back into rugby redevelopment programmes
