A question for all the kiwis out there.
Do any current all-blacks ever get to play club rugby? Its been my experience that the lowest level they ever play at is provincial. Just wondering because that seems to be the way we’re heading in Ireland.
Cheers
I think that the answer is rarely - and it will get worse. The NZRFU has announced plans to make All Blacks unavailable for Provincial matches by 2006 - they will play in the Super 12 competition, and test matches. NZ Herald Report
Simon
It is the same here in Australia. The Super 12 season starts in Feb, and is followed almost immediately by the test season. S12 players who don’t make the Wallaby squads will play out the season in club rugby, but Wallabies rarely play club matches - generally only if they are returning from injury.
Club rugby in Australia is still Amateur, however, and we do not have a national competition such as the NPC or Currie cup. Hopefully that 2nd tier competition is something that can be worked out with some of the profit the ARU has made from the world cup.
The other difficulty is that test players will always need to be contracted to their national unions. If you have a strong, professional domestic competition with all players contracted to individual clubs, there will be the club vs. country dilemma that we have seen over the past few years. Clubs don’t want their star attractions playing in too many tests, although they do need test matches to give them profile. Rugby’s international profile has never been stronger, however there are problems with domestic competitions in Aus and the UK. Apart from the big 8 (Aus, NZ, SA, Eng, Ire, Sco, Wal, Fra) and Italy and Japan, most other countries have amatuer unions - their best players play in professional tournaments overseas.
I don’t know what the answer is - Rugby will never have the audience of soccer, but I understand even there there is a club vs country issue - particularly for ‘friendlies’.
-Bubba.
In the old days (say 10 or more years ago) it was not uncommon for All Blacks to play club rugby. Sides like University A in Dunedin would usually clean up the oposition by dint of always having a few All Blacks in the side.
Now it is quite unusual. Every so often it does happen but usally by players who have been dropped from say a Super 12 team and want to play themselves back in or are recovering from injuries and are using them to prove their fittness.
Thanks for all that, particularly for the wallaby club rugby response. That would probably have been my second question.
Personally i think a balance should be struck between giving test players as much first-class rugby and giving younger players the chance to learn from representative players like the all-blacks or wallabies.
Personally I think that the strong club game in England is responsable for ther success. Case in point being Dave Walder a young five-eighth learning from Jonny Wilkinson at Newcastle RFC by playing behind him at full-back every week. I don’t think u get that at provincial, regional or test level.
I would hate to think that Brian O’Driscoll will never play a match for Blackrock again or that Ronan O’Gara will never play at my local club Cork Constitution again.
As was pointed out by TBU, Wallabies play club rugby, when available. You only have to watch the team selections for Randwick change as they come into the finals series.
This year there was a gap between the end of the Super 12 and start of the World Cup. Most of the Wallaby squad played for their club sides. In fact if Stirling Mortlock hadn’t played those games for Gordon is would have been doubtful he would have got a run-on spot in the RWC.
I’ve often wondered why Austalia doesn’t have a provincial/state tournament. Wouldn’t it fill the gap between between the summer tours by the home nations and the return autumn tours?
Also, not to bombard ye with questions but I read on the web that the australian super 12 sides are regional like those in NZ and RSA. If thats the case which of the three sides do players from South and Western Australia play for? Or do you have to play in ACT, NSW or Qland to get a S12 contract?
Union is a minority sport in Australia behind AFL, league and arguably soccer.
It’s only played seriously in two states, NSW (plus ACT) and Queensland. There have been Test players from other states. John Meadows in the 80s and more recently Ewan (Chuckles) McKenzie both props are from Victoria. (Chuckles went the uni in Sydney).
The ACT Brumbies are a hybrid, originally based on some locals argumented with NSW and Qld players who weren’t in favour with the selectors.
NSW and to a lesser extent Queensland have serious Country competions. There have been cases or players being selected from the country without having played in Sydney/Brisbane. Eric Weisel from Wagga, Greg Cornelson and others from Tamworth/Armidale etc. The last would have been Steve Merrick from Singleton who played a couple of Tests v the All Blacks in '95.
However, with Super 12 as the selection standard this is unlikely to occur again, which is unfortunate. There are moves for Super 12 to go to Super 15 and add a fourth franchise possibly in either Melbourne or Perth. The magority of these players would come from Sydney and Brisbane.