Fundamental Restructuring of S Hemisphere Rugby

hype101

Some drunken pub talk the other day lead to what we nearly all agreed was a very good idea, albeit likely to be scoffed by the SH suits in the IRB.

We were talking about the extent of the looting of young pacific island talent, not only by the well documented systemic practices in NZ and Aus, but also now in England and ever-increasingly in France. An idea emerged to combine Samoa, Fiji and Tonga under the banner of the "Pacific Islands", ala the West Indies of rugby. This, in time, would create a 4 power in the SH and go some of the way to stemming the tide of migrating players. They would then be added as a 5th team in the Rugby Championship. In conjunction with this you would grant 5 new Super Rugby franchises to; most probably Samoa and Fiji; two franchises to Arg; and a further one franchise to Japan/maybe Tonga. This would create a 20 team competition which could be restructured to be identical to the Heineken Cup with 6 groups of 4, replacing the current sterile format. A domestic competition would run concurrently, ala ITM, Currie cup and an Aus domestic league. Also, a pacific rim league of Arg, Pacific island and Japan franchises. Other emerging nations could be added to this league in time.

There are obvious hurdles like; would the Pacific Is be able to fund 2 franchises?, travel concerns, obvious IRB political hurdles and perhaps most importantly, would the likes of Samoa and Fiji actually sign up to it. In all though, I think the above measures would do wonders for developing the game at Test and club level in the SH.

Interested to hear people's thoughts?

LeeroyJones

Interesting discussion, no doubt, and I think that there is a lot of room for restructuring the game for the benefit of everyone really.

I think the combination of Fiji, Samoa and Tonga is all but a non-starter. All well and good for a touring Pacific Nations side but to ditch their national sides permanently is out of the question if you ask me.

CatFromHue

Eh one Pacific Island team was tried before (granted it didn't play in the Tri Nations or 4 Nations) and it failed. With the way Samoa are going now they won't have any interest in it either.

What's the systematic looting of Islanders by Oz and Nz? Certainly in NZ's case it's nearly the other way around with players being educated in NZ and learning their rugby there then going on to play for a Pacific Island team.

Buer

The PI teams are performing better now than they have done in a long, long time. Samoa are ranked ahead of us. Tonga are ahead of Italy. Things are on the way up in these countries at the moment with investment from the IRB. I don't think it's necessary to combine these countries and, more pertinent, they wouldn't want to do so themselves. Can you imagine if Ireland were told to combine with Scotland from now on?

Also, the island nations benefit far more from NZ than top tier nations benefit from the island nations. Have a look through Samoa's starting team. It's crammed with guys who are born and bred in NZ but have Samoan heritage. The well documented pillaging of these nations by NZ and Australia is vastly overstated. Go through the NZ sides and there are very few guys born outside NZ.

There's certainly merit in the introduction of professional rugby to Argentina and the island nations but that's something that will take quite some time and investment.

irishbucsfan

I think I remember Paddy Wallace at 10 against Pacific Islands...

It'd be a real shame to lose those pacific islands as individual nations though.

ArmaniJeanss

Samoa, 7th in the world, ahead of Ireland, Scotland and Italy, and you want to boot them out of existence.
Maybe the latter 3 should merge first.

Swiwi.

hype101 wrote: »

Some drunken pub talk the other day lead to what we nearly all agreed was a very good idea, albeit likely to be scoffed by the SH suits in the IRB.

We were talking about the extent of the looting of young pacific island talent, not only by the well documented systemic practices in NZ and Aus, but also now in England and ever-increasingly in France. An idea emerged to combine Samoa, Fiji and Tonga under the banner of the "Pacific Islands", ala the West Indies of rugby. This, in time, would create a 4 power in the SH and go some of the way to stemming the tide of migrating players. They would then be added as a 5th team in the Rugby Championship. In conjunction with this you would grant 5 new Super Rugby franchises to; most probably Samoa and Fiji; two franchises to Arg; and a further one franchise to Japan/maybe Tonga. This would create a 20 team competition which could be restructured to be identical to the Heineken Cup with 6 groups of 4, replacing the current sterile format. A domestic competition would run concurrently, ala ITM, Currie cup and an Aus domestic league. Also, a pacific rim league of Arg, Pacific island and Japan franchises. Other emerging nations could be added to this league in time.

There are obvious hurdles like; would the Pacific Is be able to fund 2 franchises?, travel concerns, obvious IRB political hurdles and perhaps most importantly, would the likes of Samoa and Fiji actually sign up to it. In all though, I think the above measures would do wonders for developing the game at Test and club level in the SH.

Interested to hear people's thoughts?

As everyone has pointed out Fiji, Tonga & Samoa are 3 countries with their own identities, traditions, national pride etc, and they wouldn't want to be permanently amalgamated as the Pacific Lions, just like Scotland, Wales & Ireland would never agree to permanent amalgamation as the Celtic Lions.

Fijians are actually melanesian, whereas Tonga & Samoa are polynesian, not that I'm an expert in sociology, but they don't have that much in common except a location in the Pacific.

For the rest you can google the ethnic backgrounds of NZ citizens, but you might find your arguments crumbling around you.

tolosenc

As mentioned regards the "looting of players", a lot of these players were either born in NZ/Aus/England (Piutau) or moved there at a young age (Rokocoko, Tuilagi). Quite frequently it's the ones that are raised in NZ and don't make the All Blacks (/are told that playing 1 match as a sub for Fiji at the World Cup won't rule you out for future All Blacks selection) that play for the island nations.

Grimebox

This is like making the Lions a permanent team and getting rid of the nations that put it together.