Time for Saru to lay down the law

Why the fecking hell are Saru continuing to allow themselves to be bullied by Aus in the Sanzar alliance? It makes absolutely no sense at all from any angle.

New Zealand has 145 472 players registered with its 26 (mainly marginal) unions.
Australia has roughly 150 000 in a good year. South Africa is blessed with about 400 000 players registered with its unions and clubs.

The above doesn’t take into consideration the non-registered casual players and schoolboys. You can rest assured though, that these would only paint a more dominant picture for South African rugby. Add to that the fact SA have been the dominant national team in two key watershed periods for rugby. Firstly the dawn of the professional era post 1995. And secondly the expansion of Super Rugby.

Now help me understand this, why then do we get bullied by our Antipodean cousins, especially Australia, at every step of any key decision made about rugby? SA bring far more to the Sanzar plate in terms of resources and more importantly, player and viewer numbers than any of the other countries. We have as illustrious a history as any rugby playing nation (let’s sweep that little state experiment between 1948-1992 under the carpet for a bit). And our geographical position is such that we don’t actually need to commit to any rugby fraternity out of necessity and you really have to wonder just what it is that has kept our rugby bosses dancing to the Wallaby tune since the mid-90s?

Sanzar needs us more than we need them. If it came to a standoff, Australia would have to fold before we did. For all their talk of alliances and pan-Pacific tourneys they know we know they need us. New Zealand knows that siding with a country that cannot even sustain a national domestic tournament is foolish. Sure they’ll back Aus over us initially out of that “stuff the jaapies” silliness they have down under but, that is only because we haven’t been bold enough to stand our ground and force the issue. And I thought forcing the issue was something we did better than any nation on Earth.

And to the current cause of this gripe. This nonsense over the Super 15 bids. Australia will have us believe that it makes more sense to award a fifth Super 15 franchise to a city with a rugby population the size of a small Craven Week union than a region which boasts more potential in terms of talent and sheer player numbers than probably the whole damn convict colony off the NZ coast. And we are buying this?

I cannot believe that our rugby bosses are such wimps that they get suckered in by the ARU’s slick charisma. We are talking Saffas here. Salt-of-the-earth okes who can smell bull dust a mile away. Or at least they should. But already we find ourselves having to go into arbitration because we cannot win over a vote over whether to give rugby to a veritable hotbed of the game or to go and compete in a region where in all its years of existence rugby has never made any impact.

I can bet you that of the Southern Kings win, the ARU will not take it lying down. It is time Saru stood their ground and made a statement. This is it.