Where have the crowds gone?

So what’s keeping the crowds away from Bok matches this year? Is it the coach? The selections, the decision to let the Bok reserves have their crack at run-out against the Lions at Ellis Park? Or is it, as I suspect, just much simpler than that?

Let’s start with the (surely) obvious rugby reason. The year’s big highlight was always going to be the Lions tour. The Bokke could go on to win all their other matches this year but if they had lost that series it would have counted for naught. The rugby public’s mind was fixated on that series and many of the regular stadium-going supporters put their ticket-buying eggs into the (rather pricey) Lions basket. I mean one Lions Test ticket was what, three times the cost of a Tri-Nations ticket? And it’s not like those are cheap either. Nick Mallett in 2000 anyone?

Then there’s the simple fact that Tri-Nations rugby has become much of a muchness. The Antipodean rugby bodies have been seeing a decline in crowd attendances and TV audiences for a number of years now, there’s only so long you will get excited for the same product year in, year out with no variation. Add to that the current economic climate and there’s just no incentive for Joe Average to add to his overburdened wallet woes a single Test ticket which costs about the same as a month’s DStv subscription. This may well in fact be what motivates best for a return to traditional incoming tours with the Tri-Nations moving to a biennial pattern.

Picture if you will, a season consisting of a month-long tour by a Northern Hemisphere country, followed by another month-long tour home/away against one of the Antipodean nations. Chuck in a Pacific Islands match in there for extra spice. That is a much better proposition. It’s still regular, televised (for the money men) Test rugby but now there is variety, anticipation and a nod to tradition.

A lot has been made of the dissatisfaction with the coach, the armband protest and reaction against Saru, but coaching issues are not new to SA rugby. Every coach we have ever had alienated one or other sector of the SA rugby population, and deeply in the case of some. Remember the “–uck Mallett” T-shirts at Kings Park a few years back? Or when Harry Viljoen anointed Bob Skinstad the Chosen One in 2001? Then there was Straeuli. That didn’t hurt attendances, just the crowd’s reaction to the coach. See Kings Park booing Snor last year for example.

As for the armband protest, maybe I am naïve, but I cannot see how the Bokke rallying around one of their own would drive your average spectator to forego watching the Boks live. I just do not get that one. Your odd eccentric, like people who moan about Isando being pronounced in the vernacular sense maybe, but that’s the corporate hospitality type anyway. I cannot see Jan and Elton getting their knickers in a knot about that.

Another thing for me has been the kick-off times: 5pm, in Bloem, smack in the middle of winter. And I have to pay R400+ for the privilege? Plus the queuing for beer that costs far less at Tops? Really? The only upside with that is not having to endure Naas (bless him) and his pseudo analysis. On the downside I get to miss out on the production director placing Kobus 10 yards from Bob and co just so he doesn’t dwarf them and cause the cameramen a sore neck while they swivel upwards and downwards every five seconds.

So ja, let’s stop coming up with flimsy, superficial reasons for the soft attendances at Bok matches. Sanzar need to revamp their product and fast. And revisit their business model too. The fans are starting to speak with their feet. We really should have learnt from our Antipodean cousins by now.