FEATURE Grave questions loom for southern hemisphere nations in 2024

As it turned out, 2023 played out well for the southern hemisphere. Four teams from below the equator made it to the last eight of the World Cup, and despite predictions the semi-finals could be an all-Six Nations affair, it was the Rugby Championship trio of New Zealand, South Africa and Argentina who made it that far, alongside England, to suggest the north is not quite the dominant force which was being portrayed.

But no-one should be fooled into thinking the World Cup indicates the game is in rude health in the south. It’s not, and 2024 will be one of the most challenging years of the professional era.

There are issues bubbling everywhere, starting with Australia where there is an acute shortage of money, no Wallabies coach in place and an enormous job to be done in reconnecting the game with fans in a country where rival football codes such as the NRL and AFL are booming.

The relatively bleak financial position is at the core of nearly all of Australia’s problems.

Rugby Australia is locked into a relatively poor broadcast contract for another two years, has lost key sponsor Harvey Norman and with the Wallabies in such turmoil, is not able to attract big-name brands to invest in the national team.

They tried and failed to find an equity investor, deciding in late November 2023 to borrow $80m in a credit facility from Pacific Equity Partners.

Essentially, this is a loan that has been given on the strength of the revenues RA is forecasting it will make by hosting the British and Irish Lions in 2025 and World Cups in 2027 and 2029.

RA has a strong case to believe it will be better off in the long run by borrowing money now rather than selling a share in its commercial assets.

As RA chief executive Phil Waugh confirmed at the time the deal was signed: “Given the visibility we have on revenues, it became clear debt capital was going to be the best solution for rugby.

“This approach ensures we retain 100% of the commercial revenues from the game, that all capital raised will go into the game and that RA controls its own direction during this next period of growth and development.”

Given the financial strife being felt in the English Premiership after taking money from CVC, Waugh’s argument it is not right for Australia to sell equity holds weight.

RA has a strong case to believe it will be better off in the long run by borrowing money now rather than selling a share in its commercial assets.

But the issue is the short term, because RA has to get through 2024 and much of 2025 before it will see the money flow in from the Lions tour, and secondly, perhaps more importantly, the money may not flow in the way it expects if the Wallabies can’t convince the public the series is going to be competitive.

Everyone loves a Lions tour, and the brand remains universally popular, but it won’t be cheap for fans to pilgrimage to Australia from the UK and Ireland. If those punters don’t believe the event will offer much drama or intrigue, it becomes a harder sell.

The last two tours to Australia have been epic. The Wallabies won the 2001 iteration late in the third Test, while the visitors exacted their revenge in 2013, when they won 2-1.

But right now, given the Wallabies didn’t make it out of a relatively weak World Cup pool and were hammered 40-6 by Wales, there is little hope the Australians would cope with a team consisting mostly of Irish and English players with a few Scots thrown in to spice the mix.

Certainly, the RA board and Waugh have been wrestling with the question of how to fix the Wallabies in time for the Lions tour, which is why they are taking their time to appoint a replacement for Eddie Jones, who resigned after the World Cup.

The local names in the frame are Stephen Larkham and Dan McKellar, but the latter is under contract with Leicester, and it will be expensive to buy him out.

The danger is these off-field issues can become prolonged, public and messy, create disharmony between the high-performance and commercial teams and unsettle the players.

The other option is former Ireland coach Joe Schmidt, who would come with enormous experience and inside knowledge of the Wallabies fiercest rival having spent the past two years with the All Blacks, but he may alienate Australian fans who won’t necessarily like the idea of a Kiwi being in charge.

Having endured a torrid 10 months with Jones in charge, RA have to get this appointment right or the Lions tour could flop commercially and compromise their ability to pay back their debt.

Across the Tasman in New Zealand, there are plenty of problems simmering too.

Silver Lake, the US fund manager which now owns almost seven per cent of New Zealand Rugby’s commercial assets, is under pressure to deliver more revenue, having shown little sign so far it can produce the sort of financial returns it was promising as part of its pitch to buy into the All Blacks two years ago.

The game is also on the verge of major governance change with a plan having been proposed to axe the current NZR board in favour of adopting a new system where all nine directors are independent.

The danger is these off-field issues can become prolonged, public and messy, create disharmony between the high-performance and commercial teams and unsettle the players.

New All Blacks coach Scott Robertson had hoped he would enjoy a period of administrative stability and certainty in his first months in charge, but that now seems highly unlikely.

What’s also increasingly problematic in New Zealand is the declining number of teenage boys who want to play the game.

The All Blacks have relied on an incredible volume of talent over the decades, but the production line is being challenged, with the latest numbers showing junior male participants dropped by another two per cent.

But perhaps the country with the biggest problem is South Africa. That may be hard to believe as they have won back-to-back World Cups, while their club teams have transitioned successfully into Europe.

That, though, is the problem. They now have one foot in the northern hemisphere and one foot in the south, which means some players are being asked to play 12 months of the year without any break.

Looking ahead, it’s hard to see how these players are going to get through the next World Cup cycle without burning out.

We are burning our assets into the ground. Especially those playing in South Africa.

When England, Ireland, France, Scotland and Wales finish their summer tours in July 2024, their players will fly home for some well-deserved rest and reconditioning before rejoining their clubs in September.

The South Africans, however, will stay in camp to prepare for the Rugby Championship which kicks off in August and ends in September and then they will rejoin their clubs, play more Tests in November and go back to club duty in December.

It’s unsustainable and while the Springboks have been able, since 2021, to pull their players from all over the world to form a supremely competitive team, the question will be for how much longer they can do this given the physical and mental demands involved.

As former Bok captain Jean de Villiers told RugbyPass recently: “We are burning our assets into the ground. Especially those playing in South Africa.

“Physically they can probably take it, but the mental aspect of representing your country, the issues that go with it, that is huge.

“We want the product to be good and for the product to be good, you need your best players on the field more times than not.”