Quality over quantity

Whenever I write about sports and where they can go or where they should be aiming for, it follows a constant theme; bigger and better. I would love for everyone on this earth to be affiliated with a sport, something they enjoy and are passionate about, to have a common ground for shared emotions and experiences, so my mindset is to want different sports to be pushed.

I have always championed rugby as a great game to be involved in, I enjoy how it is both technical and tactical in its game play, it is physically demanding and it requires a variation of qualities throughout a team’s line-up in order to be successful. On top of that, players have great respect for each other and for officials and fans so seldom cause trouble that parts of stands can be integrated without fear. As a huge football fan, I would be one of the first to put my hands up and say I think we could learn a lot from rugby.

The Rugby World Cup, being held for the first time on Asian soil, kicked off last week with an opening game win for the hosts, Japan, 30-10 against Russia. I sat down and watched the majority of the marquee fixture last weekend, South Africa vs New Zealand, wondering to myself why rugby, specifically rugby Union, is not more popular? What is holding it back?

Of course there are a number of factors that contribute. Firstly, the fact that rugby has two major forms of the game, rugby league and rugby union means that straight away fan-base and participation is split. Secondly, no populous nation has rugby as their first sport. The Australians prefer their cricket and most other nations prefer their football. It’s difficult to compete in a market that doesn’t come to you as a first choice.

The World Cup in 2023 will be played in France and honour 200 years since William Webb Ellis first ‘invented’ the game of rugby by picking the ball up in the middle of a game of football. Strangely enough, most rugby historians don’t believe that story of creation is accurate but that’s a separate point. In the 200 years since the inception of a sport which contains most things you could really ask for in terms of a physical but skilful competition, it doesn’t even come close to other sports. Not being as popular as football is one thing, being behind cricket is nothing to be ashamed of either, but to be sitting in 10th place is almost unbelievable.

Volleyball and badminton rank higher than rugby in terms of popularity. It’s one of those stats people would debate, ‘surely that’s not true’ a common line when discussing.

It got me thinking, does the world of rugby even care? Are they laughing at my ignorance to the point?

Being a huge sport can create problems, expansion can be dilution; whilst you can create new facilities and train new coaches it can be difficult to maintain the high standards. At Juventus, I am fortunate enough to be checked weekly by one of the biggest clubs in the world but in general football suffers from ‘stale males’ with coaches not being checked. Sure, they might’ve been a good academy coach 10-years-ago but times change. They haven’t been updating themselves. Nobody is checking what they are doing. Rugby has a concentrated system which allows a number of great players to be produced continuously and a much higher proportion of their players have access to quality coaching so why would you want to reduce that?

The World Cup itself could be looked at too. Of the 96 national teams who enter qualifying, only 20 make it to the tournament. It seems relatively low when you compare that with the fact there will be 32 teams next time out in both the men’s and women’s football editions. Having 96 teams is certainly far more than cricket could compete with. Why not expand to incorporate more fans and more nations? 

I’m aware that I’m getting closer and closer towards a conspiracy theory but my best guess is that the people who matter in rugby aren’t really that interested in expansion. They are happy with having a tournament filled with quality rather than a large quantity of nations. They are happy with the quality of coaching they can currently provide and happy with the behaviour of fans. Maybe in time, when they’re fully prepared, they will add but not to the detriment of the quality of the game. Holding the games in Tokyo may be a test to see how the people embrace the game coming to them

Whatever the reason, sit down and watch. When quality is at the forefront of a game, it will always be interesting, even if you don’t have your own nation to support.