JOHN CONNOLLY: 'It's a disgrace that the Rebels were set up to fail from day one'
06/08/2024 03:00 PM
The Melbourne Rebels were set up to fail from day one by Rugby Australia – and quite frankly it's been a disgrace to the sport I love.
From day one 13 years ago, the Rebels have been fighting for themselves. And nothing's changed as they prepare to head to the Federal Court to fight for survival.
It's a credit to the Rebels that they started from scratch and got this far because the odds were deliberately stacked against them.
When rival codes – and the AFL is the gold standard here – set up expansion teams away from their home state, they give them huge financial support, the pick of the new crop of young star players and every other incentive you can think of.
When the Rebels were setting up in Melbourne, they were locked out of access to top players in NSW and Queensland and were forced to spend too much of their start-up money to attract talent.
Rebels players before their quarterfinal. (Photo by Hagen Hopkins/Getty Images)
The Rebels always felt like they were outside the NSW-Queensland tent. And they were.
We needed people right at the top of the game who could see through the NSW and Queensland bias and deliver what was needed to successfully grow the sport nationally.
But at no stage has Rugby Australia – previously known as Australian Rugby Union – tried to help. They couldn't give a hoot about any team outside of NSW, ACT and Queensland.
When the Brumbies needed financial support RA couldn't have been faster to respond. Then the Waratahs held their hand out and RA raced to their rescue with piles of (borrowed) cash. But that money trail never made it past the Murray River.
Look where it has got us.
AFL is setting up a new team in Tasmania, and the NRL is reportedly looking at a team in Papua New Guinea.
What's RA doing? Killing teams. They can't even call themselves a national competition anymore.
I coached both Phil Waugh, now RA CEO, and Daniel Herbert, RA Chair, and I like them both. But they were left a sport that's in a hole which they can't get out of.
Their only answer is to shrink the sport which is giving other codes a free-kick.
RA is on life-support. Even RA describes itself as "technically solvent" and at the mercy of their funders, Pacific Equity Partners (PEP).
PEP must seriously be questioning their decision to ever get involved with RA. Did they seriously sign up for a shrinking game?
Did Nine seriously sign up to broadcast a shrinking game, and one that will now snub the nation's second biggest state? World Rugby must be seriously worried about the 2027 World Cup with the Victorian Government declaring that without a professional rugby team in the state RA can forget about their support.
Like the Melbourne Rebels in 2011, we all know RA never gave this new Rebels consortium a chance to set up in a new financially sustainable home in Tarneit in Melbourne's west.
Melbourne's west is one of the fastest growing regions in Australia which will soon have a huge population who could have grown up supporting the Rebels.
The money from the private consortium would have been a Godsend and anyone at RA who thought it was a good idea to walk away from Victoria needs their head read.
RA now faces a brutal court fight.
At the end of the day, it is a disgrace the Melbourne Rebels were not given more help. Sadly, Australian rugby is the loser.
