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As the catastrophic world economy continues to deteriorate, rugby is set to feel the pinch in a major way. Many of the sport's key sponsors, notably those financial institutions such as the Royal Bank of Scotland, have fundamentally run out of money. Twenty English Premier League/Championship teams will be without shirt sponsors at the end of this season, including probably the world's most famous club, Manchester United. The old days of chief executive vanity sponsorships or local/national pride commitments are gone. Every property will have to demonstrate how they can add connectivity, depth, and richness to the consumer experience. This will be a challenge for many clubs, teams and competitions. And the recession, of course, is not limited only to sponsors. Fans are finding it impossible to pay the high-ticket prices national stadiums/bodies have been charging over the past three years. Go on to Trademe - the numbers of debentures available at Twickenham are at an all-time high (this is due to a combination of gouging by the RFU and incredibly inept rugby from England). The fan experience will have to be enhanced at every stadium and ticket prices reduced for value to be retained. The guys from Stade de France have really understood this and the experience there on match days has to be seen to be believed. It's a combination of good value seats, great entertainment and terrific winning rugby. Combined with a deep feeling for what the French public really want to do on a Saturday afternoon. And finally that leaves the media. Nobody will be paying the kind of prices that have gone before for the current range of rugby tournaments. They are all too predictable, too boring and are consistently losing audiences in traditional rugby countries. Much more innovation is needed in camera techniques, programming time, as well as changes to competitions. I've written previously about the need to revamp tours and to re-galvanize institutions like the Lions. To generate renewed audience interest urgent action needs to be taken in these areas by the media guys themselves, the IRB and the national bodies. In this environment Rugby World Cup in New Zealand in 2011 faces an incredible number of challenges. Whilst great for the All Blacks and the game in New Zealand it is going to be difficult financially for this tournament to generate positive numbers for the IRB. And remember, the core funding for the game in developing countries comes from the IRB whose main revenue generator is Rugby World Cup. It is difficult to see sponsors, media and fans being able to embrace this World Cup in the current environment. And, frankly, I don't see much upturn in that economic environment in 2010, so planning for 2011 will inevitably be last minute and therefore devoid of premiums. Everyone involved in rugby should pull together over the next 12 months in particular to come up with innovative ideas and solutions so that we can make this tournament the best ever in terms of passion, spectator appeal, spectacular running rugby and fan experience. In this environment, it has not been easy moving USA Rugby forward. However, under ex England captain Nigel Melville as CEO and director of rugby, we have made substantial progress on and off the field. Nigel has created a national youth program called Rookie Rugby which is gaining traction across the nation at 6-8 year old level, which will pay great dividends to rugby in the US over time. He has also developed a tremendous relationship with the National Guard at grassroots level, which again is spreading the word across the nation in every community. As well as the grassroots, our high performance program is delivering results with very strong performances on our first priority the World Sevens Series. The Eagles reached the semi-final in San Diego and have notable scalps under their belts including Fiji and Australia. Sevens is a vital foundational tool for the US as this helps our players in terms of fitness, game awareness, defense, and instinct. It also helps develop team spirit, team belief and a winning attitude. We've had our best players playing sevens and it has done wonders for them as a group. The next step will be to take that into 15's where this year we play Ireland on May 31 and Wales on June 6 in San Jose, and Bridgeview, Illinois. From June 6 to June 21 we compete in the Churchill Cup prior to World Cup qualifiers with Canada on July 4 and 11. A busy international season for the Eagles where guys like Todd Clever, Chris Wiles, and Paul Emmerich will put their leadership skills on the line. We're hoping to play the Churchill Cup in Denver where the Denver Sports Commission have turned into passionate rugby supporters. We were close to hosting the Bledisloe there and are optimistic that we can put together a deal where the Churchill Cup will be played in Denver every year. We have two terrific venues, Infinity Park, a modern purpose built rugby stadium in the city of Glendale, and Dick's Sporting Goods Park, the home of the Colorado Rapids Major League Soccer team. The Denver Broncos Mile High Stadium would be the perfect venue for the Bledisloe. If we are successful in putting this together it will be a great boost for rugby in the US and really help build our fan base. Central to our development at this level has been the appointment of a new coach, Eddie O'Sullivan. Eddie will coach the Eagles through Rugby World Cup 2011 and brings with him a great track record with Ireland at the highest level of the game, as well as US experience where he was forwards coach for the Eagles in '97 to '99. I've long been an admirer of Eddie and I think he'll take the Eagles to the next level. We're delighted to have him on board. Success for the Eagles is critical to our development as a rugby nation, as are the grassroots developments mentioned earlier. Sevens are vital for us strategically in that if this were to become an Olympic Sport then we would qualify automatically for significant financial contributions form the US Olympic Committee. This would be a game-breaker for us as, like the rest of the rugby world, we have hit some hard times in terms of revenue generation in this recession. We're trying very hard to convince the IOC that rugby should be added to the 2016 Olympics. We have made the short list along with baseball, softball, karate, squash, golf and roller sports (!!!!!). Rugby will return to the Pan Am games in 2011, which will be the next major chance we have to demonstrate that Sevens makes a great Olympic sport. The whole rugby world - especially the media, should put all their weight behind convincing their local IOC delegates of Rugby's case to rejoin the Olympic movement… where the US are the current Champions! |
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