Analysis: The 12 franchise captains travelled to Auckland to celebrate season start but questions remain about the status of Rebels and Moana Pasifika, writes Patrick McKendry.
The 2024 Super Rugby Pacific season was officially launched in Auckland’s Viaduct this morning with a nautical theme celebrating the competition’s Pasifika origins set against an inconvenient backdrop of a couple of franchises in increasingly deep water.
It is the first time that representatives from every Super Rugby team have been presented to the media in a bid to drum up interest ahead of kick-off – the first game is between defending champions the Crusaders and last season’s beaten finalists the Chiefs in Hamilton on February 23 – an early indication perhaps of the influence wielded by the new independent Super Rugby board.
It probably also reflects a willingness from the Australian and New Zealand rugby unions that things must change if fans are to be re-engaged in the competition.
“It’s true we have a lot of work to do - we’ve got to get stadiums full again and we’ve got to get eyeballs on the game,” Super Rugby chairman Kevin Molloy said.
For a couple of nations still potentially suffering from World Cup hangovers of differing intensities, Molloy, at least, appeared to understand that it may take time for some fans to take that leap.
There is also the elephant-sized issue of the Rebels, the broke Melbourne franchise being propped up – for this season, anyway - by Rugby Australia.
The Rebels, a franchise formed in 2011 in an attempt by rugby to gain a foothold in an AFL-crazy state, have entered voluntary administration with debts of more than $20 million.
Present at today’s launch was their skipper Rob Leota, a 26-year-old loose forward who presumably doesn’t know who he’s playing for next year.
“We know there are people working in the background at the club on that situation,” he said. “The biggest challenge for us now as leaders and coaches is how we apply ourselves at training and controlling the things we can.
“We’re all human and it’s okay to have some of those down times… it's about application at training and showing up.”
Rugby Australia chief executive Phil Waugh, present at the launch, said of the Rebels: “Our focus is to deliver the ‘24 season.”
There are clearly no guarantees behind that.
Closer to home and almost as concerning is Moana Pasifika, the Auckland-based franchise formed in 2022 to provide a pathway for Pacific Island talent which has struggled for cut through in terms of crowds and audiences.
“Clearly they’ve had some challenges but we’re staying very close to them,” New Zealand Rugby chief executive Mark Robinson said.
“The latest update we’ve had from them is incredibly positive. We’ll just continue to work with them.”
Moana Pasifika have been propped up by NZ Rugby from the start and, with a new set of coaches, including Tana Umaga, and a high turnover of players, their long-term outlook may not be much more positive than that of the Rebels.
Pressed on Moana Pasifika's future, Robinson said: “We’re not going to speculate on the long term at the moment."
Perhaps worried about where the conversation was going after a launch high on positivity, he added: “We have athletes like no other part of the world in terms of the athleticism and the skill level. We are working harder than anyone else in the world around making this product far more entertaining and far more of a spectacle than anyone else in the world at the moment and we’re really leaning into that leadership role far greater in my opinion than anyone else.
“We can’t wait to get up to the UK in a couple of months’ time to have a conversation about the state of the game because we genuinely believe that things need to change around the international level of the game.”
A determination to limit the influence of the TMO and stop the kick-tennis plaguing the Six Nations this season are two early wins for the Super Rugby collective and clearly Robinson and company are looking for more.
One man also on the hunt for more success is Crusaders skipper Scott Barrett following a summer break which allowed him to put the World Cup disappointment behind him.
“It took a while,” Barrett told 1News.
“It’s not just the eight or nine weeks when you’re in camp [at the World Cup], it’s the four years you’re working towards your goal. When you come short it takes a while to get over it. Sometimes you don’t get over it and that’s probably not a bad thing.”
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