Rugby’s biggest gamble enters final stretch
World Rugby CEO: There are no major obstacles for the last 12 months
“World Rugby will have to have a philosophical debate going forward,” explained Beaumont, who has already overseen the awarding of the rights to the 2023 World Cup to France.
“Do you always have to keep chasing the money? Because what you find is that you would only end up with a few countries being able to host it.
“Or do you say to Argentina, Ireland, Canada – these are countries we are going to because strategically that is going to make the biggest difference in that area?
“The issue is that the Rugby World Cup is World Rugby’s only source of income. We are in a very strong financial position, but we redistribute all our funds back to the game so it is very important we are commercially successful.
“We do need to have that debate, whether the World Cup after France should go to an emerging country or an established country.”
What particularly excites those at the top of the game is the possibility that a World Cup in Asia might ignite interest in rugby across the world’s most populous continent.
While it is not the first sport to try and crack a notoriously challenging market, World Rugby say their 1 Million Asia project, which aims to get over a million people to engage with the game for the first time, is almost complete.
In order to engage potential fans again next year, World Rugby want as many tournament matches as possible available on free-to-air television channels and other broadcast platforms across the region.
“We want to use the World Cup to get more free-to-air coverage and in more territories in Asia,” explained tournament director Alan Gilpin.
“We have got to support that with better availability of content, we can’t just rely on free-to-air broadcasters. We are looking at direct to consumer platforms that will launch around the World Cup next year.”
Some 25 million people in Japan watched their Brave Blossoms team play against Samoa at the 2015 World Cup, but World Rugby hope to smash that record at the 2019 tournament.
“The tournament here will have unprecedented free-to-air coverage for rugby,” added Gilpin.
“This is the opportunity to use rugby’s biggest event to reach the widest possible audience.” – Reuters