Minnows get thrown back into tier-two sea

Japan, Fiji and Namibia have helped light up the World Cup pool stage but as their reward are handed a return ticket to obscurity for another four years. CHRIS HEWETT hears why the big nations must be more open-minded to grow the global game

So what happens now? What happens to rugby in Japan now that the Brave Blossoms are flying home from a threeweek World Cup campaign in which they caused the biggest upset in the modern history of the sport, attracted a domestic television audience of 25 million for their meeting with Samoa, despite it being the dead of night in Tokyo, and became the first team to fall short of a quarter-final place despite winning three pool matches out of four?

What happens to the union code in Georgia, one of precious few countries on the planet to elevate rugby to “national sport” status, after the success of Mamuka Gorgodze and company in giving this tournament the meaningful Eastern European presence it has craved for decades? What happens to the Fijians, who scared the living daylights out of three members of the game’s self-perpetuating aristocracy and might, with a few more bob and a kinder draw, have wreaked serious havoc among the established order?

Eliota Fuimaono-Sapolu thinks he knows precisely what the so-called “tier-two” contenders can expect as a reward for their mighty contributions to the competition: namely, Sweet Fanny Adams. Almost as controversial as a commentator as he was gifted as a centre, the Samoan veteran of the 2011 event in New Zealand made his views crystal clear in an interview published in the French sports paper L’Equipe.

“You know who grows world rugby?” he asked, embarking on one of his wildly entertaining rhetorical rampages. “We do. The tier-two teams. Samoa have been to Georgia, Tonga, Romania, Japan and Singapore. Tier-one teams never go to any of these places. They don’t go outside of tierone countries. England will fly 30 hours to New Zealand, but not four hours to Tbilisi. Any growth in the game is because of us.

“The majority of teams in Samoa don’t have rugby balls and the majority of players don’t have boots. Rugby there used to be easily the No 1 sport, but recently Main image: Georgia’s Mamuka Gorgodze goes over against Namibia at Exeter. Top left: Japan’s Amanaki Mafi (left) and Hiroshi Yamashita after their shock win over South Africa in Brighton. Below: Eliota Fuimaono-Sapolu training with Samoa at the 2011 World Cup in New Zealand American football scouts have come in and sent 40 of our tallest, biggest-built teenagers to colleges in the States. And New Zealand and Australia rugby people are still doing their yearly grab. The world wants Samoa to play rugby, to provide players, but what is in it for Samoa? What comes back?”

Fuimaono-Sapolu has never been shy when it comes to advancing an extreme argument: in 2011, he drove World Rugby, then known as the International Rugby Board, to utter distraction with a torrent of what might be called “social media spectaculars”. But on this particular subject he sounds as sane as Socrates. The major Test nations play among themselves 95 per cent

England fly 30 hours to New Zealand but not four hours to Tbilisi

of the time, grant the “minnows” a visit to Twickenham or Eden Park or Newlands once in a blue moon (while keeping the gate receipts to themselves, naturally) and do not touch tier-two territory with a bargepole if they can conceivably avoid it.

It is now almost a decade and a half since England did anything remotely adventurous on the touring front, and even the three-Test trip to North America in 2001 was driven partly by commercial imperatives. The last time they played in Romania was in 1989; their most recent visit to Fiji was in 1991; they have never once set foot on Samoan or Tongan soil. And Namibia? Please. They didn’t even go there when the place still called itself SouthWest Africa.

If Fuimaono-Sapolu’s comments are just a little too rich for the common taste, two of the outstanding Namibian back-row unit who went within a gnat’s crotchet of securing a first World Cup victory for their country against Georgia in Exeter last week have been heard making the same point in less forthright language. Renaldo Bothma and Tinus du Plessis both headed for home arguing that a little help from on high would be transformative.

“Only a couple of us are playing professional rugby so there’s a lot of learning to be done, but that process is under way,” Bothma said. “So what do we need? Stiffer competition on a more regular basis. We just don’t play the good teams often enough. This World Cup has been such a positive: off the top of my head, I’d say we’ve run down our points concession by 50 per cent compared to 2011. We’re not Japan – our population is two million, not 120 million – but if we can get a little more exposure at the top end, I’m convinced we can develop players of international class.”

Du Plessis was in full agreement. “Look at Italy in the Six Nations,” he said. “Look at Argentina in the Rugby Championship. Regular tournament rugby gives you such a lift. You take huge strides if you’re given access. If you get a couple of 50 or 60-point beatings… well, that’s OK. You’re still giving yourself a better chance of developing.

“Namibian rugby is on the up, I’m confident of that. We’re sorting things domestically and there’s been tremendous support for this World Cup campaign back home. Our league is completely amateur, but we’ve been admitted to the Currie Cup [the premier domestic competition in South Africa] and if we can just combine that with more opportunities at Test level, we’ll move forward fast. Rome wasn’t built in a day, but we could do a lot in a short space of time given the chance. And if that means doing everything on the road rather than welcoming a big team or two to Windhoek, we’d take that every day of the week.”

It was both a cri de coeur and, sadly, a howl in the darkness. Pressed on whether there was so much as a cat in hell’s chance that the international tour schedule might soon be redrafted along more enlightened lines, the World Rugby chief executive, Brett Gosper, said: “Our desire is to do as much as we can, but there are commercial realities to consider.” In other words, it is all about money and the countries that generate it. The rest? See you in four years’ time.