Why Aussies have threatened SRP exit

Rugby Australia chairman Hamish McLennan could be likened to a guy who walks into a party, pours salt into the punch bowl, and sits back to observe the fallout.

In recent years McLennan has become an expert in finding ways to needle NZ Rugby, playing the role of the tough nut who fears no-one when revealing his thoughts on the relationship between the two entities.

This week McLennan went public by saying Rugby Australia was considering walking away from Super Rugby Pacific after next year. The issue? Money.

The timing? Terrible – if you are in New Zealand, that is.

This was the last thing NZ Rugby wanted. With less than 72 hours left until the final between the Blues and Crusaders, to be played in front of 43,000 fans at a sold-out Eden Park in Auckland, NZ Rugby wanted to wallow in the positive coverage during the build-up to the showcase event.

Then McLennan hijacked the news cycle.

On Thursday he said if NZ Rugby didn’t address the imbalance in broadcasting revenue of around $67 million, Rugby Australia may walk away from the trans-Tasman competition and set up a domestic one in 2024.

Would McLennan have done this if an Australian team was in the final?

Only he can say. But it seems improbable.

What we do know is that by making this threat now, he’s removed a layer of gloss from the buildup to the clash between the two best teams in New Zealand.

McLennan has used one of the biggest weeks on the New Zealand rugby calendar as leverage to get his point across. He didn’t fail, either.

He believes Australia is capable of launching a domestic competition that will appeal to local fans, noting the Super Rugby AU final between the Queensland Reds and Brumbies in Brisbane last year attracted 40,000 fans.

NZ Rugby has refused to comment, directing inquiries to RA.

However, Colin Mansbridge and Avan Lee, the CEOs of the Crusaders and Hurricanes, were more forthcoming; they said their franchises, and their players, value the relationship with the five Australian teams and want the competition to continue in the current format.

This is not the first time RA has gone public on its unhappy relationship with NZ Rugby, which dived when the latter suggested RA should contribute just two or three teams to a new Super Rugby competition after Covid forced change in 2020.

NZ Rugby and RA had sparred in pre-Covid times, but mostly behind the scenes. The most spectacular blowup had been when Australia received the sole World Cup hosting rights in 2003 after New Zealand was left out in the cold.

Covid-19 has now driven an even bigger wedge between the two parties. When the collective Sanzaar broadcast deal in 2016-2020 was settled, NZ Rugby, RA and South Africa Rugby shared the pooled broadcast revenue.

That was ditched when NZ

Rugby and RA held their own competitions.

NZ Rugby then negotiated a better deal with Sky, while RA couldn’t get close to the same dollars offered by Nine/Stan.

RA wants a bigger slice of the revenue, and McLennan will hope his latest outburst will bring NZ Rugby back to the negotiating table.

It’s not an issue that will go away. Not when millions of dollars are at stake, and not when RA will be desperate to invest in its game ahead of the 2027 World Cup.

McLennan will make sure of that.

It’s not an issue that will go away. Not when millions of dollars are at stake.