Can long Ireland tour get rugby in the black?
PLUS: NFL is being sued, Saudi Arabia is shaking up golf, last-ball madness in Karachi, and the good times continue on The BYC.
The expensive move to house the six New Zealand-based Super Rugby franchises in Queenstown for a month in an attempt to safeguard the latest iteration of the competition shows how high the stakes are as Omicron edges its way through New Zealand’s doors.
In the Herald ($), New Zealand Rugby’s Chris Lendrum described it as a seven-figure move, a largely meaningless statement in itself - $1 million is a lot different than $9.9m, say - but one that projects the difficulty of operating among the peaks of a pandemic and its variants.
“We’re really fortunate we have a Plan B as a business. It’s not ideal, and it’s going to cost us more money, but we can keep carrying on,” Lendrum said.
Modelling suggests Omicron will peak in New Zealand in March and April, the meat of a season that is vital to re-establishing Super Rugby as a viable tournament.
Unless there is a dramatic shift in policy, the tournament will be severely financially compromised, which means the inbound tour from Ireland in June will be even more crucial to NZR in terms of rebalancing its books.
The Bounce understands the three-test tour will also include two midweek matches, one almost certainly against the Maori All Blacks.
That would see Ireland bring out a playing group of close to 40 players and a touring party around 70(!) as Andy Farrell will use the tour to try to replicate some aspects of a World Cup.
After arrival, the Irish will be expected to isolate and train in a bubble for a week before their first midweek match on or around June 29.
It is understood the first test, in Auckland, would be played on July 2. The plan is to play the second test in Dunedin a week later, another midweek match on or around July 12, before the final test, preferably in Wellington, on July 16.
Clearly the intricacies of the tour remains somewhat at the whims of the pandemic and government policy, but it is an ambitious plan.
While most New Zealand fans were disappointed by the All Blacks limp display at Lansdowne Road last year, it might have been the best thing to happen from an interest standpoint - interest that NZR will hope they can cash in on by selling out four or five stadia in June and July.
It would provide a much-needed injection of revenue for NZR, some of which is no doubt being spent in advance in Queenstown - a place that has always been mighty effective in separating man from money.
AROUND THE WORLD
The proposed Saudi rebel golf tour is giving golf traditionalists conniptions on a par (groan) with last year’s ill-fated European football super league.
It it a brave new world? Is it sportswashing? Is it naked greed?
When someone like Sergio Garcia, who has earned more than nine figures in his career through winnings and sponsorships talk about “just trying to look after my family”, your natural reaction might be to throw up a little in your mouth, but then again is your family truly “looked after” unless they’ve all got luxury yachts and holiday homes in St Tropez?
These are all questions veteran scribe Derek Lawrenson tries to answer, and this is his pointed conclusion.
Much more of this and professional golf is surely heading for a fall. You’d think it would be hard to cock things up given the rude state of the current game but some appear determined to try.
Nothing stimulates interest like glory… and nothing curdles it like greed.
Incredible news from the US that sacked Miami Dolphins head coach Brian Flores is suing the NFL for racial discrimination. You can argue the merits of his case all you like, but this could be a watershed moment for the league.
Some 70 percent of the players are black, while Mike Tomlin is the only currently employed black head coach and there are just three black general managers.
Given all the team owners are white, some have taken to calling it the Plantation League. The background to the story is complex, but the raw data highlighted in a story by The Undefeated does indicate that white coaches have longer tenures than black coaches; that after winning seasons, black coaches are much more likely to be fired and that black coaches have a harder time getting a second job than white coaches.
The NFL instigated the Rooney Rule which says teams must interview ethnic-minority candidates for head coaching and senior football operation jobs, but the suspicion from Flores and others is that it is just used for show.
He has pointed to a text Bill Belichick - widely regarded as the greatest coach of all time having won six Super Bowls with the once-downtrodden New England Patriots - sent him recently telling him Brian Daboll (who is white) had been appointed as head coach of the New York Giants before Flores had even interviewed.
While this doesn’t prove racism, it is uncomfortable for the NFL.
It also raises the questions as to whether blunt instruments like the Rooney Rule or quota systems do more harm than good? For all the good intentions, they often cause the sort of resentment and division that actually hinder a more organic move towards a level playing field.
We’ve seen ample evidence of that in South African sport where fine players have been derided as “quota selections” and white players have quit national teams to play elsewhere.
This is an issue where all the shortcuts towards a more equitable environment come with massive obstacles.
Hard on the heels of Mason Greenwood’s arrest for rape, assault and death threats, coms this ugly little story from Scottish football’s second tier.
According to this story in Football365, “Raith Rovers’ decision to sign the rapist David Goodwillie, and their reaction when faced with criticism, is football’s misogyny incarnate”.
It has caused a huge stir in Kirkcaldy, where the club is based and many involved with Raith Rovers have quit their posts. Shirt sponsor, crime writer Val McDermid, announced she had withdrawn her sponsorship, cancelled her membership and ripped up her season ticket and described the signing as “disgusting and despicable”.
The club in response has said the decision was football related, which prompted this withering assessment from Football365’s Ian King.
“It’s not exactly certain what they mean by this. Are they expecting applause for not signing him because he’s a rapist?”
AROUND THE GROUNDS
After the grim fare above, we need a bit of light and bright. How much lighter and brighter can you get than a team scoring the five needed to win off the last ball without hitting a boundary.
Neither Audionic, the bowling side, nor AutoMall, who dramatically won the match, have come across my radar before but henceforth I’ll be paying far greater attention to Karachi’s Al-Wakeel Cricket League.
FROM THE POD
Some extremely serious topics broached in The BYC, including a Basin-less test summer, lop-sided Super Smash finals, the IPL auction, a song about Marnus Labuschagne and Tony Blain’s Fitzherbert Avenue misadventure.
Keeping on the cricket theme, there were some interesting insights and even a hint of introspection from the perpetually under-rated Scott Styris in the latest episode of Between Two Beers.
Can't help but think that Golf is doing even more damage to itself by allowing slow play to continue. No controlling body seems to have the desire, or wherewithal, to deal with the Elephant in the room. I'm a golf tragic but tuned out twice over the weekend watching Men's and Women's events because it was just too slow. And if I'm tuning out as a tragic, who's tuning in as a new fan? In the end, it will come down to the dollar. Shrinking audience, shrinking ratings, shrinking purse - Golf has no right to the massive injection of cash that Tiger gave them for the last 25 years - it can go backwards.