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Scraping the barrel World Cup only demonstrated Rugby League is in crisis
Another Rugby League World Cup, another Australian victory. That's nine in 12 attempts, including the last six. Apart from the first 70 minutes of the final against New Zealand, Australia was rarely pushed. It ran out a 40-12 winner in the end. Hardly what you'd call close. With England, Scotland, Wales and Ireland on show instead of a combined British team, there were only ever two possible winners of the expanded 16-team tournament. They met in the final. Some of the other entrants were frankly laughable. The Cook Islands, Russia and the New Zealand Maoris spring to mind. Some of the venues were funnier still. I know rugby league big wigs want to spread the gospel of the game. But what was the thinking of playing the New Zealand-Cook Islands match in Reading? That's in the south of England, closer to the snotty Henley Rowing Regatta than the northern rugby league heartland. Not surprisingly a paltry, dare I call it, crowd turned out. I happen to be a fan of rugby league, growing up watching Salford in championship-winning form in England in the seventies then later reporting weekly on some of the country's finest clubs like St. Helens and Wigan. But New Zealand against the Cook Islands? Even I'd close the curtains on that one if they were playing in my back garden. It's perfectly understandable that rugby league chiefs want to expand the frontiers of the 13-man code, like rugby union organizers before them. But unlike union, they were faced with padding out the competition with weak teams from areas of the world which will do little for the development of the game globally. The Cook Islands, the Maoris, Fiji, Tonga, Samoa and Papua New Guinea -- along with Australia and New Zealand -- made up half the World Cup. All are from the Oceania/Pacific region. Britain and Ireland made up another four. France and Russia were the other Europeans. South Africa the lone African.
Lebanon made it from the Middle East, knocking out North African nation Morocco in a qualifying round. But I don't see the Lebanese clamoring to spread the rugby league word any time soon, if ever. Many of the team were Australians of Lebanese descent anyway. Union has greater strength in depth Rugby union is dominated by an elite few countries as well of course: Australia, New Zealand, England, South Africa and France. But the best of their rest are much stronger than in rugby league. Scotland, Ireland, Wales, Italy, Argentina, Samoa and Fiji can all field highly competitive teams in the 15-man code. On the next tier down, union has viable national teams in the likes of Japan, Romania, Canada and Namibia. It is a global game and, in spite of some lopsided results in World Cup qualifying and the finals themselves, there's much more competition for quarterfinal berths. The ultimate champion is also much harder to predict. Rugby league was scraping the barrel to fill what should be its most prestigious event with mere fodder for their Kangaroos, Kiwis and fragmented Brits. Crowds were hugely disappointing. Those watching on television could see cavernous holes in the stands where people should have been. Not a great advertisement for what, at its best, is a fabulously entertaining spectacle. Rugby league bosses might have been better advised to keep the British team intact and stage a 10-team competition, with two groups of five. Australia, New Zealand, Britain, France and Papua New Guinea could have been seeded through. The other five could emerge from a qualifying competition of the lesser lights, who'd surely only raise their standards and develop more by playing competitive games against each other rather than one-sided humiliations. Rugby league had its chance in the eighties, when such superstar union players as Jonathan Davies were defecting to the professional game. Union was all kicking and little frills and thrills those days. Now, in its professional form, union is an altogether more healthy and attractive proposition. League I fear has missed the boat. Only Australia -- where the top New Zealanders ply their trade -- and England run viable leagues. Even the English game has been hurt by being forced to switch from winter to summer rugby. Rugby league is in crisis. Australians are the only ones who can look to the future of the game with any great relish.
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