Gregor Paul: Rugby is testing the patience of fans in impossibly difficult way

Rugby has reduced itself to a lottery, a game of chance almost, where a faceless bloke surrounded by a bank of TVs and slow-motion replays gets to decide the winners and losers, writes Gregor Paul. Photo / Photosport.

OPINION

Goodness knows rugby has tested the loyalty and commitment of its fans over the years, but somehow the sport has managed to hold its people and keep them coming back.

The Springbok tour to New Zealand in 1981 divided a nation, split families apart and saw people take to the streets.

And yet, for all the hurt, the violence, the anger and the sadness, everyone drifted back to the sport and, a few years later, they piled into stadiums and crammed around TVs like they always had.

In 1999, when the All Blacks collapsed against France in a spectacular meltdown, people were so angry that someone spat on a horse.

Former Sky TV chief executive John Fellet says he can recall people queuing to return their decoders after that game, but come February 2000, when Super Rugby kicked off, they were back, ready to reinvest.

Fans were mad as hell that Graham Henry was reappointed after the catastrophic failure at the 2007 World Cup but, by 2011, the nation roared as one as Henry’s All Blacks won the tournament and all was forgiven.

Love for the game tends to conquer all in New Zealand and, while the rugby fraternity typically feels the low moments harder than it should, fans bounce back quickly enough.

This is the nature of sport, after all, and presumably even New Zealanders, deep down, don’t truly believe their All Blacks will win every time they play.

But after the 2023 World Cup, rugby is facing a new crisis: it is testing the patience, commitment and loyalty of its fans in an impossibly difficult new way.

Rugby has reduced itself to a lottery, a game of chance almost, where a faceless bloke surrounded by a bank of TVs and slow-motion replays gets to decide the winners and losers.

All Blacks players salute supporters after losing the Rugby World Cup final in Paris. Photo / AP

It’s worse than that because, when you drill down further, it’s the person directing what images are shown on that bank of cameras that really has all the power. While the TMOs are qualified referees, and their impartiality assured, what process has been undertaken to determine the likes, dislikes and preconceived notions of the TV personnel?

This isn’t sport, it’s an Orwellian plot, designed not to do anything other than send out the message that Big Brother sees everything.

Leaving aside that the World Cup final, and indeed many other games during the tournament, unequivocally proved that Big Brother only sees what it wants to see, the bigger question is why the sport wants to be managing games as if it were the Stasi, spying on people to find the tiniest hint of rule-breaking.

The answer is seemingly to protect itself, or at least limit the damage – financial and reputational – it is facing from the class action being taken in the UK by a cohort of former players who believe that World Rugby and the Welsh and English rugby unions failed to take reasonable steps to protect them from suffering brain injuries.

This is a big shadow looming over the game and it seems the administrators of today are trying to work out how to atone for the actions of the administrators of yesterday.

How can a sport that trawls through every play in forensic detail be considered callous or negligent in protecting the welfare of its players?

How can a sport willing to sabotage its World Cup final by red-carding the captain of the All Blacks for a high tackle be said not to be doing everything it could to protect the welfare of the players?

Except of course, there are so many holes in this argument: so many inconsistencies and moot points as to make it impossible not to think that the three governing bodies being sued need to expedite a financial settlement to enable the sport to rid itself of the tyranny of being seen to do the right thing.

Rugby will survive if it is forced to pay out millions in compensation to former players. But it won’t survive if it continues to run scared from the inevitability of a settlement.

It won’t survive if it continues to compromise its authenticity, credibility and true essence through the inconsistent application of nonsensical protocols as they relate to head contacts.

How, for instance, can Sam Cane be sent off for a tackle that was deemed to carry a high degree of danger because of the force applied directly to Jessie Kriel’s head, and the Kriel not be required to leave the field for a head injury assessment?

How can World Rugby explain why it has declared in the last few days that it will make it mandatory next year for elite players to wear a Prevent Biometrics smart mouthguard whereas, previously, it hasn’t been willing to make the wearing of a mouthguard of any kind compulsory?

Given the extreme change in stance, it would pay for World Rugby to clarify its relationship with Prevent Biometrics, to reassure everyone that decisions are being driven by data obtained by truly independent research.

More importantly, though, World Rugby has to acknowledge that using red cards as a deterrent to change behaviours and to make the game safer has not worked.

Giving the TMO unprecedented power to scour for micro-incidents of so-called foul play has not made the game safer.

All that has done is make needless and wrongful villains out of Cane, Tom Curry, Angus Ta’avao and the legion of other high-profile stars who have been sent off in the past few years for the crime of being in the wrong place at the wrong time.

All it has done is to disillusion fans, make them ask if the sport is on a mission to self-destruct and leave the players feeling victimised by a regime that, with no hint of irony, allows aged legal types who have never played the game to cast judgment on the technical work of the best athletes rugby has known.

Two weeks before the World Cup final, Cane gave one of the greatest defensive performances of the modern age against Ireland – proving himself one of the most accurate and destructive tacklers in the game.

Now he’s off to tackle school so that World Rugby can keep up the charade that the best tackler in New Zealand is somehow wrought with technical deficiencies rather than a victim of the administrative madness that will go to any lengths to deny that there is such a thing as an accidental or unavoidable collision in a collision sport.

For all that the sport has endured over the years, this self-imposed need to protect itself from a looming legal threat, rather than the actual legal threat, may be the death knell of rugby.

Fans can get over defeats, bad appointments, poor selections and sporadic off-field scandals.

But they may not keep coming back if they continue to perceive that the sport has lost its integrity and is being run to strengthen a legal argument rather than instigate a fair contest.