Super Rugby Pacific can challenge NRL with one simple tweak - Gregor Paul

Kini Naholo dives over to score a try for the Hurricanes against the Blues. Photo / Photosport

OPINION

Putting together the draw for Super Rugby Pacific is a little like being the Prime Minister, in that the best that can be hoped for is keeping all of the people happy only some of the time.

When a competition is played in five countries, across four time zones, featuring 12 teams with different threats and opportunities in their respective local markets, it is a logistical nightmare trying to put together a schedule that works perfectly for everyone.

But it is precisely because the Super Rugby draw is viewed and treated as a logistical exercise that the competition scores a high number of scheduling own goals.

Sanzaar, which is essentially a Sydney-based administrative body whose sole purpose is to put the draw together and handle the travel arrangements, doesn’t have a remit to consider the fan implications of the draw.

A classic case in point is this weekend’s showpiece game between the Blues and Hurricanes.

This is one versus two on the table, with a late afternoon kickoff at Eden Park to catch the last of the winter sun.

This appears to be gold star scheduling - the two best teams at the country’s largest venue with high hopes of being afforded a dry ball and a fast track to help them produce a classic in a contest that will go some way to deciding the playoff pecking order.

Except there has been a significant oversight, which is that the early kickoff means the game at Eden Park will effectively be competing with the opening round of the Auckland 1A First XV competition.

Within 20 minutes of Eden Park, St Kentigern will be playing St Peter’s, Auckland Grammar will be taking on Mount Albert Grammar and Sacred Heart will be hosting Kelston Boys’ High School.

Super Rugby can’t avoid scheduling conflicts but given that 1A kicks off in the same calendar slot every year and games are played at the same time every year, this is one clash that likely wouldn’t have happened had there been a fan-centric lens run across the draw before it was agreed.

The Blues should still get a good crowd, but the point is they would almost certainly have attracted a better crowd if this game had been scheduled last week - with no competition from 1A.

Big fixtures in Auckland's 1A competition draw big crowds. Photo / Getty Images

Rugby is competing for a relatively small pool of invested fans and large components of Auckland schools’ rugby communities - the parents, teachers and pupils who are there every week - are also likely to be committed Blues followers, too.

So why make them choose between their school and their club when they want to support both?

Super clubs accept that they will have to compromise to some degree and suck up the odd game that doesn’t tick many boxes for their respective market, but it does feel like there is too much low-hanging fruit that is simply not being picked.

How to get more bang for their scheduling buck is likely to be a question sitting high on the priority list of the newly-formed Super Rugby Pacific commission.

Its purpose is to better promote the competition to grow its audience share in a crowded football market, so it would be a surprise if it is not looking to work more closely with Sanzaar to see where it might be able to adjust things next year to ensure the draw makes greater sense holistically and scores fewer own goals.

Super Rugby has made some giant steps in 2024, with its innovations to speed things up having decreased the average amount of dead time per game by six minutes compared with 2022.

Games are flowing better and there has been an increased sense of drama and uncertainty due to improvements made by a few teams.

But it continues to make nonsensical scheduling decisions that hamper its ability to showcase this better version of itself to a wider audience.

Its Easter weekend offering was tragically mismatched and poorly considered - the Blues played the Force and the Chiefs took on Moana Pasifika - at a time when the competition had a captive audience.

Competitions lose momentum when there is a dud weekend, and while organisers can’t be expected to guess how teams will perform in any given year, there are certain fixtures that have enough history and tribal rivalry to create a marketing narrative and can therefore be anchored months in advance into prime real estate such as Easter.

The other issue that needs to be tackled is why Super Rugby meekly hands Sunday afternoons to the NRL.

The biggest barrier to Super clubs getting people into their grounds is not competition from the NRL but competition within the rugby fraternity, as committed fans try to juggle playing, coaching and volunteering at the amateur level with watching the professional game.

Stick more games on a Sunday and more people will have less of a conflict for their time, and Super Rugby Pacific can start challenging the NRL for eyeballs.

Gregor Paul is one of New Zealand’s most respected rugby writers and columnists. He has won multiple awards for journalism and has written several books about sport.