It took rugby union decades to join its rival codes in professionalism. Clearly, it’s still got a long, long way to go before it can say it’s joined them at the big boys’ table after Wednesday’s Rugby World Cup draw fizzer.
As Australian cricket braced itself for the highly-anticipated second Ashes Test, Rory McIlroy put Melbourne’s Sandbelt golf courses on the map, and the world readied itself for Donald Trump and a who’s who to line-up for the FIFA World Cup draw, the suits at World Rugby thought it made for the perfect time to announce the Rugby World Cup draw for a tournament a little under two years away.
Talk about burying the lead.
World Rugby’s establishment are understood to be celebrating the millions who tuned in abroad, but the result didn’t even make the Sydney Morning Herald’s Thursday paper given the late hour that the ping pong balls were plucked from inside Nine’s North Sydney offices.
The Australian, meanwhile, gave it a side bar in its Thursday paper.
Meanwhile, not a single Australian free-to-air nor pay TV camera attended the draw, which saw outgoing Wallabies coach Joe Schmidt react to the nation being pitted against trans-Tasman rivals New Zealand in Pool A.
Talk about dropping the ball.
It might have been all smiles, but Wednesday’s World Cup draw in Sydney barely left an impression. (Photo by Mark Kolbe – World Rugby)
Isn’t the World Cup all about creating a legacy, especially for the host nation?
Peter V’Landys would have been snorting under his nose at the dull affair.
Rugby has long had an issue of pumping up its own tyres, but Wednesday’s late-hour draw was the latest example of the game resting on its laurels.
Where was Sydney’s sparkling harbour?
Despite Nine’s offices being within a McIlroy driver away, not a single shot of Sydney Harbour was on show.
Instead, the globe was treated to Nine’s sterile newsroom.
Dan Carter, who was flown in for the event, could have been on top of the Harbour Bridge plucking balls out to reveal the draw or on the forecourt of the Sydney Opera House, or on top of the Museum of Contemporary Art – the venue used when Australia was awarded the men’s (2027) and women’s (2029) World Cups.
He could have been in Uluru, the great rock in the middle of Australia, which is more than 500 million years old.
George Gregan and Jonny Wilkinson might even have rocked up in their Akubras.
World Rugby could have beamed names on the Sydney Harbour Bridge or throughout the CBD.
After all, the city is famous for Vivid.
Instead, its talent was packed like sardines in a small newsroom looking hot and uncomfortable.
Where was the glitz, the glamour and the things that make Australia special?
Five years ago, French President Emmanuel Macron greeted the watching world during the midst of the COVID-19 pandemic.
In typical French fashion, the draw showed off the finest things the country has to offer ranging from acting, architecture, design, the arts and culinary.
On Saturday, German model-turned-TV presenter Heidi Klum will host the Fifa World Cup draw alongside American standup comedian and actor Kevin Hart.
NFL great Eli Manning will be on red-carpet duty and Danny Ramirez will be on roving reporter role.
Shaquille O’Neal, Wayne Gretzky, Tom Brady and Aaron Judge will all be plucking the balls under the watchful eye of Rio Ferdinand.
Global superstars Andre Bocelli, Robbie Williams and Nicole Scherzinger will all be playing at The John F. Kennedy Centre for the Performing Arts while the Village People will bring down the curtains on the event.
It will be an event that will put football – the world game – on the map.
Early next year, the NRL will once again get underway in Las Vagas.
It might not crack prime time in the USA, but at least Australians will know the sport is on.
World Rugby, meanwhile, put on a dour event that lacked imagination and the opportunity to win the hearts and minds of rugby fans in Australia.
That is, after all, what Australian rugby has lost over the years.
The Lions series might have reignited the flame for a hot minute, but it had little to do with the activation events around the game.
After all, Wallabies coach Joe Schmidt wouldn’t even do an interview with the media for the first quarter of the year.
And while the Wallabies burst back onto the national agenda with a couple of stirring performances, by year’s end even the country’s die-hard fans were wanting the season to come to an end.
The World Cup draw had the chance to bring back the excitement and finish the year on a positive note.
And that’s a legacy World Rugby can’t afford to leave.