It’s official. Australian rugby is no longer on its uppers, it’s on the up after a British and Irish Lions tour which netted a huge $120m AUD windfall, around $20m more than anticipated. The debt which was hanging around RA’s neck like an albatross after Covid-19, a $60m AUD loan from private equity company Pacific Equity Partners, has been paid off ahead of schedule. Suddenly Australian rugby is sitting pretty in pink rather than languishing deep in the red.
The Lions profit was partly generated by a joint venture model sharing data, digital and social media content between the host union and the tourists, creating a unified commercial platform which enabled ease of access for fans, sponsors and broadcasters alike.
Lions CEO Ben Calveley previously predicted the 2025 financial income would be ‘roughly three times higher’ than those from previous tours and it looks like he will be proved right. That has given RA a sound financial launchpad from which to float new initiatives in the lead-up to two home World Cups in 2027 and 2029.
Off-field progress has been mirrored by improvements on the field in the men’s and women’s game. As the Welsh Rugby Union has realised with its new two-team proposals, both versions need to be developed hand in hand, like a pair of rock climbers ascending the face of the mountain together.
Halfway through the men’s Rugby Championship, Joe Schmidt’s Wallabies sit second in the table behind New Zealand with two wins and one defeat. In the process they have reversed many of the 2024 trends I observed in my preview of the competition. The relationship between a quality uplift in Super Rugby Pacific and Australia dropping from five to four regional franchises may be neither linear nor straightforward, but the correlation in improved fortunes at both levels is too obvious to miss.
The Wallabies have progressed in all the key performance categories where they needed an upgrade, and they would not have been able to achieve it without more players being ‘fit for duty’ at a higher level of performance.
The Wallabies are now able to keep more of the ball for longer periods, and with ball-control comes mounting pressure on the defence and more penalty rewards from the referee. Australia currently sit top of the table at a healthy +11 in the penalties awarded/conceded differential at the halfway stage of the tournament.
The Wallabies are also winning at the pointy end, getting significantly stronger in the final 20 minutes of the game.
Where Australia required an average of 49 rucks to score a try in the 2024 Rugby Championship, and 38 to score one versus the Lions, their scoring potential in the 2025 tournament thus far has exploded: one score for every seven rucks set, with 11 of their 13 tries coming in four phases or fewer and 54% converted from unstructured situations outside set-piece.
Even the defence is on a steady upward curve, with Australia dropping under three tries per game conceded for the first time since Schmidt’s tenure began.
The imminent return of Allan Alaalatoa at tight-head prop should encourage Schmidt to accelerate improvement by experimenting with his starters and finishers in the front row. Triple A’s leadership and work rate is needed on the field for at least 45-50 minutes, which would mean a start for the Brumbies man with Taniela Tupou firing off the bench for the final 20-30 minutes.
AAA should be joined in the starting front row by Brandon Paega-Amosa and Angus Bell. Bell scored the game-winning try against the Pumas, and one of the more extraordinary stats to emerge from the first three rounds of TRC 2025 is the big Waratah loose-head leads all Wallaby forward ball-carriers with 23 runs, despite finishing the game rather than starting it. The raw stats are startling.
Although he comes off the pine, Bell is the real workhorse carrier, averaging six more carries than Bobby Valetini and eight more than skipper Harry Wilson during his time on the paddock. Bell and Alaalatoa on the field together represent the ideal combination of one carrying prop and one cleaner, and that mix could be mirrored by the pairing of Aidan Ross and the Tongan Thor off the bench.
In the men’s game, Australia’s comeback victory over the Pumas showed guts and mental toughness. In the women’s version, the Wallaroos honed the other side of Australian rugby’s traditionally gleaming double-edged sword with the clarity of their tactical vision in the first 35 minutes against John Mitchell’s England.
Although they eventually succumbed to a 47 -7 defeat against the tournament favourites, they gave the Red Roses all the problems they could handle in the first half-hour. Where the uptick in the men’s fortunes has been engineered by a Kiwi, in the women’s game the fires have been stoked by an ex-Red Rose captain and native of Clee Hill in Shropshire, Jo Yapp. As Red Rose skipper-for-the-day, and ex-Worcester Warrior Alex Matthews explained: “I think ‘Yappy’ is all about the human, all about the person, which I think a few years ago was quite new to the game. [It is all about] the cultures she creates and the amount of work that she will put in for the girls. She genuinely cares for you. Look at Worcester and the journey they went through [before the club folded]. The group stuck by her, which speaks volumes.”
During her time coaching the England Under-20s, Yapp mentored all three of England’s current number 10s at the World Cup [Holly Aitchison, Helena Rowland and Zoe Harrison] and it was her tutelage of 20-year-old Wallaroo fly-half Faitala Moleka which was the key to Australia’s early grip on the game.
Yapp and her coaching panel had clearly identified situations where the last England defender on the left edge could be coaxed up prematurely into the line and leave full-back Ellie Kildunne isolated in the backfield.
As soon as play crosses midfield to the right side, Moleka waits for the trigger moment when England’s last defender on the left joins the line from the backfield. At that moment she knows Kildunne will have too much space to cover on her own and the 50/22 turnover kick will be ‘on’ if she has the skills to exploit it. She does.
It was one of a salvo of 50/22s which gave the Wallaroos a dominant territorial footprint in the first 35 minutes, with all of them directed at the left side of the England defence.
The first is kicked direct from scrum by 21-year-old scrum-half Samantha Wood, then the kicking game is back in the hands, or rather the educated feet of Moleka. That seamless tie between the clear tactical vision of the coaches and the skills execution by the players on the field is a happy echo of Australian rugby at its very finest.
The Australian triangle of Moleka, Wood and 18-year-old full-back Caitlyn Halse was unafraid to use a variety of clever punts to pull the England D hither and yon and deny them easy targets on the ground.
In four years’ time back home, Wood, Moleka and Halse will be 25, 24 and 22 respectively, and all approaching the prime of their rugby lifetimes. Australian women’s rugby will be on the up. On this occasion, the Wallaroo forwards were winding down like a clockwork toy before half-time, just as the Red Roses were waxing stronger. England is still a couple of years ahead of Australia in terms of physical conditioning and its professional attitudes to the game. As Yapp observed before the match: “[England] invested a long time before a lot of other teams. That comes to fruition with the pathways that are in place. It’s something England have done well – these girls are getting a lot more game time than a lot of other nations are getting, and that is really evident. We sit at probably fewer than half of the caps the Red Roses have. It is a big challenge.”
With Rugby Australia’s move back to financial black comes the renewed possibility of investment in the game, a prospect which will only be fortified by the World Cups to follow – the men’s in two years’ time and the women’s event in 2029.
Events on the field are likewise, tracking positively. The reduction from five to four teams at regional level in Australia has improved the competitiveness of Super Rugby and stabilized the selection base for head coach Joe Schmidt. The acid test of the Bledisloe Cup still lies ahead, but all the key stats are trending in the right direction. Defence is more robust, attacking outcomes are quicker, the balance of possession and the penalty differential stand in favour of the green-and-gold.
In the women’s game, Australia’s development lags behind England’s but the landscape will look different in four years’ time. Events at the weekend showed that the twin essential elements of Australian success are getting a refresher: the mental toughness to win close games at the death and the skills clarity to translate a coaching vision on to the pitch. Sooner rather than later, Australian rugby will back in business.