SARU to focus their energies on a national revival of Grassroots rugby!

by **Biltong** Wed 4 Jul 2012 - 15:24

SA Rugby

The nationwide revival of club rugby remained one of SARU’s top priorities and plans to safeguard its survival were at an advanced stage, CEO Jurie Roux said on Monday.

Roux announced the launch of a national club rugby SMS results line and said that raising public awareness around club rugby activity countrywide formed just one part of his organisation’s long-term strategy to revamp and improve the game at club level.

“We have over 800 clubs that play every weekend across SA, but supporters often aren’t even aware of matches taking place in their community,” said Roux. “We are hoping that clubs will take full advantage of this initiative so that, in partnership with national, regional and local media, club rugby can steadily reclaim its rightful place in the public consciousness.

“Through our provincial unions we have appealed to every club in the country to SMS their 1st team scores to 44678 (charged at standard rates) after every match, thereby leading to increased exposure,” added Roux. “The SARU website (www.sarugby.co.za) also constantly updates fixtures, results and logs from club leagues in all 14 provinces, while our presence on the social media platform Twitter (@saclubrugby) has proven very popular.”

Roux said a recently-completed countrywide investigation into the challenges facing club rugby had given SARU crucial insights into the way forward. “Over the past year we’ve visited all the provinces to listen to what ordinary club people had to say and we are keeping our finger on the pulse of club rugby by making sure we attend games in different provinces every week,” he said.

“We are also busy with a ground-breaking, independent and scientific national census of SA rugby at schools and club level. As we speak, qualified researchers are travelling the length and breadth of the country, from the major metropolitan areas to the most remote Transkei villages, in order to accurately gauge the health of the sport at the grassroots level.”

Roux added that a decision to exclude universities from this year’s National Club Championships in Rustenburg in September was in keeping with SARU’s pledge to provide non-university clubs with similar levels of exposure as their student counterparts.

“It is an open secret that we are re-looking the format of competitions including the Club Champs and the various Amateur Provincial and Sub-Union competitions, so that players from non-university clubs are given every chance of reaching their potential,” said Roux. “We’ve already held workshops with all provinces about the way forward and together with them we look forward to making further announcements in due course.”

Roux said clubs would also play a more important development role in future. “This is long overdue because clubs have not played as important a part in the development process over the past two decades as they perhaps should have,” he said. “The link between schools and clubs is vital, especially when you consider that so many schoolboys stop playing after matric, and our development strategy will ensure that clubs become the hubs around which development in communities takes place.”

Great news in my view and long overdue.

by **Biltong** Wed 4 Jul 2012 - 15:29

“We have over 800 clubs that play every weekend across SA, but supporters often aren’t even aware of matches taking place in their community

It makes you wonder how accurate these numbers from the IRB is.

Number Of Clubs:
1526
Registered+Unregistered Players:
651146
Number of Referees:
3460
Pre-teen Male Players:
320842
Pre-teen Female Player:
4522
Teen Male Player:
199213
Teen Female Player:
4906
Senior Male Player:
113174
Senior Female Player:
8489
Total Male Player:
633229
Total Female Player:
17917

by MonkeyOwain12 Wed 4 Jul 2012 - 15:40

This looks great...The more I read about SA rugby at the moment, the more I'm impressed...

by **Biltong** Wed 4 Jul 2012 - 15:43

Well it has to be said these changes have all come about since Juire Roux has taken over.

First he restructured SARU as a whole to make it more cost effective, more profitable and streamlined.

Now looking at the grassroots is the next most logical step.

Look forward to him sitting in on the next broadcasting deal negotiations in 2014.

by MonkeyOwain12 Wed 4 Jul 2012 - 15:48

Could that see a pretty dramatic SANZAR shift in your opinion?

by **Biltong** Wed 4 Jul 2012 - 15:57

I a hoping it will, currently we share television spoils evenly although we bring in the biggest revenue. Hopefully that could be addressed, not that I want OZ and NZ to suffer becasue of it, but perhaps it should be looked at in context.

Then also Roux would have a clear concept of how he sees the future of SA rugby and he seems to be a man who plans well and knows how to negotiate.

Certainly a hell of a lot more positive than what has been happening.

by formerly known as Sam Wed 4 Jul 2012 - 16:06

Will the next tv deal be cutting Argentina in on the action Biltong? Argentina have the opportunity to get a good level of revenue coming in if the game can take off there. I think they currently get naff all in terms of rights from the 4N tv rights pot (though they agree their own national tv rights and keep the income from that).

by **Biltong** Wed 4 Jul 2012 - 16:09

Sam, I would think so definitely from the Rugby Championship perspective.

The question remains though what will they do about getting a professional strucutre in place before these contracts need to be negotiated, there is really only two years left befor pre negotiations will start and possible inclusion of either Argentinian players being included into the other Conference franchises or the expansion to include one or two argentinian teams.

I think there are exciting times ahead indeed.

by emack2 Wed 4 Jul 2012 - 17:34

SA Rugby,like NZ Rugby has always been big at grassroots level over the years there age group sides.Have always been competetive as RWCs at under 19,20,21 levels have proved[not just this year].The Currie Cuo /ITMs have been sacrificed to the monster that has become Super Rugby.NZ no longer run a B side NZJUNIORS/MAORI as they used too does`nt SA no longer run one too.Once all the SH sides contested the Pacific nations or Churchill cups even toured places like Fiji for example or Argentina.SA and NZ have always had great grassroots support with School sides maybe runing 20 sides from toddlers of 5 up to adult ex -pupils.THAT is why traditionally there sides at test level have always been so strong.England is the richest side in the World.and one of the few things Rob andrew got right.Is the ongoing development of youth teams/age group.A test sides England have usually been there or there abouts at JWC time.

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