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Wednesday, October 17, 2007

October 20 ... Rugby Heaven in Saint-Denis

If you paid attention to my earlier posts back in September, you will remember my call to arms - "Get Ready for some Rugby."

Well, how the time goes by? It's Rugby World Cup finals time. England vs. South Africa, with South Africa having won a 36-0 'ear-slapping" back of September 14 at the same venue in Saint-Denis, France.

In a Linked In post a UK-based headhunter posed this question to an open forum:

"Will Rugby ever become a true global sport?"

The best reply followed:

"I'm not sure what you mean by "truly international" if a game played internationally by Scotland, England, Wales, Ireland, Australia, South Africa, New Zealand, France, Italy, Argentina, Romania, Fiji, Samoa, Japan, Canada and the US, among others, does not yet qualify. Sure beats the hell out of baseball, and its claim to the "World Series". I think it's already truly international, and the fact that it can be so in a spirit of enromous sportmanship and good feeling between supporters is something to be treasured.

Incidentally, here in Syria a rugby -playing Scot at the British Embassy has been doing a lot of coaching and encouraging competitions, so I suspect at the grassroots rugby is even wider-spread than the international scene would suggest."

Wow.

So, what is my take on it?

Rugby World Cup needs to dig in, work on their global media & TV exposure. They need to hire a Boeing 767 full of people - TV sales, PR, marketing and - God help us - lawyers, to create some new deals, foresake the easy buck today (Setanta deal for USA) and "go for it."

1 comment:

Anonymous said...

TL isn't the only PR maven/guru commenting on the RWC and its sponsorships:

see:

http://www.prconversations.com/?p=334#more-334