Nick Cain column: Matt Burke’s law on summer season is good sense

Matt Burke was not only a great Wallaby full-back, he is a measured and respected commentator on the game. That’s why when Burke recently cut against the grain of strident, hectoring Southern Hemisphere threats of a Test boycott after 2019 unless the Northern Hemisphere rearranges its season – emanating mainly from New Zealand – it was a breath of fresh air.
The 1999 World Cup winner argued in an article in the Sydney Morning Herald that rather than the Northern Hemisphere making the change to summer rugby to create a global season, it should be the Southern Hemisphere that does so.
Burke kicked the “North must change” ball into touch because he recognises the basic reality that the much bigger spectator numbers – both live and TV – and commercial support in Europe can sustain and grow Rugby Union in a way that Australia, South Africa, and New Zealand currently are not able to.
He suggested that a move to a September to May/June season could be a significant benefit to Rugby Union in Australia because it would mean it is not then competing directly with Aussie Rules and Rugby League. Any Rugby Union fan who has travelled to Australia knows that those two rival football codes are so deeply embedded Down Under – especially in commercial terms – that the 15-man code is the poor relation in terms of publicity and profile.
Burke says that going up against cricket, despite its popularity in Australia, is less of a problem: “Yes, cricket is there but the last time I checked it was a completely different game, and therefore rugby offers a point of difference.”
He adds:  “It would mean no longer competing for air time or space in the paper with League and Aussie Rules, but now holding your own against a game that is poles apart…summer rugby is thinking way outside the box, but I’m looking at it from a competitive economic point of view that will allow the code to grow.”
It is also feasible because average temperatures in Sydney, Melbourne, Cape Town, and all but the far north of New Zealand, are 22-23C (72-73F) in the hottest summer month, February, and often cooler in the evening when most matches would be played.
The commercial benefits of closer alignment to the Northern Hemisphere season will also not go unnoticed by South Africa. For a decade or more there has been a strong body of opinion in South Africa that it should leave SANZAR because the advantages of being in the same time zone as Europe are overwhelming. This applies in terms of not just a far more lucrative commercial landscape, but also more coherent tournament structures, better viewing times for broadcasters, and much more favourable travel conditions for players and supporters.
Based on broadcast figures and crowd numbers the signs are that Super Rugby is in trouble, while the Southern Hemisphere’s international Rugby Championship showpiece cannot hold a candle to the Six Nations as a sporting event.
Where the European Cup and Six Nations are genuine festivals of our sport, supported by increasing live and broadcast spectator interest, Super Rugby and the Rugby Championship are fast becoming a procession of fixtures in which interest is flagging.
One factor that cannot be ignored in determining the success of tournaments is the element of risk and reward reflected by a promotion–relegation system. It creates a sporting drama that fans love, and it goes a long way to explaining why the English Premiership and the French Top 14, not to mention the European Cup, are thriving. By contrast, ‘closed’ models like Super Rugby and the Celt-Italian Pro12 are struggling.
If meaningless fixtures are not attractive to fans in the Northern Hemisphere nor is the idea advocated by NZRU chief executive Steve Tew, that the All Blacks should have a half share of the gate money whenever they play in Europe.
The concept that New Zealand, South Africa or Australia should be awarded £3m simply for playing an away international stinks. They contributed nothing to the years of investment and planning which enabled Twickenham and the Millennium Stadium to be built, and their ransom demand for playing in those great arenas should be treated with the contempt it deserves.
The rationale for this blackmail is that New Zealand believe that Europe’s greater financial clout has allowed French and English clubs to attract their leading players in such numbers that it is threatening their main source of income, international rugby.
In fact, there’s been no mass exodus of current All Blacks to Europe, and Dan Carter’s move to Racing 92 came only after he had retired from Test rugby. Which begs a couple of questions for the NZRU. How, when you are double World Cup winners, are you unable to make only marginally more from a three-Test tour against Wales than the WRU earns from a single Test against NZ at the Millennium Stadium – especially when the populations of the two countries are similar? And whose fault is it that in their own country the All Blacks cannot sell-out small stadiums two times over, let alone fill Eden Park, for every international they play?
If New Zealand, Australia and South Africa are worried about a player exodus to Europe it’s up to them to arrest it by creating vibrant, commercially strong competitions of their own.
Another remedy is for the Southern Hemisphere to adopt Matt Burke’s plan and create a global season by joining the Northern Hemisphere in playing from September to May/June.