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Bernard Foley: 'I know I’m biased but rugby has got the best product'
By Liam Heagney
Bernard Foley knows his stuff when it comes to promoting rugby in Japan. Numerous overseas players often only stop there for a brief time and are then off on their travels again. He did exactly that himself in 2016, squeezing in a short stint at the Black Rams in Tokyo before returning to the Waratahs.
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The 34-year-old’s Super Rugby days are long past now, though. Into his fifth season at Kubota Spears, Chiba has become the Australian’s perfect home away from home and he has loved watching first-hand the evolution of the sport in his adopted country.
His efforts were amply rewarded last year when the Spears – the club founded in 1978 as part of the Kubota food, water and environmental products company in existence since 1890 – were crowned first-time Japanese champions when Foley added four penalties to a try from Haruto Kida to clinch the title on a 17-15 scoreline versus Panasonic Wild Knights in front of a 41,794 attendance at the National Stadium in Tokyo.
“It was massive for this club which sort of hadn’t won’t a lot before, they had sort of risen through the ranks the last couple of years.
“But there are a lot of people involved in this rugby club for many, many years and that was the great joy of being a part of it, seeing the satisfaction and enjoyment that a lot of the players, the management staff who have been part of the company for 20, 30 years got to enjoy. It was a pretty significant achievement.
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This company aspect of rugby clubs in Japan is a strength of the game’s success. Two-thirds of Spears’ squad, for instance, work for Kubota, company men for whom playing sport alongside full-time professionals such as Foley is a bonus. “In Japan, you choose a job for life, so a lot of the guys choose Kubota and your employer takes a lot of precedence, not just in your work life but in your entire life here in Japan.
“You’re very loyal and dedicated to your employer and Kubota is quite a large company, so there are a lot of people who are attached and were happy for us to do well. It was good to be able to put joy on those guys’ faces.
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“The culture at Kubota is something we put a lot of emphasis on and we want guys to get involved, to bring their flair from wherever they are. It was extremely refreshing to come here where I first came – and every year since – to see how fortunate we are to be rugby players.
“With the set-up at the company, the guys are still having to go to work, having to put on the overalls or spend the whole day at the desk. Yet they come in, they’re smiling, they get in the locker room and are willing to work hard but then also have a good time.
“That, for me, was really refreshing and helped me enjoy my rugby again. That’s something at Kubota we are trying to do with our culture, to get everyone involved enjoying their time because they all work so hard.
“They don’t just sign you as a player,” he continued. “They want to you come and have input, bring your IP and what you learned from the successful teams and coaches and environments and cultures that you have been in the past, come and give that and that is the exciting thing about Japanese rugby – it becomes a melting pot of how the game is played all round the world.
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“Everyone brings their own style and we have got to put it together and come up with our own Kubota way. That is the exciting thing. We have got big squads here, a lot of young kids coming in fresh out of university, very talented and aspiring Japanese players, and they are forever asking questions on how they can be better and what they can do.
“They are all big fans. They will watch games from all around the world. They are big rugby people and if you know anything about the Japanese work ethic, they want to work and train hard. You do become a resource to those sorts of players.”
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The game’s current rude health is a contrast to the sense of novelty that existed when Foley first moved there nine years ago for his one-season Black Rams stay. “My first experience was in 2015 just after they [Japan] had beaten South Africa. It definitely spiked the national interest of a lot of the Japanese people and there was an appetite for rugby.
“We saw how much it went gangbusters through 2019 – they had a dream World Cup run and the country got right behind it. There are a lot of eager rugby supporters and fans here, they follow the game immensely. It’s a great place to play and it’s well-supported.
“The level of the (club) competition has improved dramatically. There is an influx of world-class players but it’s probably more so around the actual programmes involved in clubs. There are elite coaches here, they implement elite structures and programmes around high performance, around medical and just around the style of play.
“You get so many different styles of play from South Africa, New Zealand, Australia, you’ve got Welsh, Scottish, English players over here as well. There is a lot of IP coming towards this league and you can see the competition has grown dramatically in a short time.
“You come here and meet so many different people. It’s quite refreshing to play with guys, ones you have hated or played against and then you come up here and get to play with and share some stories and converse.
“But also to fit in here with the Japanese who are lovely people. They are very polite, respectful and that is what we have seen. A lot of these players coming over are invested in the team, invested in the competition and they are getting paid back by staying on.”
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Kubota’s title defence hasn’t been easy with just three wins in six games so far, but their mid-season break will feature a cross-border exhibition this weekend against the touring Super Rugby Chiefs, a perfect opportunity to showcase the sport outside Japan.
“The more cross-border exposure that this competition gets the better in terms of they have got a great product, there is a lot of running rugby and they pride themselves on that.
“It’s a great way to improve the standard even more, the high-performance aspect of the game but also to put the Japanese rugby IQ or their attachment and identity more on the global rugby market.
“It’s a good thing. It’s probably better to have these games not in the middle of our season where our season goes on hold. We have got to find a window where both sides can play at full strength, whether that is a tournament that coincides or a championship-style tournament.”
Enhancing rugby in Japan isn’t the only place where Foley would like to see the sport improve. Australian rugby has been under fire for quite some time but the fly-half, last capped on the 2022 Autumn Nations Series tour in Europe, believes this international aspect makes rugby union Australia’s best form of footy.
“I know I’m biased but I think rugby has got the best product and it has got the international factor that those other games don’t have. When the Wallabies are doing well, you can capture the entire nation.
Springy ‘22. Enjoyed being back on tour. Always an honour to wear the Gold jersey! https://t.co/YLYSGQ6Umb
— Bernard Foley ?? (@bernardfoley) December 1, 2022
“We have just got to engage supporters by having a successful national side and everything aligned to make sure the Wallabies are successful and then filtering down the structures and the pathways so it’s strong at every level.
“Rugby is definitely having its challenges domestically. The competing codes of rugby league and AFL are establishing themselves in positions or in areas like schools and universities that were rugby strongholds.
“We have got our challenges but in saying that, there is still enough local talent, enough rugby players coming through to make our domestic competition strong and then that has to be fed into the international, into the Wallabies.
“If you look at Rugby Australia at the moment and what (CEO) Phil Waugh has got to do, they have got to set up the actual structures, the pathways, getting kids in early and coached to play at a reasonable level from an early age because at the moment it’s too easy for the rugby league and AFL to poach talent, especially kids in school or just leaving.”
A more consistent level of refereeing would help, Foley reckoned. “AFL/NRL are doing absolutely everything to speed up the game. More ball in play, bringing that fatigue factor into the game which is going to open it up and make it more exciting for viewers.
“I’m not saying that is the complete answer but we have to do something regarding having more ball in play time, less interference, less stoppages because even my experiences of going back and playing at the end of 2022, I found the game wasn’t as aerobic as it had been.
“It became more intense and more short, sharp passages of play but then with long periods of recovery so that made it more of a power game, becoming a bit more like NFL where you have those power aspects and the explosive aspect but you don’t really have the fatigue or the aerobic component that opens the game up.
“It’s also how you can limit the interference from the TMOs, from referees, so we can get a product that is going to entertain fans and keep everyone engaged.
“It’s still a collision sport. We have to have player welfare and safety at the forefront of our minds but being a collision sport, having a couple of 125-kilo guys running at each other, there are going to be mistakes, there are going to be unfortunate collisions.
“It’s just how you can manage or officiate those collisions to a standard that is consistent and that is not actually going to ruin the product.”
It's all well and good having a strong international game but if the game isn’t strong in Australia, you won’t have a strong Wallabies side and thus no meaningful success on the world stage.