LONG READ How can Rugby Australia fit five into four after Rebels' demise?

Australian rugby is scratching its seven-year itch. Back in 2017, then-chief executive of Rugby Australia Bill Pulver set out five chairs for the Super Rugby clubs, and then told them one would shortly be removed. The music stopped, and the Western Force were left high and dry.

The hidden back story is the two votes registered against the cull came not from Western Australia but from Victoria, home of the Melbourne Rebels. The Force had handed back their license to RA and were already back in the fold, but it was probably not WA in the gunsights of governance.

The real target was Victoria. According to Rebels board member Lyndsey Cattermole, only the hardened shelter of private ownership, and a swift transfer of the franchise license from Andrew Cox to the VRU, saved the Rebels. With the unflinching support of entrepreneur Andrew Forrest, the Force eventually survived the cull too, though not without a fight. The five famously remained five.

Roll the clock on another seven years to 2024, and the Rebels have once again entered the administrative kill zone, this time with fatal consequences. On this occasion, RA has been able to reject the offer of a financial bail-out via a consortium fronted by ex-Qantas chairman Leigh Clifford.

In an official statement, chairman Daniel Herbert concluded:

“The consortium has claimed to have committed $18m in funding, though no documentary evidence has been provided to support this. Given the lack of detail made available to RA, the lack of transparency and the significant doubts over the consortium’s proposed financial model, RA has determined there is an unacceptable level of risk associated with entering into a participation agreement with this consortium for the 2025 Super Rugby Pacific season.”

If Rugby Australia follows through and the Melbourne Rebellion is quashed once and for all, the key to the success of the new four-club model will be a twofold commitment. On the one hand, the infrastructure and pathways created over the last 13 years need to be preserved: community rugby in Victoria, junior development programmes and elite Super Rugby pathways alike, and sustenance of the women’s branch of the game. On the other, keeping the VA-based Australian-qualified players in the Australian game is non-negotiable.

If a significant portion of those players decide the road leads to Europe or Japan or even the NRL, the experiment will be a bust before it ever rolls down the runway. As Eddie Jones pointed out when he was England coach:

“The reason Australia wanted to have more than the three Super Rugby teams was to create extra depth, so the immediate question that needs to be answered is ‘Have those two extra teams [the Force and the Rebels] strengthened the Wallabies?’

“I’ve always said Australia is best to have the three teams and the best players playing with each other. That creates hot competition to get into Super Rugby and adds extra to everything that happens in Australian rugby.”

That is the crux of the issue. Carpe Diem. RA needs to seize the moment, sign up the majority of Rebels players and ensure they go to the right place in the four franchises which remain. According the official statement, “RA and the Rugby Union Players Association [RUPA] have been contingency planning for the possibility of this outcome and met players last week to discuss options for player movement within Australian rugby.”

David Nucifora will be central to the redistribution of wealth. After 14 years as high performance director in Ireland, ‘Nussi’ has finally returned home. His role now is crucial.

The Waratahs

Key arrivals and departures for 2025

IN: Andrew Kellaway and Joseph Amakuso-Sua’ali’i. OUT: Lachie Swinton, Ned Hanigan; Will Harrison, Izzy Perese, Mosese Tuipulotu, Harry Wilson and Mark Nawaqanitawase.

The Waratahs need the most help of any Aussie club. The rash of front-row injuries and a long-term problem with Angus Bell’s foot suggest Taniela Tupou and Isaac Kailea may both find a new home in Daceyville. Add Brad Wilkin and Tuaina Tualima for back-row cover, and Matt Proctor and Lachie Anderson to plug the absentees in midfield and the back three.

The Western Force

Key arrivals and departures for 2025:

IN: Tom Robertson, Brandon Paenga-Amosa, Nic Dolly and Darcy Swain. OUT: Michael Wells, Ian Prior and Sam Spink.

The Force have recruited strongly in the tight five forwards. All they need now is a strong-scrummaging, Australian-qualified tight-head prop, a powerful ball-carrier [or two] in the back row, and a quality starter in the back three. Let’s add Matt Gibbon and Sam Talakai at prop, Rob Leota and Vaiolini for the hard yakka; with sevens star Darby Lancaster and Glen Vaihu for the back three.

The Reds

No arrivals or departures announced at time of writing. 

Les Kiss’ Reds are arguably the best-balanced squad in Australia already, and it will be a case of fine-tuning and adding depth, rather than major surgery. We may see some long-time friends of Queensland rugby – such as Lukhan Salakaia-Loto, Filipo Daugunu and Alex Mafi – returning home. Another intriguing option may be the addition of either Cabous Eloff or Pone Faamausili at prop, to see what Brisbane coaching can make of their undoubted physical attributes and ball-playing ability.

The Brumbies

The perennial Aussie table-toppers from Canberra have only one key departure, with Darcy Swain off to Western Australia. There is a sizeable hole to fill in the second row with Caderyn Neville turning 36 next year, so Josh Canham and Angelo Smith could be drafted in from Victoria. The absence of a powerful scrummaging hooker may be remedied by Jordan Uelese, while both the Gordon brothers [Carter and Mason] could arrive to create competition at the 10, 12 and 15 spots in Canberra. Giant Pone Faamausili may finally discover the scrum finishing school he needs to maximise his potential.

On the field, the Rebels’ problem could be summarised in one word: defence. They have conceded the most points of any side in regular season play [448] at an average of 34.5 points per game. They have shipped an average of 4.7 tries per game in the process. Given the circumstances, it was a remarkable achievement for the club to advance to the play-offs.

The most disappointing aspect of the Rebels’ D is some of the faults were never fixed. In the middle of March, I pinpointed the extraordinary looseness of the Rebels forwards in and around the ruck during their 26-53 home defeat by the Reds. In the final round of matches against the Fijian Drua, it seemed nothing much had changed.

Inside defence is all about attitude and movement: the attitude to tackle big men coming straight ahead with power, the movement around the ruck to check, and follow motion by offensive players. At Churchill Park the Rebels struggled on both counts.

Tupou is toiling to reload into line after a short break by the Drua, and all three of the Rebels front-rowers [Tupou, Isaac Kailea and Jordan Uelese] take turns to slip off the tackle on the Fijian number one Livai Natave, which means the defence is already fragmented on the next [scoring] phase.

A lack of mobility around the base is often most clearly shown up by attacking activity down the short-side.

In the first clip, Tupou is late to react to the threat of Drua #9 Frank Lomani down the short-side, then gives up on the play after Ryan Louwrens misses a tackle near touch. In the second example, he is the only Rebels forward to wrap around a breakdown on the Melbourne goal-line, leaving the Drua with a straightforward advantage in numbers against the Rebels’ backs on the following play.

The ultimate ‘gimme’ was a 21-phase try scored by the hosts while Lomani was in the sin-bin. It ate up a full five minutes of the yellow card, and even without their scrum-half’s nose for space around the fringes the Fijians were able to exploit a lack of co-ordination in the Melbourne interior defence:

In the first instance, Kailea is still calling desperately for help on the far side of the ruck when 20-year-old fly-half Isaiah Ravula does his best Lomani impersonation on the snipe. Rebels second row Angelo Smith still has hands on knees when the bust is made. At the end of the sequence, there are no fewer than five pink shirts honey-potting around one Fijian forward, which means the outside defence will be threadbare when the ball goes wide.

The Rebels have reached the knockout stages of an international Super Rugby tournament for the first time, in what appears to be their final season as a professional entity. It is the ultimate irony.

What will success look like in the new, Rebel-free four-club era for Rugby Australia? Keeping as much of the existing pathway/development infrastructure in Victoria, and as many of the Rebels players as possible in Aussie.

If a large rump seek their fortunes overseas, the experiment will be stillborn. But if Nucifora can get his hands dirty, deep and early, the right faces may yet reappear in the right places, and a green-and-gold phoenix rise from the ashes.