USA Features

by Nigel Melville
Nigel Melville Direct blog 

Last week in Boston I met with the Rugby Super League Clubs to discuss their schedule for 2010 and continue work with them to raise the profile and quality of their competition and clubs in 2010. From Boston I traveled via Newport, RI, where I met the local rugby community and viewed potential host venues before arriving in New York for a series of meetings with potential sponsors. I also took the Path train out to Harrison, New Jersey, not a trip for the faint-hearted, but it was well worth the effort.

Harrison, New Jersey will shortly be the home of the New York Red Bulls Major League Soccer team. The new Red Bull Stadium is a work of art, and will undoubtedly be a fantastic venue for us to use in the future. With 25,000 seats, a grass field and even sleeves for rugby posts, we are looking to place an international event there in 2010. I believe that this has the capability of breaking all attendance records for an international rugby match in the USA – we will see!

Of course, the sports sponsorship market is pretty tough at the moment for all sports, but there are definitely signs of recovery and I have been talking to a number of potential partners who are interested in rugby’s growth in the USA.

On the Olympic front, the announcement was followed by plenty of excitement, and now the reality has started to set in across the world of rugby. Rugby becoming an Olympic sport has impacted on all unions in different ways. In America, everything has been pretty positive. I have connected with the USOC; we have started to discuss our membership status and governance issues. These talks will be followed by talks about our High Performance Planning and USOC support and involvement.

Some countries have had to deal with more difficult issues: England, Scotland and Wales compete at the Olympics as Great Britain, so they will have to develop a Lions-type team. I understand that rugby sevens will now be introduced to the school sport curriculum in Russia, a boost for rugby, but seen as a threat to 15s. One country will receive less funding as a result of the announcement, and their government believes that Olympics (12 player squad) is more important than the Rugby World Cup (22 player squads), so therefore they will only fund 12 men and women going forward!

Another interesting fact is that team sports in the Olympics are all 12 team events, this doesn’t fit into the current 16 or 20 team competitions currently played around the world – so 12 teams it will be! Then comes the challenge of Olympic qualification, reducing around 120 Olympic hopefuls to just 12 teams – I assume Brazil will be included as hosts, so that’s 11 teams. Try working that one out!

Overall, I think Olympic Rugby is a huge step forward for the sport; it's an endorsement of progress being made across the globe and has given us a new dimension along with a few new challenges.

On Monday, I returned from a weekend in Toronto watching the America’s Rugby Championship games. This is a new competition that creates an opportunity for Eddie to work with domestic players ahead of the November test match window. It’s an evolving competition and has yet to find it’s feet. On Friday Eddie and I met with the IRB, Rugby Canada and Argentina to work on the future of the event, there are some exciting plans to develop this championship in the years to come.

For more of Nigel's blog visit Nigel Melville Direct.

With an impressive resume as player, coach and administrator, Nigel David Melville took over as CEO and President of Rugby Operations of USA Rugby, the National Governing Body of the sport in America, in 2006.  In addition to his full time job promoting the sport in the U.S., Melville has launched his own blog, Nigel Melville Direct, to further the discussion and his passion for what it will take to make the U.S. a great rugby playing nation.

CLICK HERE to read more on Nigel Melville

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