Papua New Guinea Rugby's New Dawn



PNG's National Rugby Team are called the PukPuks (Photo: IRB.com)

The PNGRFU AGM was held this week and it was a great opportunity to reflect on what has been a challenging period of growth for a Union that has made some major waves on the international scene in recent years.

Papua New Guinea are the current Asia-Pacific Women's Sevens Champions having defeated China in the final of the 2011 Asia-Pacific Women's Sevens Championships in Borneo. They won bronze medals in both the Men's and Women's Sevens competitions at last year's Pacific Games in New Caledonia and the Men's Sevens team won the Bowl final at the 2010 Commonwealth Games - claiming the prized scalps of Canada and Tonga along the way. They are the current Oceania Cup Champions, proceeding through the 2011 Oceania Cup undefeated, and reached the final stage of qualification for Rugby World Cup 2011 where they took on Samoa for the right to qualify for New Zealand.

Papua New Guinea is classified as a 'Targeted' Union by the IRB - one of only 10 in the world and the only one in the Oceania region. This classification is a reflection of PNG's strategic importance not only as a country, but also their potential as a Rugby playing nation.  This classification brings with it increased funding opportunities but it also brings with it an increased level of responsibility and for this reason, the PNGRFU has been undertaking an ambitious series of reforms to ensure that it has the administrative and governance structures in place needed to propel the Union into the next stage of it's development.

Background to the PNGRFU Reforms
A Major Review of the PNGRFU was conducted in 2010. The Review, which is undertaken in all Federation of Oceania Rugby Unions (FORU) Member Unions at least once in a four year cycle, identified a number of priority areas that required attention by the PNGRFU. These recommendations can be grouped into 4 main areas:

1. Governance
2. Administration
3. Financial
4. Rugby Operations

The PNGRFU has made good progress in addressing the recommendations of the report in most areas. The report was very clear in stating that unless the Union addressed the recommendations contained in the report, it would be impossible to continue funding at current levels.

Governance Reforms

Arguably the area requiring the most urgent attention was in Governance. The PNGRFU Constitution was found to be outdated, ambiguous and quite possibly not being validly applied. Any Member Union that is found to not be validly applying its constitution will likely find that their membership of the IRB will be reviewed and this is a situation that we did not want to find the PNGRFU in. Consequently, the IRB and the PNGRFU engaged a constitutional expert to assist in the redrafting of the PNGRFU Constitution. The revised Constitution was tabled at this week's AGM for consideration by the membership and is a marked improvement on its predecessor.

The next step that is required is the development of a Common Association constitution, as well as clearly established affiliation criteria, for the Provincial Unions of the PNGRFU. This is needed to protect both the PNGRFU and its Members and will result in a more robust membership structure that clearly outlines the criteria that Provincial Members need to meet in order to be affiliated to the National body. Such a structure ensures that the PNGRFU clearly outlines what is expected of it's Provincial Unions and the Provincial Unions clearly understand their obligations in growing the game of rugby. Work on this document has commenced.

Administration Reforms

The Union review identified an absence of adequate operational structures, and suitable policies and procedures, expected of a Union receiving such a significant grant from the IRB. The weak administrative structures were also hampering the ability of the Union to assist the Provincial Unions in fostering the growth of rugby throughout the country.

The appointment of a General Manager earlier this year is a positive step and addresses one of the key recommendations made in the Major Review. The benefits that this appointment will bring to the Provincial Unions in partiuclar is significant, however it is important to temper the level of expectation with the realities that history has taught us. As we have learnt from administrative reforms undertaken in other Unions in the region, it takes a long time to develop and implement proper administrative reforms. With that said, the IRB and FORU staff are better able to assist the PNGRFU in this regard now that effective administrative structures are being put in place.

Financial Reforms

The absence of adequate Financial controls has been a problem for the Union for a number of years – and this has to be addressed urgently if current funding levels are to be maintained.

Consequently, the IRB and the PNGRFU commissioned a 'Review of Financial Procedures at the PNGRFU'. The Review was undertaken by KPMG Auckland and the final report has recently been received.

The report has identified a number of recommendations that need to be implemented in order to develop best practice financial management and reporting structures. When done, this will provide the Union, the Board and the Membership with appropriate financial reports upon which informed decisions can be made. The IRB and the PNGRFU are currently in the process of prioritising the recommendations contained in the report and establishing implementation plans for the highest priorities.

Rugby Operations
The Major Review identified a need to review and reform domestic competition structures to provide a better athlete pathway to international Rugby. Perhaps more importantly, robust domestic competition structures are the foundation for rugby’s growth in the country. Once again, the IRB development team remain ready to assist the PNGRFU, and its members, to undertake this difficult process. This a complex process and will take time – if we are to successfully restructure the domestic competition structures we have to be working towards a common vision and that is the challenge that lies before the PNGRFU.

If the PNGRFU, and indeed any Pacific Island Member Union, aspires to compete on the global stage with the big rugby nations and the big economies, it has to have best-practice administrative and governance structures in place as well as a robust domestic competition structure.

What Cricket can learn from Coke (Coca-Cola that is)

As the international cricket season in Australia grinds to a slower-than-usual climax, courtesy of an extended one day international series involving both India and Sri Lanka, much debate is revolving around the futures of both Twenty20 (T20) and One-day (50 over) cricket and whether the two limited-over versions of the game can co-exist.

Having experienced somewhat of a breakout season in Australia, on the back of a new domestic League that far exceeded broadcast and crowd targets, the T20 star is seemingly rising. Perhaps not surprisingly, this has spurred furious debate about whether Twenty20 cricket is more appealing to a new generation of cricket lovers, at the expense of the more traditional one-day and Test (5-day) cricket.

Many people, myself included, believe Twenty20 is growing exponentially and will soon become a major force in the sporting markets of cricket playing nations. The question for international cricket is: can it sustain 3 different versions of the game? This question is as much about High Performance (insofar as whether players can be expected to play all three forms of the game over a sustained period time) as it is about whether the market can bear such a condensed and saturated calendar. It is almost certain that players cannot sustainably play all three versions of the game at the elite level and for this reason, cricket's administrators have a conundrum on their hands.

Whilst there are some international team sports that run perhaps two 'disciplines' (Soccer for example runs a Beach Soccer World Cup and Rugby has Rugby Sevens and Fifteens) there is no known precedent for a sport to manage three International disciplines. The ICC runs World Championships in two versions of the game - T20 and One Day cricket. Ironically (although it has tried and failed) it does not run a World Championship for what most people consider to be the most prestigious 'discipline' - Test Cricket.

There are, however, parallels in business  - and Coca-Cola's disastrous launch of 'New Coke' in the mid 80's may provide some food for thought (excuse the pun) for cricket's administrators.

The New Coke debacle is etched in Business Management folklore as an example of how not to underestimate a consumer's emotional attachment to your product or brand. And to be very careful in drawing conclusions from 'market research'. A very useful and entertaining synopsis of the New Coke story can be found here. In a nutshell however, the story goes like this:

• Concerned by a loss of market share to rival product, Pepsi, Coca Cola Executives launched a market research drive in an attempt to find out why Pepsi was gaining in popularity at such a rapid rate - a problem that was exacerbated by the rapid rise of 'Diet Coke' which had the effect of splitting Coke's once significant market share between 'traditional' Coke and Diet Coke (you see where I am going here don't you).

• Internal research confirmed what Pepsi had been spruiking in their 'Pepsi Challenge' marketing campaign - that consumers preferred the sweeter taste of Pepsi. (Malcolm Gladwell, in his book Blink, details the fallacy of the Pepsi Challenge taste test and hypothesises that just because a consumer prefers a sip of the sweeter tasting Pepsi, it doesn't mean they prefer to drink an entire can of the sweeter drink over a less sweet alternative). i.e. lovers of T20 cricket may not necessarily like Test and/or One Day cricket - and vice versa.

• Their answer was New Coke - a sweeter derivation of 'traditional' Coke that was launched with great fanfare in April 1985 after Coca-Cola's own internal taste tests had shown it to be more popular than BOTH Pepsi and 'traditional' Coke. Production of the original formula ceased in the same month.

• The fallout was swift and immediate with Coke drinkers deriding 'New Coke' in a vociferous campaign that, just 3 months later, saw Coca Cola announce that production of the original formula would re-commence immediately.

So what are the parallels to Cricket? Well the question for cricket is how it deals with three 'brands' of international cricket without eroding it's market share and maintaining player welfare. How does it deal with T20, the 'New Coke' of cricket?

Evidence suggests that T20 is bringing new consumers to cricket - and therefore not diluting the market share of existing consumers as 'Diet Coke' did in the mid 80's Pepsi war. According to the Sunday Telegraph, research conducted at the first T20 international between Australia and India, showed that one third of the 59,659 people that attended the match, were attending their first cricket international.

If T20 is the 'New Coke' of cricket, then cricket administrators would do well to learn from the mistakes of Coca Cola and resist a temptation to 'cease or wind-back production' of the original formulae - Test and One Day Internationals. There is a very clear and emotional connection that cricket lovers have for the more traditional versions of the game. Failure to recognise the emotional connection to the game at this level, as Coca Cola did, would be catastrophic for the ICC. However, because T20 is bringing new followers to the game it therefore must be accommodated in an already crowded international season. Which presents a significant player welfare challenge for the ICC.

From a High Performance Perspective it is almost certain that the players cannot continue to play all three versions of the game at the elite level. So how does the ICC deal with the conundrum of a juggernaut brand that is bringing new followers to the game with the High Performance reality that the international calendar the new 'brand'  creates is unsustainable? Walk away or scale back the 'traditional' versions of the game and risk a Coca-Cola-like disaster?

What's my solution? The establishment of an international T20 Tour - not unlike the IRB Sevens World Series. A travelling series of 3-week T20 tournaments comprising the 10 Test Playing nations held in, say, six countries to begin with: Rd1 in India, Rd 2 in Sri Lanka, Rd 3 in Pakistan, Rd 4 in England, Rd 5 in South Africa, Rd 6 in Australia. By default you would create an international product that satisfies the growing demand for T20 Cricket - but the nature of the series would require T20 specialist cricketers for the duration of a Calendar year (how each of the National Federations use this series as part of their Player pathway would be up to them). This would leave future international Tours for Test and One-Day Cricket.

The T20 Cricket World Series creates a potential cash-cow for the ICC that feeds a growing appetite for cricket amongst a new market segment whilst protecting an international Tours Program that is limited to Test and One Day Cricket - a model that is proven to be sustainable from a High Performance Perspective.