The 2024 Australian Club Rugby season is now over following two close Grand Finals from the weekend in the NSW Shute Shield yesterday & QLD Hospital Cup earlier this afternoon, with Eastern Suburbs finally won a premiership after a long 55 years wait since 1969 over Northern Suburbs by one point (36-35) while Brothers still came out on top v Wests Bulldogs by two points (29-27).
Both Grand Final winners will go on to take on the annual pre-season Australian Club Championship challenge match in early March 2025 between the Easts v Brothers.
For now, it was great seeing some of our Super Rugby contracted players playing for their respective local/grade clubs during the latter stages of the regular club rugby season including Finals including some free-to-air time on 9Gem in addition to full-season coverage on Stan Sport.
I wish we could take a lead off FIFA’s brand new annual Intercontinental Cup tournament/old FIFA Club World Club format in Soccer or maybe the short-lived Super Rugby Unlocked from South Africa back in 2020 before the South African teams packed their bags for Europe nowadays though as our next third-tier competition to replace the previous National Rugby Championship between 2014-2019.
It would involve a mix of the Grand Final winning Club Rugby teams from NSW, ACT & QLD and some fully professional franchises like the Western Force, Fijian Drua & Rugby Victoria (using the former Melbourne Rebels name licence).
Sure, we need to keep a close eye on player welfare when players need to take some time off after a long six month season on the field. Don’t forget that some 1st grade Club Rugby players who isn’t tied up to their respective Super Rugby club have day jobs too, so they won’t mind have to travel that much while getting to spend more time with their families & loved ones.
However, it would be awesome if we run a few weeks festival alongside our Super Rugby U-19s comp either between mid-September to the end of October or the start of February to mid-March and the respective Club Rugby seasons might need to start a bit later in April.
Food for thought as would love to see our best Club Rugby teams across QLD, NSW and ACT getting some extra competition at a national level v the likes of the Force, Victoria and Drua rather than creating another set of generic-based Rugby teams from each state as seen with the NRC in the past. Hope Rugby Australia can see this so more Super Rugby players who isn’t playing for the Wallabies right now can play there a bit longer that will benefit the best Club Rugby players and also the juniors coming through the ranks.