Fewer clubs mean fewer players – but all is not lost

• By Touchline

While following the drama of the Jubilee Cup on the wireless this past Saturday afternoon, (and being aware of six defaulted games in the Under 85 competition), Touchline mused on the state of the game in the Capital.

As an older member of Wellington’s rugby community, Touchline’s circle of rugby colleagues is of a similar generation – and reflects those who typically attend a club rugby match across the region on any given Saturday afternoon – or who listen to the coverage of the feature game on their transistor radio. Outside of his generational circle of fellow rugby followers, Touchline wonders, is club rugby still relevant to our wider local communities, particularly our young adults?

In 1933 – 90 years ago – there were 25 rugby union clubs in Wellington, fielding 145 teams across 13 grades, with an estimated 2,175 club players, (simply counting teams comprising 15 players). Only 6 of those clubs have survived the past nine decades intact to the present day, although the fortunes of some of these (e.g., Petone and Johnsonville) have clearly fared slightly better over the years than others (e.g., Eastbourne and Wellington).

Wellington (the oldest club in the Capital) was the largest in 1933, with 11 teams. Miramar Rugby Football Club (a curious historical footnote “from the far east” of the city) fielded 9 teams. The “Fifth Grade”, (nearly the lowest) was the largest in the Union, with 17 teams. In 1933, the three lowest grades (Fifth, Sixth and Seventh) comprised a quarter of the Union’s teams (and most young adult players). Such were the crowds attending Saturday afternoon rugby nine decades ago, that games on the Hutt Recreation Ground’s number 2 ground were prohibited when a senior match was being played on the main field.

Fast forward to 2023, and the level of participation of club rugby in the Wellington Union in absolute terms has nearly halved compared to 1933, (incidentally over the same period of time the city’s population has quadrupled). Today there are 17 clubs, fielding 80 teams, attracting around 1,200 players, (using the same benchmark as above).

In terms of secondary school rugby, 90 years ago there were 72 teams on the field spread across 10 high schools in the region. Wellington College had the largest number of teams (17), with Rongotai College the second largest rugby school in the region with 12 teams. The combined St. Patrick’s Colleges fielded 15 teams, (9 in the Hutt Valley and 6 in Wellington). The “big four” supplied two-thirds of high school teams and players. 90 years ago, Wellington High School (then known as “the Technical Institute”) could put 9 teams into action every week, as could Hutt Valley High School.

Fast forward to 2023, and there are now 92 teams competing in the secondary school competition across 22 different high schools in the wider Wellington region, a 27% increase in terms of teams, as the number of participating schools has increased by 120%. It occurs to Touchline that the numbers of teenage participants has grown as a direct result of the number of organisational entities supporting them (i.e., schools) also increasing.

Touchline hopes that these statistics are giving Wellington’s rugby’s current administrators pause-for-thought. The numbers seem to suggest that a model which leverages the organisational ability of schools and shares the rugby resources of clubs is the right way to tap into youth participation for the purposes of ensuring the ongoing involvement of teenagers as young adults in the game, (not just as players). If a shared services model was also provided by the Union to assist with the governance needs of clubs (given increasing regulatory obligations), Touchline perceives that the solution to arrest the decline in young adult players and regenerate our clubs is staring us in the face.

On Saturday, Touchline spoke with a local club legend and Life Member who, in his eighth decade of life is central to ensuring his club can operate on a Saturday afternoon, as much as a result of necessity, as of his choice. Without a deliberate change of strategy as suggested, 10 years from now Touchline wonders, “who will be there to replace him?”