Wallaroos use their voice, try to understand it

Make a noise and make it clear

The news broke, like most major women’s sports stories do, via an Instagram post. Last night, in the lead up to the Football World Cup final, with all of Australia on the high that is women’s sport, the Wallaroos dropped their statement.

I have only been writing about women’s sport for just over a year and this is the 4th (maybe 5th??) example of rugby players speaking out on mistreatment in this time. This tells me two things:

1. Sexism is a universal and foundational tenet that most of our rugby institutions are built upon
2. Women in rugby have had enough

The final straw in this instance was the tone deaf send off of the Wallabies on their World Cup campaign.

A screenshot of the video shared of the Wallabies send off. Names cropped cause this ain’t a witch hunt.

As with all these cases, this specific incident is just an example of the problem, not the root of it. So if we see Qantas come out and promise better flying conditions for the Wallaroos from now on, folks would have missed the whole freaking point.

What this example tells us is that Rugby Australia sees women differently depending on their proximity to power AKA their relationship with men in their top side. The Wallaroos are one class of women and the wives and girlfriend of Wallabies are another. Their treatment is handed out accordingly.

That they will pay greater respect to the partners of male players is a no doubt in part due to their player association going into bat for this type of thing. Is this association fighting the same fight for their women members?

What this also tells us is their sponsorship management is all out of whack. Brands need these partnerships to be mutually beneficial. If you have defined the terms to not include your women’s team, in this, the year of the Barbie movie, you are setting your sponsor up on a collision course with controversy.

I’ve said this before but such sponsorships are often built on an alignment of values or at least, values you wish to demonstrate to your consumer. This situation therefore underlines Rugby Australia’s core problem, they do not value their women.

The old saying is a fool is someone who knows the price of everything and the value of nothing, Rugby Australia are more the fool as they seem to have no idea how to run a budget either. If they have no funds it’s because they keep writing blank cheques to cover their lack of a vision in the sport.

They told these Wallaroo players there was no money in the pot for contracts and then handed out five million to a player they could have reportedly contracted for $300,000 a couple of years prior.

Their choice to remove Dave Rennie, with no just cause, to bring in Eddie Jones months out from a World Cup was expensive. They will have had to pay both coaches top dollar for this shemozzle. We were told upon this signing that Jones would be overseeing the Wallaroos programme. I would wager that the only time he has spent on the women’s game so far is the time it took for him to say that in the press conference.

Given they are paying Rennie why not redeploy him in a Wayne Smith manner? Giving the Wallaroos a boost leading into the launch of WXV.

Oh yeah that’s right, you would need to value women’s rugby in order to see that as a crucial role to progressing the future of the game rather than a demotion.

If you’ve listened to me talk about rugby in New Zealand in the last year, you would have heard me speak about the threat the NRLW poses to our game. That’s from a distance across the ditch, in a country that plays four versions of oval ball games (union, 7s, touch and league) with rugby union occupying top place as our national sport.

Meanwhile, over in Aus, they play all these sports plus of course their national obsession, Aussie Rules. It’s fair to say that rugby union is the last cab off the rank for a lot of prospective talent. They have always struggled to draw players in against these odds but with the type of cash being thrown at AFLW and NRLW, this has become even harder.

There are issues for the Wallaroos regarding resource coaching, access to training facilities, nutritionists and provision of adequate test matches. This is alongside all the greatest hits of the struggle of being an amateur rugby player supported by paid but deeply amateur administrators expecting you to deliver professional results. If you want a clear case for the return on investment in talent, look no further than their gold medal winning 7s team. If you want to know if there’s an audience, look at every other Aussie codes growing off the back of their investment.

If Rugby Australia has no interest in women’s rugby then get out of the way. Hold on to your precious Wallabies and the glory of days gone by and leave the future of the game up to a new organisation that values the gift they’ve been given.

Latest statement from the Wallaroos this morning.

Rugby Australia has won the rights to host the World Cup in 2029. They will be desperate to recreate some of the magical scenes we have seen as part of the Football World Cup. Central to the success of this tournament, was a home town team that Aussies could cheer for. Rugby Australia has six years to get their act together and transform their top six side into title contenders.

Wake up or break up. Either way, the women are now taking action. That’s the part of this story which brings me the most hope.

With you,

Alice