Saturday's A Rugby Day: "Waste your money and you're only out of money, but waste your time and you've lost a part of your life."

Saturday's A Rugby Day: "Waste your money and you're only out of money, but waste your time and you've lost a part of your life.".... Blondie raises some good questions about finances for premier level rugby clubs. I would point out two possible alternatives for financing club rugby, which are not mutually exclusive: (1) the all inclusive club (U6-Senior Men and Women) in one club; and (2) the semi-professionalizing of the team (by which I mean defraying costs, not necessarily paying players). Without 1, you wouldn't have the fan base for step 2. If the rugby community starts building an infrastructure of community wide teams (i.e. involving all levels of play and not just one aspect (i.e. men's/women's/high school), from the ground up, I think there is the potential to have these community wide teams support senior level play, by providing resources and a fan base.

If you look at the tax returns of local soccer associations, these organizations are bringing in $150 to $500K. These associations have the resources to buy fields, pay coaches, and develop players from the youngest levels. Think what a club could do if it had these kinds of resources!

Not to mention, if we can have semi-professional teir-II arena footbal or women's footbal, don't you think the public would come watch some premier rugby? Perhaps we need to bring in general managers and community organizers for our local rugby clubs.