Monday 22 December 2008

maori rugby - answer lies within

After a lengthy contemplation of my blog earlier this week about the criminal abandonment of Maori rugby by the New Zealand Rugby Union, cousin Rugby Prawn was working all night on a "correcting mechanism." heres what he said.

It's straight forward really. Who needs the NZRFU and the never-really-accountable Steve Tew? In the complex mechanism which is Maoridom there are plenty of vehicles to get behind a national Maori rugby team. You need an administration, organisation, funding, a coaching capacity, and of course, selectors. To bring together this compex formula, who better than the Maori Trustee, John Paki. The Trustee is far more at home at rugby than even the marae! He has a strong administration background, instant access to all iwi, close liaison with potential sponsors (perhaps the national fishing industry, now chiefly owned by Maori) and potention organisers (perhaps TOKM, his own office and officials, the much-under utilised Hui Taumata or even the national Maori group which hosted the PM last week!) Now, for top player availability they will need to take into account All Black committments and probably the Super 14. They can easily ignore the Air New Zealand championship. With these limitations it would be quite simple to gather the Maori All Blacks in Auckland (no stadium ready) or Wellington to play the top Samoan team. Properly marketed (with great Maori support) they could fill a stadium, stamp their own brand on the sport and not be pathetically reliant on the NZRU, its outdated operations and theories! Who knows, if the new organisation shows real initiative it could host a Pacific Festival or Rugby. "But we are in a international depression, there is no money, Steve Tew said so!" Well think for just a moment! There is a West Indies cricket team here this week with all sponsoirship proudly displayed as DIGICELL. Who the hell are they? Well they operate in Samoa, Tonga, Fiji (to name just a few places!) So, someone, get off your asses and contact Mr John Paki, Maori Trustee. It would be a well reasoned first step! After a lengthy contemplation of my blog earlier this week about the criminal abandonment of Maori rugby by the New Zealand Rugby Union, cousin Rugby Prawn was working all night on a "correcting mechanism."
Heres what he says

4 comments:

Anonymous said...

This smells like a cunning ploy by the NZRU to suck up to us TW types by first threatening to axe our team and then having a change of heart early in the New Year when they see reason, reinstate the Maori team and axe something else.

Cousin Witi reckons this whole thing smells like 8-day-old kina.

Anonymous said...

Aaahhhh - finally someone who can something other than gimme, gimme.

Good to see someone who says "get off your fat arse and do it for yourself. Stop saying gimme, gimme"

Anonymous said...

If you think that the Auckland v Canterbury rivalry is bad enough, imagine the infighting among Maori tribes over what players to choose!

Anonymous said...

i would suggest Mr Tew take a long holiday and let the recently unemployed Mr D E Kirk take his place.