The demise of Moana Pasifika is not a good story. The conscious uncoupling of the club from Super Rugby Pacific doesn’t come as any surprise though.
Not a bad idea, but the execution was awful. The team were hog-tied from the get-go.
The slow slide of the side started at inception and even though the tenuous grasp the franchise had on its position showed shadows of sustained grip on its place in the program, Moana Pasifika was only ever heading south.
Unsupported, underfunded, unwanted, unable to provide players with a solid path on the route to I don’t know where. A place holder franchise, without a genuine and consistent home paddock, a holding pen for athletes before they were herded into a flock shepherded by NZR, or a northern team, or for Savea, Japan.
The idea was wonderful, a home for the huge numbers of Pasifika players who couldn’t find contracts in other super franchises, another chance to tap into this seemingly endless resource. Except the Fijians. Another nonsense in this rudderless Pacific journey. Professional rugby contracts at the top level need to be earned, not distributed out of necessity.
The Blues, the traditional home of AKL based Pasifika, saw them as a parasite. The public didn’t know what they stood for. The players loved the idea, but as soon as they showed promise, they were off to greener pastures.
I’m sure that being owned by PMA, the Pasifika Medical Association, wasn’t helpful either. Again, good intention, but problematic as one of the key sponsor veins to tap into over the years for oval ball codes has been everything that Pasifika health doesn’t need. Fast food and liquor, right?
Arguably the only positive was the astonishing arrival of Ardie Savea, who brought eyeballs and bums to the games, but it was all for nothing as the gun for hire promptly upped sticks and buggered off to cash in, sorry expand his horizons, play with his global whanau, I dunno, whatever.
This not a punch down on a mortally wounded group, it’s just a naked precis of an experiment that had a good heart, but a terrible respiratory system.
Super Rugby needs to drop the Pacific moniker and revert to type. Super Rugby works just fine, and now with 10 teams it works even better. Back to the old school when the comp was vibrant and crisp.
Super 10 anyone?
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New Zealand