Melbourne’s rugby landscape opened up with Rebels’ demise - Storm are pouncing on the opportunity

In a city accustomed to sporting crossovers, Wallabies captain Harry Wilson and winger Harry Potter obligingly kicked a Sherrin in front of news cameras at the MCG on Wednesday. Featuring players from AFL club Essendon, the media event was designed to promote Saturday’s Test against the British & Irish Lions, and drive ticket sales towards the crowd of 90,000-plus Rugby Australia is hoping for. Behind the two Harrys, the rugby posts had been installed but the Australian rules ones also remained, not yet giving over the field for the northern code to borrow for the day on Saturday.

Despite the dominance of Australian rules in the winter sporting marketplace, Melbourne has produced a crop of international rugby union players, including John Eales medal-winner Rob Valetini, Potter, other Wallabies such as Seru Uru and Hunter Paisami as well as Scotland captain and Lions centre, Sione Tuipolutu.

The sport’s connection to Melbourne can be traced through its multicultural roots, elite private schools and suburban communities, especially those with links to the Pacific. Yet the demise of the Melbourne Rebels last year has left the sport without a professional entity in Australia’s biggest city. There are increasing concerns from those within the code that promising players will be lost to rugby league.

Another local product, the Rebels’ last captain, backrower Rob Leota, made the letter M with his hands after scoring for the First Nations & Pasifika XV against the Lions on Tuesday, “for where I’m from,” he said. “Unfortunately last year was hard for me, being in Melbourne for nine years. I just look at it as good memories, and treasure those times.” Leota had to move to the Waratahs this year to continue his rugby career. Now, he is off to France to play with Bayonne. “Don’t forget your roots, because wherever you go, whatever sport you play, just be proud to be yourself,” he said.

Rugby Australia is in a period of “right-sizing” the organisation, and it gave up waiting for the Rebels to become viable last year. Rugby Victoria, the body in charge of local clubs and grassroots, is also facing financial strain. Though a new centre of excellence is crucial to the organisation’s new strategy for financial sustainability, it remains unfinished, and temporary change rooms are being deployed at the site in north-eastern Melbourne for games, training and events.

View image in fullscreen Former Rebels captain Rob Leota says ‘you can’t blame kids’ for wanting to take up rugby league given the opportunities available. Photograph: Martin Keep/AFP/Getty Images

Meanwhile, rugby league club Melbourne Storm continue their slow but steady growth. Average crowds are now above 20,000 and the outfit is considered one of the best run in the NRL competition, behind only the AFL in terms of revenue. Storm’s football manager, Frank Ponissi, has been credited with much of the club’s success over the last two decades. After seeing the Storm’s supply of young talent – often recruited from New South Wales or Queensland – dwindle by 2022 in a period he admits was “neglect”, he worked to secured support from the board for a renewed focus on Victoria’s best.

Six new full-time staff now run the men’s pathways, and the club will field a team in the second-tier NSW Cup competition for the first time next season. The Storm are also recruiting staff to run the junior women’s programs, designed to support the club’s eventual entry into the NRLW.

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“We don’t see it as rugby league v rugby union, but we just want to have a program that young players – even if they are rugby union players – can say, well, there’s a genuine opportunity for me to climb the ladder,” Ponissi said.

The veteran administrator said young Victorians especially with Pacific Island backgrounds often played both rugby codes, and it was natural that they would see the appeal of the club’s now complete pathway.

“If you’re good enough, you’re ambitious enough and you want it, you can climb that ladder without leaving home,” Ponissi said. “Where now, through no fault of Rugby Victoria, they haven’t got that opportunity.”

Leota doesn’t blame young union players from recognising the opportunities in NRL. “The Storm have been going well for so long, and you can’t blame kids for wanting to take up league, which is the unfortunate thing with the Rebels not being here any more,” he said.

So far, the Storm haven’t produced many local players in their almost three decades of existence. Winger Siulagi Tuimalatu-Brown became just the sixth Victorian to wear the jersey earlier this month.

But Ponissi is open to leveraging those in other sports for the betterment of his club. He even invited former Lions player Ronan O’Gara to Storm training on Wednesday, after the pair struck up a bond when the Irishman was coaching at Crusaders in 2018 and 2019. “On the bigger scale, it’s not an AFL v the NRL here in Melbourne, because we’re not going to win that fight,” Ponissi said. “If kids playing rugby union are attracted to come over, that’s fantastic.”

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