Marinos next in Rugby Australia’s obsession with foreigners

The definition of “insanity” is making the same mistakes and expecting a different outcome. So why has Rugby Australia hired yet another foreign CEO?

Zimbabwean Andy Marinos steps into New Zealander Raelene Castle’s shoes

At the beginning of a new rugby year, it’s disappointing to be the bearer of bad tidings.

But the definition of “insanity” is making the same mistakes and expecting a different outcome.

By that definition, the decision makers at Rugby Australia would seem to have lost their marbles.

Andy Marinos has replaced Raelene Castle as CEO of Rugby Australia. Believe it or not, both spent time at the Canterbury Bulldogs.

Raelene’s gift to the club was back-ended contracts that crippled the Bulldogs’ squad. Andy Marinos played one game at Belmore in 1996 during the NRL war.

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On the face of things, Marinos seems a decent bloke — a journeyman player from Zimbabwe who failed to make it at the Stormers in Cape Town and ended up at Newport in Wales, where he played for five seasons, managing a handful of Tests for Wales at the end of his career.

After playing, Marinos tried his hand at administration, first at Newport for one year and then as team manager for the Springboks. But his next role as a key executive was a complete disaster.

He was the CEO of SANZAAR from 2015 until 2020, where his primary job was to raise revenue to grow Super Rugby and the Rugby Championship.

On his watch, Super Rugby went from being the best provincial rugby competition in the world to a financial basket case. And as he walks away from SANZAAR, South Africa is poised to walk away from the Rugby Championship.

As the boss of Super Rugby, Marinos was embarrassingly inconsistent. He first drove the expansion of Super Rugby from 15 to 18 teams. Then, because his organisation failed to raise enough sponsorship revenue, teams were turfed out of the competition.

The biggest consequence for Australian rugby was the Western Force getting thrown under the bus in 2017.

Outside Australia, the Sunwolves, too, were eventually abandoned in 2019, amid much controversy. Japanese Rugby claimed it was payback for its failure to vote for South Africa to host the 2023 World Cup.

But while Marinos and SANZAAR were running around tinkering with the structure of Super Rugby, television audiences and crowds plummeted.

Why is it that the English Premiership, Pro 14 and Six Nations secured private equity investment, but Super Rugby and the Rugby Championship could not?

If Marinos had done his job properly at SANZAAR, Super Rugby would have remained the best provincial rugby competition in the world and the Rugby Championship would be bigger than the Six Nations.

Apart from Marinos’s lack of commercial acumen, there are other questions about his lack of judgment. In 2016, Marinos had to defend the Super Rugby playoff system that favoured South African teams.

It meant that two South African franchises were guaranteed home quarter-finals, while Australia and New Zealand teams were assured one home quarter-final each.

In Super Rugby, due to the enormous travel demands, home teams have a huge advantage, particularly in playoff matches. The decision was a massive disadvantage to Kiwi teams that were dominating Super Rugby at the time.

Marinos was the key decision maker during this debacle. But he has always known where his bread was buttered.

Just last season, Marinos and SANZAAR controversially granted Australia the hosting rights to the revised Rugby Championship. The Kiwis were the most obvious hosts and the decision was widely questioned.

Marinos has been at the centre of plenty of other controversies as the boss of SANZAAR.

Remember the hometown referee debacle that questioned the integrity of Super Rugby match results?

Statistics show that in 2017, South African referees awarded local South African Super Rugby teams, playing on South African soil, 159 more penalties than were awarded to their visitors.

The numbers suggested that overseas teams were unfairly refereed in South Africa by local referees.

In 2019, it became so ridiculous that in a Lions v Melbourne Rebels match in Johannesburg, the South African referee, Egon Seconds, awarded the Lions 20 penalties, while the Rebels were awarded one. On top of that, the Rebels had two yellow cards against them.

I watched that game on television. It was clearly a farce.

The Rebels were robbed but what did Marinos do about the issue? Absolutely nothing.

In fact, Seconds was a match official for another South African team a week later.

As head of SANZAAR, Marinos should have changed policy and called for independent referees.

Instead, he simply buried his head in the sand, claiming there was nothing wrong with the hometown referee policy, when the evidence suggested the opposite.

It’s a shame Rugby Australia has chosen to employ another outsider with substandard credentials to a key position.

We have a Kiwi coach in charge of the Wallabies and his tribe of globetrotting coaching journeymen. And now a South African passport-carrying CEO with a questionable track record.

Australia has an abundance of impressive sports administrators and commercial key executives. With all the local talent, you would think Rugby Australia would choose a gifted Australian business leader for the job.

The appointment of Marinos is baffling and disappointing. Once again, Rugby Australia has chosen to ignore Australian talent.

At least Rugby Australia is consistent. It signs Fijian wingers instead of young Aussie kids and signs foreign coaches instead of promoting the best emerging Aussie coaches.

Why wouldn’t they sign a South African CEO to replace a Kiwi?

Marinos has been appointed the CEO of Rugby Australia. His primary job is to drive revenue so he can grow our game. Unfortunately, he managed to do neither in his time at SANZAAR.

It’s interesting that to date, he has not shared his vision of how to grow revenue and the game. Instead, he has offered gibberish “coach speak” about the Wallabies lacking “spine players”.

Marinos played one NRL game and he’s dropping NRL terms to describe our Wallabies’ shortcomings.

Meanwhile, we await the announcement of a new sponsor to replace Qantas. There is a fair chance McLennan will need to sell this sponsorship because Marinos has no chance based on his track record.

When McLennan announced Marinos as the new CEO, he did so trumpeting: “He’s rugby to the core”; and “he’s got impeccable global relationships”.

It’s fair to say the Japanese and the Kiwis would vehemently disagree.

In Europe, Marinos has virtually no profile. The chairman of World Rugby, Bill Beaumont, wouldn’t know Andy Marinos if he fell over him.

It would take me less than a minute to list 10 extremely talented Australians who would be brilliant CEOs of Rugby Australia.

Why is the board of Rugby Australia so obsessed with foreign appointments?

Let’s hope things get better from here. They will need to.