Wallaby great calls for rugby ‘war cabinet’

Respected former Wallaby Dick Marks is pushing for Cameron Clyne’s Rugby Australia board to be dissolved.

Rugby Australia chairman Cameron Clyne is standing down

Respected former Wallaby Dick Marks is pushing for Cameron Clyne’s Rugby Australia board to be dissolved and a “war cabinet” set up to rescue the code.

Marks believes that only such a radical step can reshape the entire rugby landscape with the comprehensive review that is desperately needed.

Australia’s former National Director of Coaching is staggered that Clyne is on the nominations committee to pick his own replacement now he has decided not to seek re-election as RA chairman in March. Marks suggested eliminating the nominations committee altogether.

Marks, 77, has taken the remarkable step of paying for an ad in today’s edition of The Australian calling for public support and ideas to ignite a #LetsFixAustralianRugby campaign.

He said Clyne was part of the two biggest problems afflicting the code.

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“We have declined over the last two decades because we have had the wrong people running the game,” said Marks when branding the demise of the Western Force a “fiasco.”

Marks said the game’s “governing elite are in a state of denial” and the Wallabies’ early exit from the Rugby World Cup in Japan merely magnified a wider disillusionment.

“Also, forget about copying New Zealand and getting their coaches, use our own template,” Marks said.

Marks’s stance on Kiwi coaching input will put him further at odds with Clyne as New Zealander Dave Rennie is the hot favourite to become the Test coach.

When Clyne announced on Monday that he would not be seeking re-election as chairman he outlined a busy four months which will put his fingerprints on all of rugby’s big decisions.

“Over the next four months I, along with the rest of the board, remain committed to overseeing the delivery of a new broadcast deal, the appointment of a new Wallabies head coach and the conclusion of the legal matter involving Israel Folau,” Clyne said in a statement.

Marks said a prominent former Wallaby was so dismayed at the state of the code they had set up a LetsFixAustralianRugby.com.au website to garner support and ideas.

Marks said hardline action was now the only solution.

“I would suspend the Constitution for 12 months and establish an interim (RA) board or a war cabinet, if you like, to conduct the comprehensive review of the entire rugby landscape,” Marks said.

He advocated a subcommittee system be temporarily reconstituted in the technical, community rugby, financial and constitutional areas to shake-up the game’s health.

New focus on elevating the coach education system was essential, Marks said.

“My caller said, ‘What I want is something radical, revolutionary and rational instead of mere tinkering. Our weapon will be floods of urgings from the public’,” Marks said.

The Courier-Mail