The Wallabies have been thumped by Wales by 40 to 6 in the Rugby World Cup. But to be honest, it really comes as no surprise. Ever since Rugby Australia sacked Israel Folau for expressing a personal religious opinion – which in the context of world history, would have been totally uncontroversial until about five minutes ago – I have not been able to watch any of their games. Not. A. Single. Game.

And I am by no means alone. Most of the people I know have switched off and even started going for some other niche country. For example, Fiji seems more popular right now than even our national team.

David Campese – Australia’s greatest ever rugby union try-scorer – tells the story of Russell Crowe coming into his shop in Sydney to buy a Wallaby’s jersey in the early 2000s. Australian rugby was flying so high that Rusty exchanged one of the two original masks he wore in the movie Gladiator for Campese’s signed 1991 World Cup jersey – the one he wore to beat the All Blacks – and the great All Black Jonah Lomu’s Test jersey.

What do you reckon the chances are of Hollywood movie star wanting to do something like that today?

What’s happened to us as a sporting nation? When I was growing up the Wallabies were living legends. They were role models young and old people wanted to emulate. But at the moment, you’d be hard-pressed to find a kid who could name more than three players in the current team. As Jeff Messitt, secretary of the Bundaberg Waves Falcons Rugby Union club, was quoted as saying back in 2021:

The grassroots are in a catastrophic state at the moment. Kids can’t name a current Wallaby … funny the only one that they know is Israel Folau. And he’s now gone.

For me, the incident involving Folau was the tipping point where made the decision to turn off. The way Rugby Australia dealt with the situation was appalling. They’d become so Woke that in the name of tolerance, everything was to be tolerated except for views which were deemed as being no longer en vogue.

In saying that, I realise that the issue is much more complicated than simply what happened to an individual player. As David Campese explained in a podcast called The Breakdown for The Australian Campese:

I just think we just need to get the culture back. I think that’s important. I think we’ve lost our culture, players have got no idea who we are, the kids have got no idea who we are, where we came from. I was taught that the only way to be the best is to aspire to win. It seems like the winning mentality has been lost. Mediocrity is accepted and normalised. 

If you talk about ‘winning’, people get offended and tell me it’s all about participation? How can you be the best with an attitude like this? We shouldn’t have to apologise for wanting to win and be the best.

Campese is obviously correct. A massive culture change is needed. And it has to start at the top, even if Eddie Jones cannot take all the blame. The analysis of the decline of rugby in Australian Alan Jones has been spot on over recent years as can be seen here and here and here.

But I reckon bringing back Folau would be a good start. At the very least it would make a powerful statement and maybe even win back the fans who – like me – have switched off. But sadly, they won’t. The leftist paradigm of identity politics has become so ingrained that they’ll look for corporate answers to what is in essence a cultural problem.

Maybe it’s not too late to buy a Wales jersey … as an Aussie mate of mine said after their win against the Wallabies – Ardderchog!