SARU in 2015 RWC bid
Mon, 10 Mar 2008 10:42
The South Africa Rugby Union (SARU) are set to bid for the 2015 World Cup, thanks to a change in the outlook from the International Rugby Board (IRB).
The Afrikaans newspaper Sondag reported that South Africa have already sent a letter to the IRB enquiring about the tender process, a move which was also confirmed by SA Rugby's managing director Jonathan Stones.
Stones told the newspaper that because of the immense revenue created by the World Cup and the fact that this contributed much to the IRB's development fund to grow the game across the world, there is a school of thought to keep every "two out of three" World Cups in the European time zones for broadcast appeal.
"New Zealand may have the World Cup in 2011, but it isn't ideal for the television audience, and the IRB derives much of its development income from broadcast money. So the idea is to have either every two out of three or three out of four World Cups in these time zones to
maximize the incoming revenue," Stones told Sondag.
"We are perfectly positioned in those time zones and that is why we sent a letter to the IRB enquiring about the tendering process for 2015. We are at the beginning stages, so there is a lot of work to be done before we decide if we will put in a bid."
The IRB remained mum on who had expressed interest, but it is expected that other than South Africa, Japan, England and Argentina are expected to submit bids and the process hopes to be concluded by next year.
