More Canadian tests in St. John’s, Newfoundland please.

August 17, 2006

Canadian legend Al Charron raises a toast to Canada's huge effort last Saturday in his latest commentary, and makes some especially good points about sharing test matches across Canada (excerpt below). Hopefully we'll see more of it and Canadian television will be brave enough to televise the event. Let's face it: when was the last time you saw any live sporting event from Newfoundland that wasn't broadcast from the inside of a curling rink?

As I have written in the past, yes we need to play Canadian fixtures in the Vancouvers and Torontos of the world but we need to spread the game out right across our country as well. I’m not saying Canada should play a game in St. John’s every year but it would be nice to throw fans east of Toronto a bone every once and a while; they certainly have showed that they are more than capable of putting on a good event.

And yes there certainly is a need to revisit hosting games in Victoria and Vancouver (as it has been a couple of years now) especially with the new downtown stadium slated to be built there - it would be foolish not to.

What I am saying is that it is good for the fans and the players to play in a variety of Canadian sites. There is no question we need to appease sponsors and potential sponsors but we also need to correlate our fan base across Canada.

If Canada was to have only one or two tests per year in Canada then yes I suppose the bigger market cities need be first looked at for a whole host of financial reasons but I’d have to say Ottawa and St. John’s to name just two cities, have demonstrated a successful event can be run there both on and off the pitch in smaller markets. It’s time to share the wealth with people needing to set aside pathetic rugby politics and not be so pig headed every time your city or province isn’t the one chosen to host a test.

Source: Rugby Canada.

Earlier: Monday Morning Go Canada Go!