National rugby team going places

National rugby team going places

The Jakarta Post, Jakarta

The national "White Rhinos" charge into rugby union history
next week, becoming the first all-national team to play a series
of matches in the Philippines.

The matches, held as an exhibition during the 23rd Southeast
Asian (SEA) Games from Nov. 27-Dec. 5, could lead to it becoming
an official medal sport by 2007. The new Rhino emblem, the
national captain and the run-on team will be introduced at a
fundraising dinner at Aphrodite Club in Kuningan, South Jakarta,
on Saturday night. The dinner is open to the public at a cost of
Rp 200,000 per person.

"This is an enormous honor and obviously a once-in-a-lifetime
opportunity for these players to become the first team of
Indonesians to represent their nation," Indonesian Development
Rugby (IDR) spokesman Geoffrey Atkinson said in a release.

"Outside soccer, rugby is the biggest football code in the
world and the past 12 months has seen an explosion of interest in
the game at a local level. Our men may lack the experience of
some of the other sides in the region that have been playing
together for years, but they are determined and have been
training hard."

The 16-man squad from Jakarta, Papua, Kalimantan and Maluku go
through an intensive training camp at Senayan in Jakarta this
week under a Bahasa speaking coach from Singapore. The 7-a-side
series in the Philippines will be a curtain-raiser to the SEA
Games.

Saturday night's fundraiser also sees the New Zealand All
Blacks try and create their own history as they go for the final
leg of a European Grand Slam in a televised match against
Scotland.

The Rhinos head for the Philippines with the full support of
National Sports Council; Indonesia has already received "observer
status" from the International Rugby Board and two months ago
applied for full recognition.

"We hope this tournament will spark interest in other
Indonesian provinces so we can soon be fully recognized at an
international level," Atkinson added.

The squad was selected in Bali last month after an annual
international 10-a-side tournament which went ahead despite the
second Bali bombings.

The Jakarta Bantengs -- in their first year in the competition
against sides from Singapore, Australia, Taipei and Guam -- won
the IDR runner's-up plate. The same weekend, the first 12
Indonesians received Level 1 Coaching Accreditation through a
course run by representatives of Singapore Rugby Union.

"With 220 million people in Indonesia, we have the potential
to be the best in Asia," Atkinson said. "But we have to spread
the game to every corner of the country. We have to introduce
rugby at junior and school levels -- this is the only way to
grow. We are continuously on the lookout for people interested in
expanding the code and new sponsorship is vital."

IDR receives financial backing from multinational construction
company Thiess and Digital 1, part of the KabelVision Network,
but the game still has a way to go here.

"In Singapore, Thailand and other Asian countries, where rugby
has been established for more than a decade, the game is run by
full-time professionals -- which include coaching and
administrative staff working off multimillion dollar budgets. We
would like to head down the same path as Singapore," Atkinson
said.

"In a decade they have become an Asian rugby force behind
Japan and Korea. But, like us, they started with very little."