Last week’s Waratahs game attracted a pretty ordinary crowd of 20,000. This was the combined effect of a Friday night (pain to get into the city for a lot of people), talk in the press about how dull NSW’s attack was and the fact it was a lowly rated South African side they were playing.

Even the Force, the most successful of the current Australian Super 14 sides on and off the field only managed 24,000 for their match against the Cape Town Stormers (who have a good shot at the semis this year).

This is not a debate about the different Aussie teams or cities, that’s a whole different can of tuna.

The point is that South African teams draw less of a crowd than the red hot Kiwi teams, especially then they are ranked as low as the Cheetahs are.

Why not have these games up at the Central Coast or down at WIN Stadium in order to promote the game?  Both grounds hold 20,000 which is the same number as those that went to the Cheetahs game last Friday.

NSW Rugby officials must have a rough idea when a game isn’t going to attract a big crowd (or at least more than the capacity at Central Coast or Wollongong). If all things remain equal they won’t be getting a big crowd for the Lions game in a few weeks either.

If you had one game a year at either ground and promoted it, it will surely be a capacity crowd with the great benefit of promoting the game. Let’s not forget the Waratahs represent NSW and not just Sydney.