Grassroots - Representative Rugby

U16 & U18 National Championships 

South Harbour New South Wales

North Harbour New South Wales

South River Queensland

North River Queensland

ACT & Southern NSW

Victoria

Western Australia

Allied Unions Barbarians

• Seven of these junior pathway teams mirror and are extensions of the representative teams that participate in the Australian Rugby Championship.
• In addition to every Shute Shield and Premier Rugby club being aligned to one of the two representative teams in NSW and QLD, every suburban club, country region and school is also affiliated to one of these teams based on their location in relation to the prominent geographic landmark in their names that divide each capital city. 
• Seven of the eight representative teams (minus the Barbarians) select squads in the Under 16 and 18 age groups to participate in training camps in the June/July holidays. Squads continue to train throughout Term 3 when much of the major school boy rugby season is played and these squads can be added to based on form in school boy rugby competitions (as is currently the case for academy squads).
• The squads are reduced at the end of Term 3 in preparation for National Championships and the Barbarians invitational side is established from the best players that have been discarded from their representative side to minimise the chances of quality players ‘slipping through the net’. 
• Another training camp is held before the eight teams play in the National Championships during the September holidays. 
• The eight teams are split across two groups of four with each team playing three games against those teams in their group before the top two advance to the semifinals. The bottom two from each group also play an additional two games to decide final finishing positions and to ensure each team competes in a total of five games during the Championships. 
• An Australian touring team is selected from the Under 18’s tournament to compete against any inbound tourist before venturing off on an annual tour during the December holidays.

U13/14/16 & 19 NSW & QLD State Championships

New South Wales Junior State Championships 

North Coast 

New England

Hunter

Central West

Illawarra

South Harbour Sydney

North Harbour Sydney

Sydney Barbarians

Queensland Junior State Championships 

North Queensland

Central Queensland

Sunshine Coast

Darling Downs

Gold Coast

South River Brisbane

North River Brisbane

Brisbane Barbarians

• The five ‘country’ teams in both New South Wales and Queensland are joined by three teams from Sydney and Brisbane in their respective junior State Championships.
• ‘Metro’ teams are picked from players north and south of the harbour and river while the Barbarian teams are made up of the best of those that didn’t get selected in these sides.
• Both State Championships follow the same format as the aforementioned National Championships- two pools of four teams before the top two and bottom two of each pool combine with the opposing pool for two playoff games.
• Along with a school-base Under 12’s State Championships, the aim of the Under 13’s and 14’s is to identify talent early.
• There’s also a school-based State Championships in the Under 15’s age group and that along with the Under 16’s State Championships help identify talent for the Under 16 squads to participate in the Under 16 National Championships.
• School rugby takes precedence in the Under 17’s and 18’s so tracking talent for the Under 18 National Championships is done via the school-based State and National Championships and within school First XV competitions. 
• A State Championships is picked up again in New South Wales and Queensland in the Under 19 age group to identify talent for state-based Under 20’s academies.

These junior representative pathways are more or less in place as it stands and the tinkering only involves minor reformatting that attempts to enhance regional-based ‘brands’ to better bind them to clubs and schools while connecting them to players across a wide spectrum of age grades to solidify that pathway up the ranks.

It’s important to have identifiable and aligned pathways that start at the grassroots to help encourage participation, however this is only a small part of the challenging piece of work associated with drawing people to the game to start their rugby journey.