Even before the New Zealand Rugby Union announced that they had turned an expected million dollar loss into a modest profit following the All Blacks-Eagles match in Chicago it was expected that several of the world's top national teams and club teams would want to do come to America to cash in. Leicester and Toulon have already signaled they want in and now it appears that Australia want the same. According to a report in The Courier Mail in Australia the Wallabies would like to play the Eagles in Chicago ahead of next year's World Cup.
The move makes sense for Australia considering their money problems. With no incoming teams next year the Wallabies need to look elsewhere for money. In addition to the proposed Eagles match they are also looking to play the Barbarians in London. The report says that there could be a total of AU$3-5 million coming in from the two matches.
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The Eagles and U.S.A. Rugby would probably be more than thrilled to play the Wallabies. While they don't have the same following as the All Blacks, even among the ex-pat Australian community, they do have a significant enough draw to potentially get at least 40,000 fans to a match. That was the break even point for the Eagles last year and you would think they would have learned how to trim the margin a bit in the year's span.
The Eagles would certainly like the challenge of playing Australia but it also becomes a matter of timing. The Eagles have the Pacific Nations Cup in July which is ideal preparation for the World Cup. They also have a planned home and away series with Canada as well as one or two matches against Premiership clubs. It's possible that they could scrap one of the Canada matches or stiff the Premiership. The latter is problematic because U.S.A. Rugby is trying to build a relationship with the Premiership. Plus, there is the idea that facing a near certain loss, and possibly heavy loss, isn't good for preparing for the World Cup. Still, it's nice to see that American rugby fans are likely to be treated to some strong opponents in the future.
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What do you think of the possibility?