In 2011 New Zealand rugby fans erupted in celebration as the All Blacks narrowly defeated
France to win the Rugby World Cup - the team's first title since New Zealand hosted the
inaugural tournament in 1987. In the years between these victories the sport of rugby has been
radically transformed from its amateur roots to a professional global entertainment 'product'.
This book explores these developments and focuses initially on the New Zealand Rugby Union's
key deals with Rupert Murdoch's News Corporation and global sportswear giant Adidas in the
1990s. The new pay-per-view era has curtailed the traditional 'viewing rights' of rugby fans to
have live free-to-air access to All Blacks test matches on public television. Adidas
meanwhile has relentlessly commodified aspects of national heritage and indigenous identity in
pursuit of local and global markets while exploiting labour in developing countries. Escalating
merchandise costs and ticket prices have at the same time pushed the sport further out of the
reach of ordinary New Zealanders. All of these issues however have not gone uncontested and
the authors argue that rugby remains a contested terrain in the face of a new set of limits and
pressures in the global economy.
