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Pre-post warning : I'm particularly talking about Union here. I thought of this, switched on the laptop, and there's the baseball thread.

What sort of (non-mutually exclusive) PODs could make rugby bigger in the the Commonwealth countries other than Australia, New Zealand and South Africa, and in Eastern Europe?

I thought in the case of case of the former Empire, how that in the case of cricket the locals picked up the sport, but not rugby. What sort of thing could lead to the rugby being picked up? I'm thinking that some of the Caribbean nations (either being an ATL Pacific Islands, or being on a similar level to the Pacific Islands) and Nigeria (in the right circumstances they could become a rugby powerhouse) as the most liable ones. India too.

In the Eastern Bloc element, Romania have been big, even getting invited to join the Five Nations (but declined due to running a calendar year season). But in the USSR, what could make it popular? What about more interface between Red Army troops and the British and French, who teach them the sport? Or, instead of Stalin banning it 1949 (as claimed by the Genocide but someone put "possibly untrue" next to it), a Soviet ambassador to the UK close to Stalin is in Wales, watches a game being played by two village teams comprised mainly of minors and raves about the sport to Stalin in a cable, who then actively encourages it, latching on to the amateurism element? With this you do get the problem of South Africa, so perhaps the Soviets manage to get South Africa kicked out the IRB in the 60s? Then you get the possibility of countries under Soviet influence possibly picking the sport up (Angola, as silly as it sounds).

Under the first and second, would happen to internationals - earlier RWC? And in the second, what would happen to what is now the Heineken Cup and the Six Nations? I guess professionalism might happen a bit earlier, especially as the Soviets would be likely to operate some near-blatant shamateurism.

Just thinking aloud mainly.
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