World rugby election: Brett Robinson says Test rugby should go on the road

Robinson also wants rugby to experiment more with the way the sport is played and presented to engage a young generation of fans.

“The channels we have historically consumed through – print, TV and radio – are not the channels that young people consume,” he said.

“If you look at the way the NBA and NFL are targeting my kids and their friends with gaming, with the Netflix series, the podcasts, we have to challenge ourselves to do things that are contemporary and relevant to them.”

This year’s Autumn Nations Series featured several new law variations – including 20-minute red cards and set-piece speeding – along with referees announcing the reasoning behind their decision to the stadium crowd.

Robinson believes more needs to be done to keep the action flowing and to reward teams that attack with the ball in hand rather than kicking.

“The fan is not something that we necessarily put downtown, and I think that’s changing,” he added.

“At World Rugby we have a historic process about change and that is a challenge because we are a huge global sport with many stakeholders, but we can probably do more.

“I think we could probably think about how we can move things forward more quickly. It’s probably the impatient Australian in me, but I think it’s a bit bureaucratic.”

One area where Robinson wants more regulation concerns player contracts and movements.

He is concerned about the international transfer of young talents, with academies offering contracts to teenage players in the men’s game to move thousands of miles from home and potentially compete for their own international sides.

Another is the pressure that rising player wages have put on the club game. Australia’s Melbourne Rebels followed English Premier League clubs Wasps, London Irish and Worcester into government earlier this year.

“World Rugby doesn’t have direct control over things, but it does play a role in bringing unions together to think about how we can deal with it,” Robinson said.

“We need to work together on a model that creates some friction in player transfer arrangements because we have an environment where player wage inflation is supported by philanthropy, not the real commercial revenues of the sport.

“That’s not sustainable in that league, but it also destroys the foundations of other leagues as talent leaves or the attempt to retain it pushes the salary budget through the roof and teams collapse.”