Former Wallabies captain John Eales visits New Zealand with Buck Shelford to get to grips with the meaning of the All Blacks' Ka Mate haka.

ANALYSIS: It would be a monumental strategic error for New Zealand Rugby to regard the push to depose Raelene Castle across the ditch as just another example of Australian politics mixed with personal ambition that will play out entirely within Australia's borders.

Knives are being sharpened but getting rid of Castle is not the end goal: it's the first step to enact long-term changes to the Australian game and invariably include a hard look at competition structures.

MATT KING/GETTY IMAGES Former Wallabies Rod Kafer and Phil Kearns, on the right, are among those who are unhappy at the game's direction.

That could finish off Super Rugby as we know it and leave New Zealand, South Africa and Argentina scrambling for alternatives.

Days before influential former Wallaby Rod Kafer started the ball rolling with a massive swing at Rugby Australia last week, Stuff was reliably informed that things were about to get ugly.

READ MORE:

* Dave Rennie may walk from Wallabies job if Raelene Castle pushed out

* Wallabies great Nick Farr-Jones predicts administration forRugby Australia

* Coronavirus: Rugby Australia needs change but timing is off in siege of Raelene Castle

* Israel Folau payout at risk if Rugby Australia folds - report

* Will Genia calls for peace in Australian rugby war

* Ex-Wallabies captain calls Rugby Australia 'unbankable', feels board should stand down

* Raelene Castle responds to reports about her position as Rugby Australia chief executive

Those pushing for change know it is ugly, and they also know that Australian rugby will go through a period of pain if the game is reshaped.

That they are willing to go through both should send a message to New Zealand about their preparedness to go through significant turbulence to set the game up in Australia as a sustainable sport.

MARK METCALFE/GETTY IMAGES Australian Super Rugby derbies are a shadow of what they used to be.

The trans-Tasman relationship will always be treasured by no matter who runs Australian rugby, but New Zealand rugby bosses shouldn't be under any illusions that some in Australia want to redefine it on Australian terms.

That will be particularly true if former Wallaby Phil Kearns replaces Castle as CEO.

There was a very telling moment involving Kearns in John Eales' 2017 documentary about the haka, in which Eales expressed his deep regret about turning his back on the haka twice in 1996.

Eales spent some time in New Zealand understanding the cultural significance of the haka, but the documentary also showed him back in Australia at a gathering of former Wallabies, including George Gregan and Kearns. The group formed a consensus that they had made a mistake but there was one voice who remained unrepentant: Kearns.

There is no doubt that, as CEO, he would take unapologetically 'Australia first' approach to running Australian rugby, a hard-line approach that might even endear him to Australian fans who wince at his pro-Waratahs commentary on Fox Sports and his frequent attacks on referees in both Super Rugby and test level.

MARK METCALFE/GETTY IMAGES Rugby Australia CEO Raelene Castle has been left to carry the can for a decade or more of bad decisions in Australian rugby.

Whether Kearns could unscramble the egg that is Super Rugby is debatable, but there is an unmistakable desire in Australian rugby to get out of the competition: from former Wallabies, many fans and current players.

That would leave New Zealand Rugby with some hard choices: to 'fly over' Australia in some travel-heavy arrangement with South Africa, to construct some sort of trans-Tasman Super Rugby competition, which Kiwi fans would be cool on, or revert to an NPC-style competition that NZ Rugby has already signalled would not be its preference.

If New Zealanders feel their anger building at potentially being forced into a corner by Australian rugby, they need to appreciate that the game in Australia is in a desperate state.

Super Rugby, as a brand, is disliked strongly even by the fans who have remained wedded to their franchises. There is a strong sense that it has become a vehicle that cements the All Blacks' hold over the Bledisloe Cup while simultaneously sending Australian rugby on the road to irrelevance.

Even if Castle survives the push for fundamental change won't go away, something that the New Zealander recognised when she announced a 'think tank' to look at the future of the game last week, saying "it would be crazy for us not to be thinking about other scenarios that might roll out. Be that domestic, international or the Sanzaar product."

NZ Rugby will regain a degree of control over its own destiny when the government succeeds in flattening the curve of coronavirus cases in this country.

But that will not mean a return to 'normality'. Events in Australia have the potential to bring down Super Rugby in any case, and prod the New Zealand game towards its own day or reckoning.