But to be honest, I have always been a little surprised that everyone focuses on the science, or the idea that a sponsored club/players could have demanded an audit of the sponsoring company’s books, or that they should have done a personal background check on Johnston himself. Surely the biggest caution light and alarm bells should have gone off when everything was based on future events and potential. Common sense says that all of Johnston’s time, money and effort should have been focused on getting his product to market, if he actually had a product to sell. How on earth could so many people place so much trust in an individual that was instead freely splashing around money that was raised for other purposes and was yet to be earned??!!

Still, as an aside, I would encourage you to make public anything you have to back up the assertion that any of the sporting teams were actually aware that Firepower was a fraud. I am sure there would be plenty of people interested, as it would probably be actionable.

Johnson offered people shares in Firepower on the vision that Firepower would be listed on the the London Stock Exchange.

His promise was that the 50c/$1/$2 , whatever they paid for the shares or were given, were going to be worth $8/$10/$20 when they listed on the London Stock Exchange.

Giteau et al decided to take shares and not CASH.

The people who lost were not innocent, they were GREEDY.

So how does this collate to the loss of the latest CEO. Completly different story.

Think you’re a little way off the mark in comparing wynns and others to Firepower.

Directors of Firepower raised almost $100,000,000 for themselves, not the company, and have left shareholders and creditors dry. Did wynns and others do this?

Firepower peddled a pile of fraud to perpetuate a fraud and had help from those that have now gone to ground. Did wynns and other reputable businesses do this? Perhaps ask them.

I’d sugges there are a number of very major differences between Firepower and existing businesses. If you dont agree, why dont you write to Wynns and others and suggest otherwise.

Further, Firepower directors raised money and splashed this on sporting teams, some of whom knew that Firepower was a fraud. Some of these sporting teams were even promised shares and bonuses to sell firepower products….greed overtook common sense and thats a sad indictment on the administrators of certain sporting groups.

I admire the coach and team of the Sydney Kings. They had the guts to stand up to johnston and expose him for the fraud he is. Its a shame the Western Force CEo and his friends didnt do this earlier. A lot less innocent people could have lost money and the Force may not have lost so many players…

Giteau, Mitchell, Valentine, their latest CEo…. and I imagine more to come….

But of course, AndyS. This has nothing to do with Firepower…

And yes, Firepower may have been a Ponzi scheme but comments like Andy’s suggest that it should have been obvious to everyone that the whole thing was a scientific impossibility. That implies that everyone must have been either morons, blinded by greed or somehow culpable. If wrong, it is just more than a little smug. If true however, it would surely have to be a much, much bigger scandal that there are actually products on the shelves that are equally impossible. Maybe our journalistic bretheren could help by confirming a sighting of the documented performance results for those products, otherwise there must be a much juicier story and significant company that they would surely be itching to take on…

and Lyon,
“…the best players the Force recruited, with some help from firepower, would still have played for their former franchises….The Force..bought talent that would have blossomed in the states they were pinged from anyway”
The best players – yes, but not the players that were developed in replacing them at their former franchises…the Poloto Naus, Lealifanos, Toomuas, Hynes’ etc. And the talented ones certainly would have made their way through…eventually. But then this might well have been Pocock’s debut year instead of Braid, and who knows where Brown might be. The Wallabies have suddenly identified a flush of depth and youth and, like it or not, that is because of the additional playing opportunities provided by four teams rather than three.
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More than anything though, I am always amused by journalistic re-writing of history. Stuff like “The club then went further and guaranteed to pay the players the agreed amounts if the employment fell through….The transactions would later create headaches for the new club, including the need to hide payments from the ARU or risk sanctions”. Yeah, right, well done, that’ll be this: http://www.rugbyheaven.com.au/news/super14/force-to-front-aru-over-payments/2007/08/17/1187462139125.html on the 17/8 and this: http://www.theaustralian.news.com.au/story/0,25197,22263751-2722,00.html the next day where Peter O’Meara cunningly conceals those payments by basically saying “Yeah, so what, it was pre-protocols” and (direct quote) “Before any protocols were actually documented in 2006, there were players in Australia receiving commercial payments benefits that were underwritten by clubs and some clubs, in the case of Queensland, were paying players directly out of the operating costs of their business”. Remember, this was someone who was on that board speaking…didn’t hear much more about that though, did we?

Overall though, I just get the feeling that the undoubted debacle that was Firepower has more generally proven a boon to anyone unhappy about the existence of the Force. It is routinely referenced in comments and articles, sometimes with the flimsiest of links to the actual topic at hand, and it is often hard to miss the little undertone of smug satisfaction and even glee in much of it. Let’s at least hope some lessons have been learnt, at all levels.

Agree with your comments here on the regulation of sport in relation to salary caps etc. If an organisation is going to establish a form of regulations, then they do need to police this. Like corporate regulators police companies.

I have mixed feelings on salary caps, but I think their disadvantages are outweighed by the disadvantages of a free market system. A free market system will see many teams, in any competition, wilt and die and we’ll end up with a group of powerful teams and those that continually struggling. A free market in sports is potentially open to abuse by overzealous and uncommercial administrators. We’ve all seem this before.

I believe the ARU have the right mix. They have a cap ( to some degree I believe) on player payments but allow the players to foster third party deals – without assistance from the provinces of course….

The problem I see with the ARU, is that they may not have policed the very systems they created. Perhaps they need to do this now?

Or are they awaiting another Firepower to arrive on the scene?

The flipside of such heavy regulation is sameness. Yes, the NRL is a terrifically even competition, but there is a sameness to all the sides, because the rigidly applied salary cap is a straightjacket that leaves little room for variety.

So what do people want, the sameness of the NRL, or the potentially disastrous variety of a truly free market? This is not an easy question to answer.

One might make a comparison here with English football (and other leagues of Europe), where Firepower-style collapses are known to occur (who’s a Leeds United supporter?). The multi-layered structure of such competitions is what enables such catastrophes to be absorbed, i.e., it doesn’t matter too much if a Leeds United goes belly up, because there are plenty of other clubs ready and waiting for the chance to step up. But if the Western Force collapse, then Australian rugby has a huge problem, because there is no multi-layered professionalism.

To change the topic, it is relevant to mention that Ross Meurant’s brother Brad is a senior NZ rugby coach and expert, having been at the helm of the Chiefs in their early years, and also having been in charge at North Harbour during their best days. As far as I am aware Brad is still an expert commentator on radio broadcasts of Auckland matches. So Ross may be a villain in the above story, but there is genuine rugby blood in the family.

Time will tell I guess, but to be honest I dont think they’ve started that well. And that a reflective view. A slower, more measured climb in to Super 14 comp may have been better. Searching for instant success is going to hurt them in the short term.

The Firepower influence on sport is devastating and cant be overlooked. Though many seem to be taking a head in the sand approach to this.

Firepower brought down the Sydney Kings and left a stain on basketball. They caused grief to South Sydney and they’ve left the Force in a mess.

Taking Giteau and Mitchell out of any team is going to hurt and will badly stretch the depth of the Force. Depth that needs to be developed locally.

I was looking at the competition structures for juniors in WA. They have had to split many of the comp into two pools due to the swell in the ranks. The numbers of clubs aren’t as numerous as in Sydney but when junior teams are fielding three teams from the U 6 up thats pretty impressive. The Force is a building process as will be the Victorians. Look at the AFL and their expansion nationally from the VFL to illustrate a great example.

Those two locally developed players are Kieran Longbottom and Dane Haylett-Petty. Incidently James Stannard was also plucked from their local ranks. But he was formally of Queensland.

Great read … I very much enjoyed it and I congratulate you in that we all know you to be rusted on hard core rugby person but you spared no one and that is how the right decisions get made.. Again well done

The Force should be ashamed of perpetuating a cover up of Firepower. And more so, the players that took money from Tim Johnstone have taken the hard earned money of mums and dads around Australia. Should they repay it? I think so.

The Force ride is similar to that of other sporting teams that have tried to buy success and use whatever means they can to win. Amibtious and self serving Administrators doing their best not for the team, nor the state or competion, but purely serving their own ambitions and egos. We’ve seen these administrators before. They love the publicity when things go well, but quickly go to ground when found out.

But what were the Force adminstrators buying and who benefits?

In relation to the Force, it appears that the CEO and Coach were the only two that stood to gain the most from any ‘instant’ success the Force could muster. And interestingly, both have indicated a desire to coach and manage the Wallabies /ARU.

Think about it, the best players the Force recruited, with some help from firepower, would still have played for their former franchises. They werent, nor are they still, destined for greater honours by playing with the Force. How did they benefit then?? Money! And only money.

The real parties that stood to benefit from any short term success the the Force could was O’meara and Mitchell. But will they now benefit? Appears that O’Meara wont and it looks like Mitchell has some fences to mend. I believe kiwis can be good at mending fences.

So, what have the Force achieved as they enter their 5th season next year -

1. They’ve just announced their profits are plunging and they stand to lose millions this year and more next year.

2. Their membership has plummeted. And its not ALL because of a stadium

3. They have lost 2 talented players and so far 3 very experienced players. They’re likely to lose more before the season is out too.

4. The Force have produced very little talent locally. In fact I dont think one local has played s14 rugby. And for all those bluffing about how good rugby is in WA, how many Wallabies have they produced? One. One who happened to jag a few games 10 years ago due to injury.

5. The Force havent developed any talent. They’ve bought talent that would have blossomed in the states they were pinged from anyway. Just like a car bursting with firepower, these guys had power and talent to burn anyway.

6. The Force are likely to have a much weaker side next year and there is no denying this. The loss of 6-7 first team players is going to devastate the team and results.

But of course dont tell the locals. They’ve done everything right and its not their fault……………..

Change is needed and badly. But I think people have been saying that about Zimbabwe for a while too.

Andrew, I loved the book. I’m sure it will make a leading case study some day on how NOT to develop a business – and how to stuff the development of sport in a state in the short term.

Also the comparison between Wynns and Firepower is silly….Firepower was a Ponzi scheme where the CEO was using old VC to court new investment to pay off said original VC. There were links to the Russian mob and the scam touched every level of Australian society and the fact that the product didnt work is only a fraction of the tale.

And all the wise words said about how there was obviously no scientific basis for the claims and everyone must have been blind and greedy…it all has me eager for the main course – when is Ryall going to be taking on companies like Wynns and Fleetpower for selling their wide range of fuel additives? Surely they must have his journalistic spidey senses all abuzz and he won’t be resting on his laurels now?

Johnston honed his skills out West. The smell of dodgy deals still permeates sections of the business community out that way. I believe they’re breeding a whole new generation out West too.

I like the point, Albert. But I think the A-League leadership is pretty astute. I think they’ve had a reasonable degree of experience at managing crisis and self interest groups.

I read the Firepower book on the weekend. Bizarre comes to mind. How the Force Management perpetuated and promoted Johnston is another.

Force Management even went with Johnston and Firepower investors to Russia in 2007. Didnt they detect something was wrong then? Or was the lure of casinos and vodka too much at the times? Or perhaps the Force CEO of the time was far too close, or even an ally, of Johnston?

The ARU must be wondering how on earth this happened under their nose. Guys, dont let the new Melbourne team have such an ‘underbelly’.

Redb

The recent news that one of the bidders for the proposed Western Sydney HA-L franchise is headed by the colourful identity Sydney identity Joe Meissner of “love boat” fame is disturbing. He has been described in Federal Parliament in 1992 (quoting Senate Hansard 4 May 1992 Page: 2027) as “…a known criminal and standover man who, …had been convicted of stealing Army machine guns to sell to the underworld…”

More on Firepower at Ger’s blog… http://www.gerardryle.com/blog/?p=83

Sure, Giteau is a loss but there are other Drew Mitchells, and he may regret his joining the Tahs if they dont fundamentally change their playing strategy and skills set. He will be constantly injured, well his left foot will wear out from kicking and with incessant cold and flu from standing waiting for the ball that never comes………..

Someone like Playford would have had much more game time had he gone west rather than to be a reserve of reserves at the Brumbies. Its about game time…………………….. for the young guys.

From fad diets to bizarre alternative healing practices to gizmos and widgets that outlandishly defy well-understood laws of physics and chemistry, the list seems endless and our scientifically-ignorant media lap it all up and re-serve it piping hot to a gullible audience that, apparently, has no socio-economic bounds.

If Firepower hadn’t impacted a major sporting body, one wonders whether its demise would have even made the news in Australia for more than a few days.

Generally, we are unused to the term “province” being used in Australia, but these financial dealings were so provincial in their degree of sophistication (on the part of the adminstrators), that the term seems more than apt.

What an awesome post. You really should seriously consider a career in journalism – you have a gift for it!

I did sign off in my reply to Spiro’s post about the Saffies bluffing over the S15, that “money is everything”.

Your story confirms it!