A dark day for the NRL and for all Australian sports

 
Adrian Musolino Columnist

By , 23 Apr 2010 Adrian Musolino is a Roar Expert

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John Hartigan

John Hartigan, chairman and chief executive of News Limited (left) with Chief Executive Officer of the National Rugby League David Gallop (centre) and Melbourne Storm Chariman Rob Moodie. AAP Image/Tracey Nearmy

No matter which code or club your allegiances lie with, all Australian sporting fans should have felt extremely saddened by the news of the NRL’s Melbourne Storm salary cap breaches that rocked Australia yesterday.

The severity of the punishments are unprecedented in this country and mark a dark day for sport – particularly for the fans of the club and code who have been cheated out of a fair sporting contest, and had their commitment to the game trampled on by the putrid greed of a select few.

Whatever your thoughts on the punishment, the consensus must be that the code should not rest until the perpetrators of this cover up and those who knew of it are thrown out of the game.

David Gallop may have been the target for critics of the game as it dealt with issues surrounding rebuilding following the Super League war, countless player misdemeanours and indiscretions and preparing the League for independence in a climate of expansionist threats from rival codes, but he has stood tall as his colleagues in the game continually let both him and the NRL down.

Considering he was prepared to make such an example of the Storm, let alone remain in his post following another catastrophe, is heroic in itself.

The implications of this saga will run deep, and not just in the NRL’s base.

For Rugby, the Storm’s catastrophe at first look appears to have swung the door wide open for the Super 15 expansion franchise, the Melbourne Rebels, to sweep into town and consume the Storm’s disgruntled supporter base.

The imminent departure of CEO Brian Waldron, all but implicated yesterday by chairman of News Ltd John Hartigan for his role when CEO of the Storm, is the only option for the franchise to distance itself from any link to the Storm, especially in a city where the differences between League and Union still need to be explained to confused Victorians.

In the process of creating their own brand and image, the Rebels can at least move on post-Waldron, with a weakened Storm now an easier target.

While a staunch divide may exist between Union and League fans in the eastern seaboard states, such a division is not as a fractured in Victoria, and it will be unquestionably easier for the Rebels to build a fan-base should the Storm – particularly its players and coach – be further implicated.

The AFL, meanwhile, will investigate player contracts at St Kilda during Waldron’s three-year stint at the club, with The Sydney Morning Herald hinting at possible irregularities in his dealings with players.

While the AFL’s Andrew Demetriou claimed the AFL would be prepared to strip premierships from clubs found breaching its own salary cap, one wonders whether they would really have that courage had, say, the Sydney Swans been in breach of the cap, particularly when comparing its own lukewarm salary cap punishments to its own clubs in the past.

Would the AFL have been prepared to all but sacrifice a market such as Sydney for the sake of making a point for fairness in its regulations?

It remains to be seen.

But this is what the NRL has done; risked the future of the code in Australia’s second biggest market (biggest sporting market?) for the integrity of the competition.

For football, questions surrounding the Storm’s sustainability will undoubtedly impact on A-League clubs, the Melbourne Victory and Melbourne Heart, with co-tenancy agreements in place at AAMI Park (the new rectangular stadium in Melbourne).

Like the Rebels, expansion side Heart will benefit from a damaged Storm brand in the intensely competitive Melbourne sporting market, even if it’s as intangible as a weakened Storm playing for nothing as the Heart ramp up their own campaign before their debut.

AAMI Park, the home of the Heart, is set to open with a League international between Australia and New Zealand on the 7th May 2010, a further attempt by the game to connect with Victorian sports fans.

But the Storm’s cheating could well condemn the NRL’s future in Melbourne, very sadly.

If players and coaching staff are implicated as knowing the goings on within the club and its secret payments to them, then the brand will be damaged even more severely than if it were a select few who could be removed like a tumor.

But how can they go on?

With nothing to play for aside from pride for the remainder of the season, the Storm will become touring pariahs in the NRL, mocked and jeered as cheats wherever they go, playing for nothing more than hopeful redemption.

As for the fans, how many will turn up to Etihad Stadium on ANZAC Day – a day the AFL owns in Melbourne – to see the Storm face the Warriors in what is now a dead rubber?

The crowd they can generate on Sunday may well be the first true indicator of whether the Storm is a sustainable franchise going forward.

And should they rebound into the coming seasons, will a Melbourne audience be interested in seeing a legitimately salary capped side squander in the mid-pack following the halcyon days of multiple premierships?

Again, it remains to be seen.

Is the bond really strong enough between fans and club?

Italian football giants Juventus, for example, were stripped of Serie A titles for match-fixing and sent packing into the second division, found redemption and the continued support of their fans. But they are a club of rich tradition with deep cultural ties to Turin.

The Storm doesn’t have that in Melbourne.

The punishment of no points for the remainder of the season may sound ludicrous when put into the context of playing on this season, but what else could the NRL do to a club who had so comprehensively rorted the system, including into this season with a $700,000 breach of its salary cap already?

Allowing them to continue this season, even with a zero points as of this round, was not an option, particularly with a squad of such gifted players that, as we now know, was only able to be kept together by breaking the rules.

The Storm, from the very beginning, were strangers in a strange land – an anomaly of a club born out a messy divorce of the Super League wars and sustained through the deep pockets of its custodians, namely News Limited, and the support of the NRL itself.

While it found its niche crowd in the Victorian capital, averaging around the 15,000 mark, it never threatened to topple even the weakest of AFL clubs in the winter sporting market.

But greed merchants corrupted the soul (and lets hope there are few of them) of a club that promised much.

The NRL deserves to be in Melbourne, just as the Storm deserves another chance under new leadership and with the scum evacuated from its offices.

Let’s hope they get the chance at redemption.

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