Not a Storm in a teacup, but the club must survive
Roar Guru
By Steve Kaless, 23 Apr 2010 Steve Kaless is a Roar Guru
- Tagged:
- Brian Waldron, Melbourne Rebels, Melbourne Storm, NRL, Rugby League
Shock is the only word to describe the downfall of the Melbourne Storm, especially given the fact that they have received so many plaudits from neutral supporters for their achievements and it had seemed they had done so much to stay under the salary cap. It now leaves the NRL with four major challenges.
1. A complete overhaul of the salary cap and how it’s policed
It’s become apparent through both the Storm and the Bulldogs scandals that Ian Schubert, the man tasked with policy, can only find breaches when they’re handed to him on a platter.
It would seem forensic accounting is yet to hit the NRL. But just how a side like Melbourne had to go so far over the cap, shows it needs to be reworked. The NRL’s inability to find breaches on their own raises doubts about other clubs’ salary cap status.
2. The overall integrity of the competition is in question
Someone, somewhere, is signing off cheques which are clearly more than what should be for legal salary payments. Who in News Ltd knew about this breach and how will the NRL deal with this problem?
How much did former Melbourne Storm chief and current Melbourne Rebel’s head, Brian Waldron, know. as this occurred on his watch?
3. It’s correct that the NRL have not backdated titles to give premierships to Manly or Parramatta because you must factor in sides that the Storm beat to reach the Grand Final. For instance, Brisbane beaten in the final minute by Storm in 2007, would have a case as to why they aren’t awarded the title.
4. But I disagree with the NRL’s decision to strip the Storm’s points in 2010. In the English football system, the club is provided with a concrete penalty and they play from this point. Clubs have been known to start from a negative value, but at least their games have some relevance.
Going forward, there must be some relevance to Melbourne playing each week. This decision completely dilutes any match the Storm play this year. This is not what the competition is about.
It overly punishes the players, too, all of whom would have signed a contract in good faith.
In terms of the future, three questions remain:
1. The future of the club
2. How quickly is the club expected to get their side under the cap
3. What are the legal ramifications, given the signed contracts with the players
The first point is the most salient.
I don’t think anyone will argue that there now remains serious short term challenges, but long term, there remains a need for a Melbourne team in the NRL.
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JiMMM said | April 23rd 2010 @ 7:38am | Report comment
Excellent points Steve, I have a funny feeling they may be missed by most though which is a shame.
I think the most important point that we need to take out of this is teh first one that you make. What were the people whio were supposed to monitor the salary cap doing for the last 5 years? Realistically if we are going to have the salary cap set at a low level (which it is), then there does need to be an incredibly in depth audit undertaken at the vast majority of clubs every year, otherwise the comp will start to lose credibility with questions raised about every strong team.
Ken said | April 23rd 2010 @ 8:11am | Report comment
Good article but I must disagree with the idea that they should not have wiped them completely out of this years premiership. Melbourne really gave them no choice, if they gave them a -10 penalty but they still scraped into the finals and won the thing it would be twice as farcical as it is now
Ben of Phnom Penh said | April 23rd 2010 @ 6:00pm | Report comment
the problem is who will turn up to watch? It makes the Storm’s games farcical from here on in. Give them a 20 point penalty or some such, something they won’t recover from, however making games meaningless for Victorian league supporters may well be the decision that sends the club under.
oikee said | April 23rd 2010 @ 8:37am | Report comment
Sad day for Melbourne as a whole really. I think this could effect Melbourne alot more than just losing a footy team.
Melbourne as a sporting capital without a league team will be the losers out of this, to be honest. Test matches, Origins, world cup games and 4 nations will be lost.
I think Perth may become the new destination of choice for rugby league. Sad day for Melbourne if the club folds.
Maybe rugby league could use this as a chance to put teams into other states, Aderlaide Perth maybe. You are only competing with 2 clubs at most in these states. Leave Melbourne to AFL. There loss.
CK said | April 23rd 2010 @ 8:37am | Report comment
Steve, I particularly agree with your last point: that going forward the club has to be able to win points. I would preface that with, once they can prove they’re no longer in breach of the cap, they will be in a position to receive the points.
It’s not only unfair on the players that weren’t getting a sling and breaching the cap, but let’s spare a thought for those opposing teams that have to show up, play the game and potentially lose to a team that isn’t entitled to the 2 points anyway. Ultimately the opposing teams are risking injury for potetnially no reward. Whilst you can say that this is the case every weekend, any player will admit that if you’re beaten on the day by a better team, than so be it, they deserve the points. How will they feel being beaten by a team still in breach and not getting the points anyway?
Michael C said | April 23rd 2010 @ 9:34am | Report comment
Problem fo rStorm is that whilst they can’t accrue points for the remainder of 2010…..and this is not just a couple of weeks,……it means that the tarnish remains and is NOT recoverable at all during 2010.
The brand of both NRL and Storm will suffer every single week.
The recovery can’t begin until 2011.
And there’s no hope of being tangibly recovered in part until at least 2012. Because ALL of 2011 will be the first season of re-structure and scoring real points again.
If the NRL had allowed a restructure now to fit under the cap and permit pts to be accrued from that point on – then everything could be brought forward.
News Ltd has an issue in how much of a financial hit Storm will take over 2010 and 2011 when they might be very, very untouchable in a corporate sense. News was trying to get out – - no private equity would touch Storm until at least 2012. If they survive that long.
News has an agreement now in place at the new MRS (AAMI Park) – - if News Ltd walked away from Storm, they would have a penalty pay out to the MRS.
The NRL may have gone too hard – - if Storm folds, then, how long until the NRL could approach the Melb market again?? What would happen to the SG Ball lads? The Melb Rebels would stand to benefit.
oikee said | April 23rd 2010 @ 6:06pm | Report comment
Who would want to break into the Melbourne market again. Look, if a point can be found from this, rugby league should stick to its heasrtlands, same as trying to play rugby league in London. It does not work, simple.
When we get a new mupput running the game, hopefully they can understand this, before its all over red rover.
Like i said, Melbourne is not really a major blow for rugby league. We will get more test matches and all origins now in our states. We also dont have to worry about playing 4 nations or world cup games down there any more. If your not interested, why panda to you muppets down there.
Mr Cheese said | April 24th 2010 @ 10:07am | Report comment
Don’t speak too soon, Oikster.
Earlier this evening, Harlequins RLFC ( from the great city of London ) beat Wigan 38-26.
Bottom of the league beats top of the league.
At Wigan, too ! The attendance was around 18,500.
They don’t get that in London, obviously, but it’s a good figure to see at Wigan ( bearing in mind that Quins don’t take away fans with them ).
I heard the match on BBC radio. Every time Quins scored, there was ABSOLUTE SILENCE. Great.
Michael C said | April 23rd 2010 @ 10:02am | Report comment
btw -
what this does bring into question is the lack of NRL’s ‘heart’ in the expansion, compare the AFL’s financial commitment to GWS and GC17 compared to the NRL’s lack of support for Storm. Sure News propped them up.
M1tch said | April 23rd 2010 @ 11:21am | Report comment
The game had no money in 1998 to expand – remember the game cut teams back due to lack of funds
Poita said | April 23rd 2010 @ 2:33pm | Report comment
Mitch what you forget is that the super league war took most of the money and teams were cut to provide better entertainment for TV. The NRL is the bastard child of the peace deal between Super League and the ARL.
The game cut back teams to suit TV as channel 9 and Foxsports could cover 6 to 7 games a week but it was not cost effective to cover more.
Superleague teams even basket cases like the sharks did not have to merge, NRL teams did ( see St George Illawarra, Wests Tigers, and the Northern Eagles)
David Gallop was one of the lawyers who fought to exclude Souths on behalf of News.
News Limited owns Broncos & Storm and propped up the Storm to the Tune of 13.75 million per year. ( that sort of money would go a long way at a number of struggling clubs)
Jim Wilson said | April 24th 2010 @ 11:42am | Report comment
Poita you don’t know how much the Storm costs News unless you look at the total income & expense stream of the company owning the Storm.
News is a media company & derives income from amongst other sources their half ownership of Foxtel.
Last year Storm games were the most watched games on Pay TV. A few of their games exceeded the 300,000 viewer mark. In fact the aggregate audience of Storm games that were confined to Pay TV exceeded the aggregate of the Australian audience of all the Super 14 RU games screened on Pay TV.
This occurred despite several of the Storm games being replayed on the 9.30 pm Saturday timeslot. It doesn’t include the Free-to-Air either. So you would have to conclude the value or earning stream that the Storm brings to its owners would be half as valuable (50% ownership of Foxtel) as RU is to Foxtel.
The ownership of the Storm would be nice earner for News.
For Pay TV Ratings go here:
http://astra.org.au/news
Stormin Red said | April 23rd 2010 @ 11:49am | Report comment
I think this actually is a great stance being shown by the NRL and it took a lot of guts for them to do it. Just because a team is expanding out of your traditional area does not mean they are above the law. If the GC17 team and St Kilda (just for arguments sake) are found to be significantly over the cap, would you be happy to let GC win everything just because they come from outside Vic while St Kilda cop the full wrath of the AFL?
oikee said | April 23rd 2010 @ 6:11pm | Report comment
To be fair MC, the CEO was a ex-afl muppet. Look its abit hard to find heart when everyone in Melbourne wants you gone. Well they are now gone. Now you can get rid of the rugby union club.
I am not going to bother with that snow now either. I will visit NZ if i wish to put me toe in the snow.
Rugby1 said | April 23rd 2010 @ 10:07am | Report comment
Oikee denial ain’t just a river in Egypt, Adelaide and Perth come on!!! Rebels set to replace storm, best bet for storm move to brisbane!!!
gingerbeer said | April 23rd 2010 @ 11:11am | Report comment
Its probably best for the game.
gingerbeer said | April 23rd 2010 @ 10:14am | Report comment
I think maybe the Storm expirement should be drawn to a close, move the team to central Qld or Brisbane. I dare say that everybody who was anybody knew what was going on. As a player you get $$$ in your bank account then, then get a brown paper bag later on. Is that normal. Or even another payment from another account. Is that normal. You have to ask how many other clubs operate like this????? Get the odd house built for you etc. etc.
Ex NRL fan said | April 23rd 2010 @ 10:44am | Report comment
New Ltd knew all about it and I’ll tell you another thing. Other clubs are also rorting the cap. Melbourne is the convenient scape goat because they want to wind up the club as it is losing so much money for News.
All so very convenient.
Soccer, rugby union and basketball will fill the vacuum in Melbourne.
So now, RL only in 2 states with Queensland swamped by other codes, New South Wales is the final citadel to stand alone.
gingerbeer said | April 23rd 2010 @ 11:09am | Report comment
Rubbish the NRL will still survive, they just have to scale down the comp a bit. You are better promoting and placing clubs in your heart land then branching out. More Qld clubs are the secret. there should be at least 2 Brisbane clubs and another Qld club based on the Sunshine Coast, Toowoomba or Ipswich. No more NSW club there is too many.
M1tch said | April 23rd 2010 @ 11:20am | Report comment
the game will go on, it always does
what next for Rugby League in Melbourne – that is something that nobody knows
what doesnt kill you only makes you stronger – this is something that the Storm need to have
Corey said | April 25th 2010 @ 1:01am | Report comment
I think they are very premature words Ex NRL fan (and may I enquire what made you an Ex NRL fan from being an NRL fan?), QLD loves it League to bits and Melbourne will not sink due to News Ltd forcing money to keep it afloat.
mushi said | April 23rd 2010 @ 11:00am | Report comment
The irony for every fan on their news limited high horse is that without the pockets of a corporation like news this would spell the end for melbourne