The rugby league world was this week in raptures following the announcement by NRL Head of Football, Todd Greenberg, that video referees are to start making their decisions from a specially designed command centre ‘bunker’.
When making the announcement, Greenberg revealed that the NRL are going to spend “millions of dollars” ensuring the bunker provides video referees with world-class technology and comprehensively recreates the NRL experience.
To this end, the bunker will only be accessible at the most inconvenient times (such as Thursday and Monday nights), parking will be in the next suburb, and food and drink will be over-priced and barely edible.
Sources close to Greenberg have also indicated that the bunker may be modelled on the one Ned Flanders built in his backyard.
If so, it’s a good move. That thing was able to hold basically the entire population of Springfield, and a similar structure could be used to protect rugby league’s most valuable assets in the event of a nuclear war, rogue asteroid or other unforeseen catastrophe – such as Manly being on the wrong end of a penalty count.
So who would get a spot in the NRL Bunker?
Obviously Dave Smith and Todd Greenberg would be in there.
Channel Nine would also get a few spots for their biggest stars, chosen according to how often they feature on Friday Night Football – so that’s ‘Gus’ Gould, ‘Rabbits’ Warren and Julie Burgess taken care of.
Beau Ryan also gets an invite – for light relief, it could get tedious in there, especially with Gould and Warren talking nonsense. Entertainment will be provided by whatever talentless non-entity won The Voice this year.
In the future, rugby league would need to be re-built from the ground up, so we would also need the irreplaceable knowledge of Des Hasler, Wayne Bennett, Craig Bellamy and the Colonel from KFC.
Stephen Dank can be in charge of health and nutrition, David Middleton in charge of statistics and Ian Schubert in charge of checking finances (although, obviously, not for anyone from the Roosters).
Jarryd Hayne would get a spot, together with Johnathan Thurston, Daly Cherry-Evans and Greg Inglis. Sonny Bill Williams is in on the proviso that he stays with rugby league, which means Danny Weidler would have to be in there as well.
Who else is going to break the weekly Sonny Bill Williams ‘exclusives’?
Somehow, Ricky Stuart will get his manager to convince the NRL he’s worthy of a long-term seat in the bunker. He will then create confusion and chaos, forcing several bunker inhabitants out in the middle of the night, before moving to a slightly better-resourced bunker at short notice and repeating the process there.
And even the most thoroughly prepared bunkers can run short of food and water over time, meaning the inhabitants may need to resort to extreme measures to stay hydrated. So I guess Todd Carney gets a spot too.
Sadly, there will not be room for everyone. Tragically, the capacity of the bunker will be determined by the same process as the NRL uses to count its crowds, meaning thousands of empty seats will be incorrectly identified as being full.
The Melbourne Storm will almost certainly survive a nuclear attack – they are basically exempt from the rules of rugby league, so probably won’t be bothered by the rules of nature and science either. They’re out.
Mal Meninga will be in there for a while, before conditions deteriorate and he leaves, ranting about the “rats and filth” who are ruining the whole bunker experience for hard-working and noble heroes like him.
And unfortunately the four living Immortals will be excluded, after someone in administration takes their title too literally.
There also won’t be any room for the likes of Justin Hodges, Cameron Smith, Sam Thaiday, Josh Reynolds, Billy Slater, Darius Boyd or Brent Tate, on the flimsy basis that I simply don’t like them. After all, what’s the point of building an imaginary bunker if you can’t spitefully exclude people for no good reason?
So, what do you think? Who else should be saved to help re-build rugby league when the radio-active dust has settled? Who should be left outside? Are there too many bunkers in Sydney, and should the NRL be urgently looking at establishing a bunker in Perth?
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