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I have recently read a couple of articles about possible structure changes and futures for the NRL, most recently an excellent article by Shane Wall.
I had been writing my own version of this for a few months so I thought I should put it forward.
I have had this simmering idea, this image of a possible rugby league future that won’t go away. It nags at me and has been begging to be released for quite some time. It won’t go away, so I’m going to share it with you, Roarers, just to get it off my back.
When I played my first game of footy at the age of four, for the Wagga Kangaroos, there was no such thing as a National Rugby League, and that was cool, the NSWRL was the highest level of rugby league in the world and they had some amazing history and rivalries to go with it.
Fast forward to today and we are at a crossroad, a staging point where the right decisions could propel league up to the dizzying heights we know it should be at, or, it could be left behind to fall into obscurity. Everyone outside Sydney is craving for a truly national competition, rugby league has grown, it has become the property of Oceania not just Sydney and Brisbane, and I believe that our competition should reflect that.
The Broncos are the most successful rugby league club in the world, and we should be analysing why that is and trying to replicate that at every club in the competition. I absolutely hate the idea of the Bombers bid, by allowing a second team at the same ground you are halving the Bombers’ chances of survival and halving the Broncos’ ability to be successful.
Really, the only people that want a second club in Brisbane are are Sydney-siders hoping to justify rugby league’s mistakes of the past by making the same ones again. The reality is that there should be less Sydney teams, effectively bringing Sydney clubs up to the same level as the Broncos, rather than bringing the Broncos down to Sydney’s levels.
Less Sydney clubs would also improve a few issues. Canberra’s problems attracting players and sponsors would lessen, stadium scheduling problems would be fixed, and game attendances would improve -bums on seats are atrocious in Sydney. Third part sponsorship would increase for each club – the less clubs, the more dollars per team – and there would also be more Friday night games for the remaining Sydney clubs.
In saying that, the South East Queensland region can support another team, and I would hope the governing bodies would see the merit in bringing an Ipswich team into the competition, hopefully lassoing Toowoomba’s enormous nursery as well as Logan and the western corridor. This whole area is responsible for (among many others) Anthony Milford, Cameron Smith, Mal Meninga, Johnathan Thurston, Alfie Langer, the Walters brothers and Peter Sterling (had to throw that in).
I also believe that we have an enormous opportunity right now to tap in to a new market in the Pacific Nations, the populations of Samoans, Tongans and other islanders in Parramatta, Redbank Plains and a few other places are so large that they could support a team by themselves. One team rotating home games between Parramatta Stadium, Suncorp Stadium, Samoa, Tonga, Fiji and Papua New Guinea might bring multitudes of people to our competition.
I am tired of this supposed war with the AFL. I think the NRL should sit down with the AFL and work with them how to minimise our impact on their competition and vice versa, we are all a part of the Australian sporting landscape. They have superior game day experience, we have representative football.
I propose we take the best bits from all the success around us, look at the AFL game day and learn from it, look at the EPL scheduling and create an environment that supports bums on seats and TV ratings, look at the NFL and create mini conferences to maximise our derby games.
My proposal would be a 20-team four-conference competition where teams play each of their own conference teams home and away every year, and all the other conference teams once per year with a biannual home-and-away schedule.
That, I believe, is where the conference part should end though, come season’s end the top eight should play in the finals, which should remain untouched in its current format. This would result in a 23 round regular season. I also propose a six-week mini-representative season mid year but I’ll get to that in a bit.
That’s 33 weeks of glorious football, and our star players should have a couple less games to play per year, without the need for clubs to play without their elite players on the field. The biannual home-and-away gaming schedule should improve the bums on seats factor too.
Let’s take a look at the conferences.
Queensland Conference
North Queensland Cowboys
Central Queensland
Brisbane Broncos
Ipswich Jets
Gold Coast Titans
Sydney Conference
Manly Sea-Eagles
Eastern Suburbs Roosters
South Sydney Rabbitohs
Canterbury Bulldogs
Penrith Panthers
Southern Conference
Canberra Raiders
Melbourne Storm
Adelaide Sharks
Perth Pirates
St George Illawarra Dragons
Pacific Conference
Pacific Nations (Papua New Guinea, Samoa, Tonga, Fiji, Cook Islands, Vanuatu)
Newcastle Knights
Central Coast Bears
Auckland Warriors
Wellington Tigers
Now, the thing that rugby league does best is representative footy, so let’s embrace that and make it part of our season. I propose a six-week rep season.
Annual Representative Carnival Rounds
We could have State of Origin fortnightly, as stand alone games on Saturday nights. There would also be a New Zealand South versus New Zealand North fixture, Samoa versus Tonga and Papua New Guinea versus Fiji. The Pacific Nation fixtures could rotate annually.
Then over the six weeks there would be a Nines knockout tournament, including possible invitational teams such as the Queensland and NSW Cup premier and the Indigenous All-Stars. This could loosely mirror the FA Cup and Challenge Cup in England.
A combination of all the above representative fixtures should provide enough games every week so that the TV broadcasters won’t even notice the difference and we would be watching an improved version of footy without taking from our clubs
International
The World Cup would be held ever six years, with the Four Nations held every two years – one European and one Pacific.
The World club challenge tournament would be held at the end of season in the off years, and to include the grand finalist teams from both years (eight clubs in total, culminating in top four Super League ranked clubs versus top four ranked NRL clubs).
I’m almost done. One of the things that is detracting from our game is the constant rule changes and interpretations, partly because of the passion of State of Origin. For example, Justin Hodges scores off a wrap around, no one is impeded but he ran behind a player, the try is awarded and south of the border cries foul, the rules get changed and no one knows what is going on with the obstruction rule for four years.
The rules of the game should be only changeable by an international committee, not the NRL, and only changeable at set intervals, say, for example, after a World Cup meet. Let’s call that every six years and just stick to it. To create consistency we need to have stability.
I think we need to make a few changes and then stop messing with the game, and give it a decade or so to settle and build momentum. If we tweak it after that so be it, but as little as possible.
Okay, last thing. Please bring back reserve grade, and create a separate salary cap for it, managed by the clubs, not as an amateur feeder. This was a great idea and should never have been abolished.
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