Will NRL have 24 team competition by 2014?

If you want to see passion, talk to the Bears fans! Like your beloved QLD teams, were were rubbed out. The difference is, you all wanted to join the NSWRL and be a force with the Broncos as a 1 team town, winning premierships and all the benefits that accrue to State of Origin from combinations etc. You got what you wanted. The Bears have been far worsely treated, but did we wring our hands? No, we've been building our bid for 10 years, despite rejections, until we've reached the point now of acceptance. Nothing can stop you if you keep trying. Suggest you anti-Bear people show some graciousness and step back a minute, applaud our achievement, then recreate that model for another QLD team in 7 years time, which would have the backing of us all.

Crosscoder, come talk to me about passion when all of the Sydney teams dwindle into what the Brisbane teams are now. non of you Sydney folk can ever understand what happend to our Tradition and History... and you wonder why we are so passionate and want to start our own League that was fair for all of us. Why is it that you keep all of your teams while ours are all gone? is that fare?? you keep your tradition and history, but we dont?? thats crap isnt it??

Manly not so as much as the sharks at the moment..thanks to their investors, Delmage and Penn..but what happens when they start wondering how long will they throw money into Manly for..

Gazza mate you really should know your geography of Sydney before you spruik off as well.. I believe there's over 141000 population in the warringah council alone which the suburb of Manly is apart of.., thats just 1 of the council and thats not including pittwater council which is all part of the peninsular.. and part of the Manly catchment area..and Manly and Cronulla are both struggling now..

beowulf, we keep saying it and one day it might just sink in.. The Bears and the Reds for 2013 Qld teams after that.. it's going to come down to who has the best business plan and who can sustain it.. to have a 102 year old brand behind it is a marketing bonanza not only for sponsors but for the NRL/IC as well... and this will be on top of our forward thinking Business plan.. love to put some out here, but you will have to wait and see..it'll be the envy of other clubs, and it'll be so simple and so effective that other clubs will think, gees why didn't we think of that... Go the Bears...

well you don't have to worry about that anymore gary because you won't be the reserve side to canberra after this year.. they are teaming up with goulburn I hear..

oh Adam we can go around in circles here, I'm not denying Qld get another team as i'm not opposing Perth.. but what i'm saying is that this time is the CCBears time..where have all these other bids been for the past decade.. the only reason they are talking about expansion again is because the CCBs have kept the pressure on.. give me a break.. david gallop has made it clear.. that he wants one team in the heartland of rugby league and one not this time around..thats why i think you'll see it's Central Coast this time and Perth also..

There should be two seperate divisions of 12 teams. The best 12 play in the NRL Telstra Premiership while the worse 12 play in the NRL Telstra Championship. Bottom 3 from Premiership get relegated to the Championship while top two teams in the Championship get automatically promoted to the Premiership. Teams 3 to 6 in the Championship play-off for the last spot in the Premiership. First week of playoff is 3v4 and 5v6. Winner of 3v4 gets a week off while loser of 3v4 hosts the winner of 5v6 for for the right to play Winner of 3v4 at ANZ Stadium for the last spot in the premiership. There should be a final 6 system in the Premiership. As there are currently 16 teams, the new ones should be based in Perth, Adelaide, Port Moresby, Central Coast, Wellington, Sunshine Coast, Ipswich and Central Queensland to make 24. As there will be twelve teams in two different divisions, each team in the same division plays each other twice, home and away. There should be no matches at ANZ Stadium except for State of Origin, NRL Grand Final, NRL Prelim Final if it's between two big Sydney teams and the NRL Premiership playoff.

Like St George-Illawarra, North Sydney has the corporate support (like St.G) while the Central Coast has the players (like Illawarra). Individually, neither would be strong enough in the modern era to sustain a $14/year million NRL side, but together, their strengths and weaknesses complement perfectly and they can form a very strong side. I too would have loved to see a North Sydney Bears and a Central Coast United team, but realistically, there's no other way to give over 1 million people an NRL side. Luckily, there's the history of association between the regions (like St.G & Illawarra) to make it more palatable to all. I think its better to have 90% of what you want than 0%. Certainly, the NRL have knocked the idea of a relocation (e.g Sharks) to the Coast on the head, and have twice put the CC Bears on standby to enter (Cronulla and Storm issues), so its not hard to follow their plans IF a TV deal is big enough to allow 2 more teams....fingers crossed.

As I've said, I bought a Centary of League Bears Jersey for my son who was born at Royal North Shore. The Bears are from North Sydney, their players are from Queensland, the Bears should reenter and the Central Coast should have their own team. QUEENSLANDER! - go, Billy.

2013 18 team comp. 14 existing teams + Auckland Roosters playing out of North Harbour Stadium. Adelaide Sharks at Hindmarsh. Central Coast Bears Perth Reds 2016 20 team comp + South Island NZ(Christchurch + Dunedin) 2nd Brisbane

If the GF had been in Brisbane I suspect the crowd would have been even more red and white. The Dragons have quiet a large support base in SE Queensland. The Dragons should do a deal with Brisbane and the Gold Coast and set up a Queensland membership package next year for the 2 games in Queensland.

WIN Stadium is getting a new western grandstand which should be finished by June/July next year in time to host the final 6 home games of the year. It will then have a capacity of about 22,500.

Good points all. No way will the NRL look at NZ anyway when Central Coast has such a strong bid and Perth, CQ and SEQ 2 are also keen to join.

A second NZ side presents just as many challenges, if not more, than the AFL in western Sydney. Let me explain. 1. Rugby union in NZ is not a minor irrelevance that way NRl fans see the game here (my opinion). Rugby has become a powerful statement of Kiwi identity to the world, which says NZ is capable of performing and even dominating on the world stage. The smaller the country, the more the need to make such a statement, I feel 2. The game is played differently to Aust rugby. It is more fluid, more side-to-side like RL (I bought Andrew Johns;s autobiography for my brother and it was a point he made while talking about rugby's overtures to him) while still retaining the key aspects of rugby -- scrums, mauls, rucks, lineouts, kicking 3. The recent rules changes (sigghh!!) have produced a more watchable game in NZ. The ITM Cup is increasing in popularity - I personally perferred it to the S14 last year and even this year. Games are not so one-sided. And even the low-scoring games are still exciting to watch. It's also been driven by the rural sides; rural areas tend to be more conservative and less open to quick change (ie a second NRL side). 4. The provincial structure of the ITM Cup means you can sort out the good club players from the good provincial players unlike club comps like the Shute Shield. The ITM Cup is played with a speed and intensity (I feel) at least equal to that of the NRL. (Feel free to disagree!!) 5. The NZRU is not sitting on its butt. ie the day after their Tri-Nations game at home or in Aust, All Blacks went on a doorknock campaign along streets in the smaller towns, knocking on doors, talking to residents, having morning tea and even taking part in birthday celebrations (video footage is available). They've gone on roadshows to smaller isolated communities taking part in community challenges (gumbott throwing, caber tossing, waiter racing etc). The elite players are reconnecting at the grassroots level. 6. Super rugby could be about to undergo a major change with the addition of Argentina in 2012. There's talk of a combined Pacific Island side, perhaps based in Auckland. IF that does happen, the Warriors will have a fight on its hand. Auckland is the largest Polynesian city in the world. The fight for the hearts and minds will step up several notches if that that scenario happens. 7. Rugby is about to get inbound tours again. This can involve up to 14 games by a touring side (with midweek fixtures) resulting in greater TV exposure (this will also apply to Aust; think British Lions in 2001). 8. To compete in this environment, the NRL (or ARL IC or whoever's running the club game) will need to hit the ground running. Hard. This means a massive outlay of money just in startup costs; could Aust RL afford that kind of cost especially if other expansion clubs had been set up already? 9. How sustainable would public support be for a second NZ NRL side? No idea but I have my doubts!

AdamD Just can't escape the SL funadamentalists. I want to game to expand that is my first point, and I want another Brisbane side. .Obviously you are a Queenslander,and pushing the barrow from that perspective.It was Qld where the SL plot was first hatched, and I suggest unless you flollowed Sydney clubs, the effect that raid had on the game here. Iwas one of those mugs ,who attended the meeting at the Sharks league's club,when Ribot,Quayle and big Mal all attended and Mal (made the silly statement ATT, " what has the game done for me".I fell for it hook line and sinker.The vision that is. ET would be seen in the streets of Beijing and recognised,there would be English interpreters blah blah blah. The only good thing ATT,the money was a boost for the Sharks, but the Sharks were a last miinute consideration. Yeah your traditional teams have dwindled in Brisbane, and the price, 1 NRL team the Broncos, no Crushers, competition from the AFL ,yet the Broncos crowds are only 3 times as many (in a pop of 1.2m) as Cronulla (pop 200,000 plus). Teams being kicked out of a comp does not mean a code will die, what it does ensure is losing a fair percentage of the suppporters of those clubs, will look elsewhere for entertainment,dare i say it other codes.Ask yourself what Souths and Norths supporters do in the longgggggg off season,some I know for a fact became Waratah and Swans members. If that is your idea of sport's marketing in a highly aggressively competitive,yet in reality small market in Oz,then good luck. Memo champ.Su[per league failed due to one word PASSION of rugby league supporters,and Ribot with his business nous underestimated that human quality,big time. His word SL good for the code, yeah and put it back 10 years.

Gob, if Super League had won wouldn't Alf Langer now be superstar in China and the end of the season here would signal the start of a 15 round World Cup Challenge including block busters like PSG taking on Adelaide Rams before a Super Nines tournament in Fiji. The war thankfully ended after much blood letting in a draw, with Packer part owning Fox Sports and the NRL being formed. The only winner were lawyers who put there kids through private school. The loser was the game that is still only now recovering and hopefully the new commission will finally get the game back to 1995 with a team in Perth and a second team in Brisbane.

I'll try and put it very simply for you. The NRL is not considering a stand alone team from Gosford. There is no bid other than the Central Coast Bears, and why??? Because the NRL want to get the twin benefit of not just giving the Coast a team, but re-engaging with northern Sydney's huge unrepresented population. Why do you think all the sponsors are clambering on board? The sponsorship is conditional on the team being called the Bears and playing in red and black. No Bear, no Central Coast team, ever. Period. RL would meander along on the Coast and would die in northern Sydney, allowing the other codes to dominate Australia's most affluent region. The Bears proposal will make them one of the strongest teams in the comp - the NRL doesn''t want any more weak teams. The Bears bid is financially strong and sustainable for the future. 23 junior teams in the combined region attests to their potential onfield strength. And even better, despite what you might think, the silent majority of the Coast is behind the bid. Like any area, there are fans of other teams and even some dinosaurs who think the Coast should not be with the Bears, but education has taken place over the past few years. The Bears are in the community, supporting schools, charities, local rugby league etc. Membership numbers are rapidly increasing, most from the CEntral Coast as anticipation rises. Some fans will be 100% Bear fanatics and some may initially supporting the Bears as their second team but their kids will follow the Bears - the St.G-Illawarra model shows the way. Plus the strong heritage brand of the Bears means we have fans everywhere, particularly in SEQ and CQ - ironic, ain't it!

Soon to be seen in Gosford .... http://farm1.static.flickr.com/51/119315030_a059e0978c.jpg

Your points are ridiculous, Beowulf. You suggest "A Central Coast United team cannot work for 4 reasons": 1) Insufficient population (320,000). The popultion of Manly is 41,000 and the entire Sutherland Shire is only 219,000. 2) Insufficient sponsorship (no major corporations on the Central Coast). Sanyo does not have a factory in Penrith and Steggles don't have a farm in Bondi. 3) No threats to code. Well... good! They are a long-standing RL community deserving of a team. 4) No areas to expand TV reach in area. They have their own bloody television station! And radio stations! And newspapers... You really need to think before you type, Nob!