David Gallop, the time to expand has come

Soz mate, I was ill informed on your two props, Next year may see a big improvement on the field, Jeremy Smith is a strong forward with a great work ethic, Will you be able to replace the two props (Probably amongst the best in the league), time will tell. -- If so much is happening around The Shire, maybe your knockers are gonna eat their words in a few seasons.. I for one hope so... i have to agree with your comment on The Eels and to a lesser extent Raiders & Panthers

Jeff With due respect,the Sharks lost the two props one(Snowden) who wanted to go back to his hometown of Newcastle and be under the influence of Tinkler and Bennett.And they also snatched players from st george.The other prop(Douglas) to the Gold Coast,to be near his relos at Ballina. They secured Gibbs who is a decent 80 minute player and John Fifita whose potential is starting to show,just needs the discipline. Who else have they lost of any consequence?. The club will be using their full salary cap in 2012,as only other clubs can do the same. The club retained who they wanted for next year,gave the flickeroo to those who were let us say non performing. This is the same club,that kocked over St George in the1ist half of the season,and was only beaten in the last 15 seconds by Manly in the early round. As soon as Bird completes his GC deal,he will be back in a flash to the Sharks. I have been in attendance at all info meetings and voting on the new development details and the AGM and EGM.Suffice to say,if this gets the go ahead in march thereabouts,the club will be in a far better situation than more than a few other sydney clubs.There will be an immediate cash injection of $10m by the developers,leaving a debt of $3m with the licensed club(which will be repaid and can be serviced) until the profits from residential developments come through. If it doesn't then we have a problem captain. The crow average, that Cronulla pulled thsi year,was directly related to weather,and to a lesser extent team performance.Why.When they played St George on a wet monday evening ,over 15,000 attended.Given a sunday arvo with sun,20,000 would be conservative.Over 18,900 against the rabbits,and over 13,500 against the Rorters. When it squirts down rain,more so on a Monday evening ,and there is little cover,you are not going to attract crowds ,as Manly will affirm. The club got over 16,000 against the west Tigers when they only had Gallen's 200th game and nothing else to play for at the end. This club has had 3 near death experiences and pulled through,it will do so again and come back stronger,that is why Sharks fans have a sense of humour and are passionate.We all want to switch off the confounded porch light ,waiting for Harold Holt to appear ,when they win a G/F. I offer this view ,the Eels are a club who develops and loses players to the likes of Manly,Cronulla,it happens.

Crosscoder. I didn't mean to 'point the gun' at Sharkies, but here are my thoughts on this club (applies to others as well) Sharks seem to be in the unfortunate position of being a 'Nursery' for cashed up clubs. they find the kids , teach them the game then lose them because they have to negotiate against clubs offering Bigger pay packets,.whilst they are in this position, Each year becomes a 'rebuild' -- they cannot improve!. Without either getting lots of help from NRL or Finding another 'Tinkler'. this club will continue to be an 'also ran', I have attended games at Melbourne and found Sharkies fans to be Fun loving/noisy/passionate, it would be a shame to allow this bunch of fans to lose their team. but withou success on the field, how are they going to continue to survive??.

The one rule change I would like to see amended immediately is that of the knock-on. Simplify the matter by making it any dropped ball - whether it's backwards, sideways, or forwards. It would also eliminate my pet hate in league - that of the "tap back" from a high kick, and players scoring flukey tries after teams have defended courageously. People contesting the ball would have to catch the footy cleanly. It would stop a lot of AFL type tactics from being further entrenched in the game.

Origin in Melbourne is awesome - as Etihad is not too disimilar to Suncorp in size and feel. Hook up with some friends and jump on a plane, then spend a few days down there. You'll come back with a altered point of view.

It would be nice to hit the reboot button to reconfigure the national structure from the get go.

With you all the way there btj. Sydney is overcrowded and some smart business decisions need to be made to pay the respect of giving our game a truly national league and not the suburban Sydney competition that's been maintained for 25-30 years too long. The current structure of the NRL is stuck in the 1940s and we need the ic to deliver us an exciting league that's up to the present day. I do however believe that taking a snapshot of the state of the 9 Sydney teams and doing away with the under performing ones isn't the right way to deal with the clutter. T does run the risk of isolating fans which the league cant afford to do in its biggest market. I would drop all 9 into a league beneath the NRL to feed the national comp. Then create 2 new Sydney based franchises, one in the east and one in the west. Brisbane with 2 million people hosts one of the most successful sporting clubs of any league in the country. Sydney with just over 4 million should aim to the high benchmark set by Brisbane and sustain 2 clubs in its metro area. A bit of an east/west rivalry already exisits in the town and the NRL should tap into this. The 2 biggest stadiums are located in each of these areas and could support the large crowds that having 2 teams would bring. 8000 watching a Rabbitohs home game at anz would be a thing of the past. I think Gosford and the Gong are large and far enough away from Sydney to have a case for teams based in those places too. But clearly in the present day there are far too many teams under the Sydney blanket. The teams are bleeding money and they're holding back the league as a result. The fair way to deal with it is follow Brisbane's lead from 23 odd years ago and introduce a more sustainable number of teams at the elite level that aren't bound by the geographical constraints that the current 9 are.

Thanks Mark, I hear what you’re saying. But by using your example are you saying that all North Sydney Bear fans have given up the game of Rugby League? I for one find it tough to believe that all of these fans have packed up and given up on sport, because really I doubt they’ve taken up the Swan’s cause, because really AFL is just not league and that’s a much tougher transition to go to another code, when there’s a team just around the corner. I know Bear’s fans that still talk of the glory days (and they’re not in their 90s either… supposedly making a few semi-finals is good!), but still actively watch the game and have chosen new loyalties. As I said previously, the Western Suburbs/North Sydney Bears still exist in the NSW Cup. If these fans are still loyal to their clubs they should still be packing out the stadiums or is it because it’s not the top league anymore and they just don’t want to support their team anymore? So what I am bound to hear is they’re 2nd division; therefore they don’t have the top players so the quality of league is lower. Tell me is it the quality of league, the sport or the club they are following? But yes, of course loyalties are strong, and it is sad to see teams, some with great history, disappear, but everything comes to an end, and that’s life. Unfortunately the NSWRL hasn’t come to the end it should have and is now just masquerading as the “NRL” and keeping the true growth of the game down, which in turn hurts league not only in Australia, but the world. However, that term “life” is such an important one. It means to start and finish, it means growing and not all fans are in there 30s, 40s, 50s, 60s and so forth. There are young ones out there, who guess what? Will be the next crop of diehard fans and an 8 year old will not walk away from the game because the Sharks are out of the comp. They’ll pick another team to support and go on loving the great sport that it is. The introduction of the Brisbane Broncos pretty much ended the Brisbane League, which in its time had a large fan base. Sad it was, but it was for the good of the game and it’s just a shame that Sydney cannot man up, take the pain and follow suit.

So true about isolating fans. Im a sharks fan and if we go there's no way you'd see die hard sharks fans in a red v with the dragons being the our next option geographically. But the fact remains that the sydney market cant support 9 teams. Sydney clubs are bleeding money (not just the sharks). It's a catch 22 but some tough decisions need to be made and hopefully the IC will have a set to make them...

Crack smoking? Really? That's your clever line DKR Come back when you have a normal debate about this.

Because we all want to see what people like that would do when they have 50 times the local per capita in wage rather than merely 5 times. Australia would probably get dragged in front of the UN Human Rights Committee if we did that :)

True, Gold Coast suffered, but at least they played in front of more than two (2) people and a dog. I personally don't have the hatred of Manly that most do, I was rather pointed out the stupidity of moving one of the best supported teams in the NRL when there are other more "likely" canditates to be moved. For the records, I don't think there are too many teams in Sydney. Melbourne supports the same number of AFL teams with ease...

Couldn't have worded it better myself. By all means, expand. Put clubs in Ipswich and Perth. Just not at the expense of existing fans.

Interesting Bush, if Manly are hopeless with 3 grand final appearances in 5 years I would hate to see what you label clubs like Cronulla, Souths, North Queensland etc with!?!? How did your league team go this year? Not beaten by Manly perhaps? ;-)

I'll give you an argument of why we should keep the Sydney teams Bjt. If you started getting rid of teams in Sydney, you would be getting rid of League fans. Most League fans don't support League, they support their team. When the Bears left, the fans didn't start following other clubs nearby, they stopped following League, which is one of the reasons why it is a fringe sport in the Northern Suburbs. If you can find me a Rabbits fans who is happy to start follownig the Roosters for the "good of the game" so that we can have a team in Perth... then I will bow to your comment that it is a blight on the game. Otherwise, I can't see why having League Clubs where the Leauge Fans are is a blight on the game They may not turn up to games in the huge numbers that AFL fans do, but where else in the world do they? No where else I can think of is there a city of four million people that has 9 teams playing out of it, all with enormous attendances.

How are the Central Coast Bears sentimental and nostalgia? What 90 sponsors, 7300 members, all junior, school, local sclubs affiliated, singo's backing, alan jones backing is based on sentimental value? 27,000 fans growing each day is sentimental value? Central Coast residents who never supported the Bears until now due to the CC being their local team is sentimental value? Yeah right. They have accomplished all this due to hard work, make no mistake mate. The CcBears got their hands dirty and put in the hard yards in the community. Hardwork, hardwork, hardwork. Maybe other bids should take note.. actually some current clubs should too! They have a great business model and will be self sustainable. They established key foundations and made themselves one with the CC community.

So the Bears don't make financial sense, yet you would have them over another Queensland side which would? There are currently 3 bids in Queensland - Western Corridor, Brisbane Bombers, Central Queensland - plus several Queensland Cup teams are making moves. There is huge demand for more teams in Queensland. Most of the Bears bid is sentimentality and nostalgia. Not exactly in the best interests of the game.

Jeff My point does not differ from your " ïf clubs fail to improve"I agree.But Cronulla is actually in the process of trying to improve,firstly off the field with the development(decision expected March 2012) and with the development on the field the u20s in particular and the youngsters in the first grade side. One of the most important considerations to look at ,is what happens if this poker machine legislation gets trough,and the clubs that have big grants from the respective league clubs,how they are effected.Ask Penrith who are selling off clubs at a rate of knots,due to their huge debt. Cronulla gets SFA from the licensed club ,and a successful development approval will only underpin their independence.

Send all the bag eggs like Carney, Bird and Lui up there

"You can’t call the dragons, tigers or magpies former clubs, that’s a load of crap". Yes, I will. The dragons and tigers currently playing in the NRL are new clubs. The magpies are still in the NSW Cup, but not the NRL. I'm surprised you didn't know this. But anyway what I would like to hear is a solid argument to why the NRL should retain the current quota of Sydney teams. I'm yet to read one yet. Why don't you take it upon yourself and enlighten us? There are plenty of Gould articles out there that you can take ideas from. Here I’ll get you started: For one thing at the SFS, we don’t have a seagull problem...