The widespread hatred of Thursday night Football in the NRL started me thinking.
If we were in charge, what format would the NRL take? If you suddenly became a multi-billionaire tomorrow and decided to start your own hypothetical NRL competition, where the only goal was to bring maximum entertainment of fans, how would you do it?
As a fan the only thing I love more than watching, and whinging about, the NRL is speculating about hypothetical scenarios. So, with no regard to money at all, this is how I would do it.
The Teams
The first problem that needs to be solved is the overabundance of teams in the Sydney area. There are two possible ways to deal with this problem, the first is to shut down, merge or relocate all teams.
The second is completely abolishing all current the franchises in the NRL and form a group of new clubs in Sydney. I think it would be a shame to ruin the history of some of these clubs, so for me, it would be about deciding which clubs to keep.
Eliminating teams was not the simplest of tasks, obviously in doing so you will alienate a group of supporters and make them resent the competition. It is for this reason that I wouldn’t fully be against the idea of starting over from scratch in Sydney altogether.
I would restructure sides as follows:
Tigers are gone. Western Sydney simply has better teams with better tradition and more storied histories, sorry guys. You can be still be in the NSW Cup. Penrith also are gone. Sorry Panthers fans but you guys missed the cut out west.
Parramatta and the Bulldogs make the cut, but there is going to be one small change.
The Bulldogs shall no longer be referred to as the Bulldogs and will henceforth be known as the ‘Berries’.
Sharks and Manly are also gone. I don’t know who I will hate now that Manly are gone, but out of these two teams and the Roosters I decided only one team could make the cut.
The Roosters are the only team to play in every single season of professional Rugby League in the country and with their wealthy backers that isn’t going to change anytime soon. Plus, I am a Roosters supporter. They will, however, be rebranded the Eastern Suburb’s Roosters.
Souths also make the cut. Not only are they a team with one of the strongest traditions in the competition, but they also are the strongest supported. As such, they are simply the first team through when such a list is decided.
St. George-Illawarra kind of makes the cut. Well, Almost. Henceforth they will be known as the Illawarra Steelers and will play back in Illawarra.
Sorry Dragons fans. But you know, they will keep poaching your juniors, not that you have as many as them. Oh and they will play in an alternate strip once a year with the ‘red V’ and pretend you are still getting your fair share. It will be great, you will love it.
The Newcastle Knights and Canberra Raiders both keep their spots, but Ricky Stuart is immediately given a life ban from coaching and is no longer allowed to report on NRL.
Buzz Rothfield is given a similar treatment.
The Central Coast Region also gets a team. The Central Coast Bears are officially in the competition, and Manly are gone… I guess you can call that karma?
North Queensland, Brisbane, Gold Coast (who are no longer the Titans but are instead the Gold Coast Dolphins), New Zealand and Melbourne are all obviously still in the competition.
That sees us arrive at a total of 13 teams. So now we look at the areas that could potentially host a figurative NRL team.
Perth is in. They are the Reds. It is happening. No doubts at all.
West Brisbane/Ipswich are in. They are the Jets. This also is a no brainer.
Central Queensland gets a team. They can be either the Central Queensland Chargers. Named after the Stanwell power plant nearby their city, or the Central Capras named after the fact they are situated on the tropic of Capricorn.
Now we are at 16, the same as our current amount of teams. I have decided to increase the amount of teams to 20 – and this is where it gets tough.
Potential suitors are; a third Brisbane team, a second New Zealand team, an Adelaide team, a Papua New Guinea team or if you want to go even further left field, you could be the first football code to put a professional team into Darwin or Hobart.
I eventually decided on Adelaide, Darwin, Hobart and Papua New Guinea. It seemed unnecessary to give Brisbane a third team from a fans perspective, even though it would obviously make a lot more sense than any of my selections from a financial perspective.
Adelaide can be the Rams, this however means the Central Queensland team cannot be the Capras, otherwise they would have too similar logos. So, the Adelaide Rams and the Central Queensland Chargers are now official NRL teams.
Papua New Guinea will be known as the Hunters.
Northern Territory will be the Northern Wedge-Tails. It is imperative to the clubs success, however, that they will never ever be associated with the Manly club whatsoever.
Accordingly, they will most definitely not wear maroon and white. Instead they will wear the Northern Territory traditional colours of black, ochre and white.
Hobart possibly makes the least sense out of all the teams available. But the opportunity to be the first professional football team was one to great for this crazy commissioner to pass up.
They will be the Hobart Tigers. But a Tasmanian tiger, none of this Bengal tiger rubbish.
The Format
The second problem would be dealing with the schedule and deciding a way that makes it fairest for each team in the NRL.
Many people like to point out that the only way too have a truly fair schedule is too bring in a format where each team plays home and away twice and that is the only way to do this.
Unfortunately, this would lead to a 32+ game schedule. Not only is this a completely unreasonable and unrealistic schedule for a full contact sport team it also presents the problem that every game you add to a schedule makes each individual game less and less important.
One way to get a fair schedule without going to a full home and away schedule is too bring in a conference and division format like what is common in American sport.
In doing this, the goal always has to be to ensure that as many rivalries as possible are preserved and that each game carries maximum weight in the context of the competition.
Another option is too go to an odd number of teams, say 17 for arguments sake. Every year you would play 16 games, so you would play half the competition at home and half away.
You could then flip this every year so that over a two-year period you would play every team at once each at home and away. The only problem is that this, though possibly the fairest model, offers less opportunities for rivalry games or marquee games which are what the fans really want to see.
You also would have a bye during each season. There also would be a team stuck with the mostly pointless Round 1 bye. Although the Round 1 bye could be given too the team who had to play the World Club Challenge, any early bye would be largely pointless.
Considering the pros and cons of each of the models proposed I decided that for my vision of the perfect NRL the ‘conference and division’ method would be the best way to go resolving such a dilemma.
Now the problem is, which teams do we keep and how do we divide the sides.
Fortunately NRL has a schism that we can traditionally base ours off. One conference shall be the Super League, the other shall be the Australian Rugby League.
Each conference will consist of ten teams broken up into two conferences, and further bifurcated into two divisions.
Super League
Superleague East
Brisbane Broncos
Gold Coast Dolphins
Melbourne Storm
Ipswich Jets
New Zealand Warriors
Superleague West
Canterbury ‘Berries’
Parramatta Eels
Canberra Raiders
Perth Reds
Newcastle Knights
ARL Conference
ARL North
PNG Hunters
North Queensland Cowboys
Central Queensland Chargers
Darwin Wedge-Tails
Central Coast Bears
ARL South
South Sydney Rabbitohs
Eastern Suburbs Roosters
Adelaide Rams
Hobart Tigers
Illawarra Steelers
Every team would play each team in their division twice, they then would play the team from the other divisions in their conference once each – all home the first year and all away the next.
On the years where a given side had all home games against their conferences other division they would play all away games against one division from the other conference.
Then the next year it would swap and you would play all away games against your own conference and all home against the same division from the other conference. Then, on the third and fourth year, you repeat the same pattern except now with the other division from the opposite conference.
Over a 4 year period this means you would play:
• 8 games against your own division (4 home, 4 away).
• 4 games against the other division in your conference (2 home, 2 away).
• 2 games against the other conference (1 home, 1 away).
Each season a team would play a schedule of 18 games. There would be 180 games in a season. Just 12 less than the 192 total currently played.
Finals Structure
At the end of each season the top team from each division automatically qualifies for the finals. Then the next two best teams in each conference (for ease of explanation lets just call them wild-cards), regardless of division would also go through for a total of eight teams.
In the first week the four division winners would face the other division winner from their conference. The four wildcards would also verse the other wild-card from their own conference. The team placed higher on the table would host the game at their own home stadium.
The teams that lose the wild-card games would be eliminated. The winner of the wild-card games would then play the loser of the other finals games at the home field of the team that won their division.
The loser of this game would also be eliminated.
Following this you have two options for your semi-finals and your Grand Final. You can either cross the teams across the draw here, meaning that the two winners from the first week would verse the winner from the second week for the opposite conference. Or you could keep it within each conference.
Each of these models has their own strengths and weaknesses.
If you keep it within the conference you are not always guaranteed to have the two best teams playing against each other in the Grand final. However, you are given the advantage that this would make the conference championship similar to another grand final on its own – like the conference championships in American Sport.
Either way would work for me, but personally, I would go for the more American method and make this conference championship a whole event on its own.
The final would be played following a fortnight break to allow the teams to prepare and the hype to slowly build among the fan base.
It would alternate being played between Brisbane and Sydney, and would be like Australia’s very own Superbowl. It would be played on a Sunday afternoon and the city it was in would host many events in the build-up to hype up the event.
Once the pre-game entertainment was over however, it would be all about business. This means absolutely no 30-minute halftime break, rather the game would play out identically to a game in the regular season.
State of Origin
State of Origin would take place after a two-week break following the end of the season. The teams would be selected (full squads of 25) immediately after the Grand-Final and those wishing to participate would get into camp by the end of the first week.
The teams would stay in camp for the duration of the series, though they would be able to leave for brief breaks at the discretion of the coaching staff.
Each state would have its own commentary team for the coverage of State of Origin.
It would contain only one person from the opposing state who would be constantly talked over the top of and mocked mercilessly and they would be encouraged to be as biased and as one eyed as they felt necessary.
This way everyone is happy with the quality of the commentary, not just the NSW fans.
The games would be played on Wednesday nights still, sorry guys. This would continue to allow the people who are not first choice sport NRL to still watch and enjoy the series. Following the State of Origin series we would still actually be inside the amount of time usually taken to complete and NRL season.
This whole season would have taken place in 29 weeks as opposed to the 30 it currently takes. This means that we could pick the Australian team at the same time as always and we wouldn’t upset the current international season.
Oh by the way, the Anzac test got cut. But don’t lie, you didn’t even notice it was missing.
Weekly Programs
The important thing when looking at the fans dream NRL schedule is to hit the right mix between having games for the fans to watch on television and the games in the Ideal situation for attending matches.
The way I would do this is to every single week have one Thursday night game, one Friday night game, one Saturday night game and one Monday night game. These would be placed so that the NRL games were always on the TV for fans who don’t live near a game or don’t want to go for whatever reason.
It is also great for all fans who can sit back four nights a week and watch live rugby league.
Ray Warren and especially Ray Hadley are given the Ricky Stuart life ban for being incredibly negative and constantly saying the wrong names and we would build a new commentary team.
Gould would also get cut but not because of incompetence. His points are concise and relevant.
While, he is undeniably a knowledgeable individual I just don’t think he works in a commentary setting. He can start up a new version of the Sunday Roast where he was much more entertaining and useful.
Fret not though Broncos fans and haters. The ‘Broncs’ would not be on a Friday night every week were I in charge. Instead the Friday night games would be shared amongst the teams as close to evenly as possible.
Once these games are sorted we then would have six games left. Tow of these six would be played on a Saturday afternoon.
They would be played starting at 3:00pm local time, except for Adelaide, which would start at 4:00pm. This means that a Perth or Adelaide home game could double-up as the live Saturday night game for example.
The remaining four games would all be Sunday afternoon games, three would kick off at 2:00pm and the remaining one would kick off at 4:00pm.
I would make sure that games played in the Northern areas where it is hotter kicked off at the later time for the safety of the players and comfort of the fans in attendance.
It also would allow fans at home to watch two games in a row live. Fox sports could bring back the viewers choice and the fans could decide which specific game they wanted to watch.
A sample week could look something like this:
FTA– Free to Air TV
PAY– Pay TV
PVC– Pay TV Viewers Choice
Thursday: South Sydney V Eastern Suburbs @ Redfern Stadium 7:00 local (7:00 EST), FTA live
Friday: Brisbane V Gold Coast @ Lang Park 7:00 local (7:00 EST), FTA Live
Saturday: CQ V Darwin @ CQ Stadium 3:00 local (3:00 EST), PVC Live
Hobart V Adelaide @ Hobart Stadium 3:00 local (3:00 EST), PVC Live
PNG V NQ @ PNG Stadium 6:00 local (6:00 EST), FTA LiveSunday: Illawarra V Central Coast @ Illawarra Stadium 2:00 local (2:00 EST), PVC live
Melbourne V New Zealand @ Melbourne Stadium 2:00 local (2:00 EST) PVC live
Canberra V Perth @ Canberra Stadium 2:00 local (2:00 EST) FTA live
Parramatta V Canterbury @ Parramatta Stadium 4:00 local (4:00 EST) FTA liveMonday: Ipswich V Newcastle @ Ipswich Stadium 7:00 local (7:00 EST) PAY live
In a single week, if you felt like it, you could watch seven games of NRL live and it could be any of the ten games you choose.
If you don’t feel like getting pay-tv, that is ok because there is five games live and free to air! On top of this seven of the ten games are on at times when the fans want them and will be more able to attend.
The salary cap, the draft and trades
Simply, the salary cap stays. It has the NRL the closest and most competitive it has ever been. The salary cap has been highly successful in achieving what it is meant too.
The draft isn’t going to happen in my NRL. The teams will continue to develop and nurture their own talent.
The only change I would make to the way teams can be put together is by adding trades, up until Round 6 of the season teams can trade players – with added bundles of cash to sweeten the deal.
For example, this year when Ricky Stuart couldn’t get a single player to go to the Raiders and if Robbie Farah had his annual hissy fit at the Tigers board, the Raiders could have approached the Tigers to trade them some assets to obtain Robbie Farah.
They could have traded say, three or four young guys and a big bundle of cash to add Farah to their squad.
This also would have helped them, for example, when they lost Dugan for nothing.
They could have instead traded him too a team and brought back some talent instead of losing him for nothing. When the Roosters let Carney go only for him to be snapped up immediately by Cronulla they could have instead traded him for another player of a similar calibre.
Stadiums
Sydney would build a rectangular stadium of the quality of Suncorp to host the State of Origin and the Grand final.
If you were paying attention you would have noticed that the Souths and Roosters game above would be played at ‘Redfern Stadium’. This is absolutely how things would work in my NRL.
Every team who does not already have a stadium of acceptable standards would instead build a stadium very similar to what the Titans play out of, with a capacity of around 25’000. Only re-skinned to suit the colour scheme of their individual tenants.
Picture Skilled Park in red and green filled with Souths fans nine weeks a year. Or the ‘Berries’ fans packed into a similar stadium built at Belmore yet only blue and white is everywhere the eye can see!
Imagine the Jets fans decked in green and white packing a stadium every home game all the way up to the rafters.
This whole scenario has me salivating already. This is my dream scenario for the NRL. I know it is never going to happen… But a man can dream right?
What would you change if you were in full control of the NRL? Let me know in the comments.
Shadow
Roar Rookie
Untapped in the sense that those regions didnt have a side in the national comp. Those clubs with 50 years plus history are already in the national league. Its not a question of whether clubs like the sharks should be there but whether it is worth destroying a fan base by excluding them, Difference with BRL clubs like Souths Logan is that they were never in the national comp to begin with. Of course those clubs have history but it was the way things turned out that the NSWRL decided to expand into a national league and not the BRL. Its the typical Queenlander view to snort at Sydney's history. Sydney is the heart of Australian Rugby League. There is no NRL without Sydney. North Sydney has always had strong ARU but not strong Aussie Rules. The Swans have been the big winners from the demise of the bears. Lost fans to rugby league. Ill iterate again that teams like the Sharks and manly can't survive in their current form. In all likelihood the Sharks in particular will probably bite the dust. Im just saying people underestimate what is lost when these clubs fold.
Matthew Edwards
Roar Pro
I like it! I propose we name two of these teams the Marble Bar Mud-crabs and the Betoota Baboons.
Matthew Edwards
Roar Pro
1. That was intended as a joke mocking the Sydney RL fans desperate pleas for not culling teams under the guise of tradition. Seeing as like some of my article was serious and some wasn't I think some people kind of missed my point in some parts. 2. I don't really like the Dragons so maybe i am just biased. but i think Illawarra would be a huge area to have a pro team playing in full time. 3. Relocation is a bad idea in my opinion. Areas want their own teams with their own traditions. I really think that Perth and Brisbane should be in at the expense of 2 sydney teams or that Perth, Brisbane and CQ should be in at the expense of one so that we have a 18 team competition. We can't go any bigger than that right now. 4. So do I, I think it is really something that could work. I like that most of your schedule would be identical compared to teams that you are competing against to make the finals. And though fans would hate a shorter schedule now once they saw it in action I think they would learn to love it. 5. I am torn on it. I think that it needs to change from what it is now, but i think it has to stay midweek for financial reasons. It was just another suggestion on what we could do with it. 6. As a Qlder who was only 5 at the time the year of the Superleague was one of the fondest in my memory. Though i can't remember the fighting in the background and the finer details of the SL war I know from talking to my grandfather and father QLDers felt we were finally getting the amount of NRL (or professional rugby league) that we deserved. Once we got shafted following the conclusion of the war (I know this was largely due to the Broncos killing the crushers and the GC teams ineptitude) a lot of the hatred has been directed at the NRL that we feel never gives us valid representation. 7. So will I. I quite enjoy the test. it is a quality game of RL that is improving every year. Even as a QLDer i watch the city country with mild interest. This was also intended as a joke mocking the people constantly death riding anything other than NRL games and Origin. 8. QLDers can't stand that guy man… he is an annoying biased tosser. The only person worse is Hadley. Seriously an all QLD commentary crew for Origin is the best idea ever. You guys (if you are from NSW if not i apologise just kind of an assumption i have made based on some of your points) wouldn't get it because you support NSW and would overlook it. But you guys whinge about Wally basically cheering for the Maroons in the commentary box when something amazing happens. We have to listen to Goulds last minute pep talks and a constant biased commentary throughout the entire game… Just because they are more subtle than Lewis doesn't mean they don't do it.
Matthew Edwards
Roar Pro
By far my best idea (in terms of validity and ease of application), and one of only a few i mentioned that i actually think should happen.
Matthew Edwards
Roar Pro
Cheers Dutski, I think i missed a memo on the seriousness that every article here must be aspire too. I wrote an article suggesting a slight culling of Sydney teams, considering trades and a conference system and optimising the schedule by putting on as many afternoon games as possible, as well as getting people who aren't intolerable to commentate. Thought it was the most boring thing i had ever read (as well as something everyone on this site had written) so i scrapped it and just took everything to its most extreme conclusion. A lot of what i put in was also to make fun of some various sections of the Australian sporting community but it seems to have gone over their heads mostly *sigh*. Like when i suggested every team had their own stadium, none seems to have got it but i was actually attempting to poke fun at the people constantly calling for games at leichardt and reminiscing of the days when souths played at Redfern, even though these places are dumps. The joke is that they say they want to go to all these old dumps, but if anyone fixed them up and teams played out of them they would whinge about that too… Ultimately i wrote a few serious points that were valid but boring and then just decided to write something fun and absurd. I am glad you too got some enjoyment from it.
Matthew Edwards
Roar Pro
Financially it would be near impossible to maintain this sort of model in Australia…
Matthew Edwards
Roar Pro
I was half serious absolutely… I think Sydney should have less teams YES I think the TV schedule should be optimised to hit all the TV spots but still have games on in better times than they do YES I think Brisbane needs another team and Perth needs a team YES I think the schedule should be worked in a fairer way YES I think trades should be accepted and regulated YES I think that NRL should fork out to build every team a new stadium NO I think PNG, Hobart and Darwin should have a team NO The berries thing was meant to mock tradition. but clearly people have taken that one seriously too. i will say though that the Bulldogs is the 4th dumbest name in the NRL (behind the 3 Queensland teams). I was half serious in that some things I said are valid and based in reality. I was half joking in that i took everything to its most extreme conclusion and just had fun with it. I enjoyed writing it and my article title Quickly changed from 3 things the NRL needs to do, to who cares lets blow this thing up and start again!
Matthew Edwards
Roar Pro
Man as a Queenslander i can attest that a large part of us following the mighty maroons so closely is that a lot of relatively large areas have no local league team and a lot of the old Bridbane RL fans hate the Broncos.
Greg trilby
Guest
Can't have promotion relegation in Australia the storm don't get much support now imagine if they went down a division!
cr
Guest
This is a complete lunatic writing - stupid!
Gary Magpie
Roar Guru
What are you talking about? "Untapped market" in Brisbane, Townsville, Gold Coast??? This is the myopic Sydney view I wrote about. You can take your "50 year history" back with my nasal snort all over it as I laugh! I also wrote about the 106 year history of Souths Logan - but you aren't suggesting they get an NRL gig. If you were consistent you would be. North Sydney has always had strong ARU due to private schools. The demise of clubs at Crows Nest etc is coz there's no families there now - all units, same as South Sydney catchment. There is still 8 clubs in Bears territory.
Shadow
Roar Rookie
Those clubs you listed have the benefit of untapped geocgraphical catchment areas which make the identity of those club. And tapping these new frontiers is important. But we mustnt forget the importance of history. Even the broncs storm and cowboys have made their own history in their short existence. Which is what makes them successful. It is extremely valuable to have clubs that have existed for more than 50 years in the comp and the intergenerational support that creates in communities. So any talk of overlooking this to cull clubs should be looked at very closely. The game certainly didnt make a net gain with the demise of North Sydney. The area is now rugby and aussie rules land. Having said that, I do not believe sharks and manly in particular can survive in a national comp in their current form.
Squidward
Roar Rookie
Afl prob has 8 teams in a 5min tram ride and look at their crowds
Gary Magpie
Roar Guru
Broncos, Storm, Cowboys - all extremely well supported despite being new inventions. The Titans, too, are well supported and going pretty well for a poor performing club. Western Reds had a tough job but were growing the game over there. These clubs, whether they represent existing rugby league regions or new 'expansion' areas have increased the popularity of the game across a wider demographic. The nostalgia-chancers will follow whatever club they think is the coolest to follow. Bunnies for this generation. The South Queensland Crushers had an average crowd of over 20,000 in their first year despite competing with the Broncos (which averaged over 30,000 that same year). The Rabbits got 3,000 on a good day. Penrith does have a good following although they may not turn out to games. I have lived there and they're doing quite alright - representing the heartland. Removing clubs will be painful but the net gains have always been, and will continue to be, net gains for our great game.
Gary Magpie
Roar Guru
I'd agree that there are lots of NSWmen who put club first. But those attitudes are a changin'. Also, there are many new fans who aren't passionate about a club, but they are for the Blues. I've been to Olympic Park to watch State of Origin for about 7 years. Each year NSW lost the Blatchy's Blues contingent grew. It is now about four to five times larger in just those years. There is a growing magnetism of NSW fans to the Blues and, for many - yes many, it is already the main game. You ask those Bears... NSW's total embarrassment at the dominance of this amazing QLD side has lit the fire. Ahh, the struggle. That's what sport is about.
Shadow
Roar Rookie
History is very important. It is what comes to define and shape the club's identity which in turn gives fans something to attach to and be proud of. Just look at the woeful state of Gold Coast Titans. The Panthers are a team with history but very disjointed. The constant changing of club colours and emblems leaves fans confused about what the club is really about. Despite their success this year, crowds seem reluctant to come out. In fact, most people in the Penrith region support other teams such as Parra, Dogs, Dragons and Souths. Why? Because these teams have history.
Andrew
Roar Rookie
I think its a good idea in principle, it certainly would increase the intensity in those current end of season dead rubbers between struggling sides, if they were playing for their survival in the top division. but there is nowhere near enough talent or interest to sustain what would be effectively 24 NRL sides
Muzz
Guest
Birdy - Just a thought mate, submit an article on it.You will get plenty of feedback !
Birdy
Guest
Doesn't any one care to comment on my 2 tier idea 1st and 2nd division 24 teams ? Promotion and relegation ???????
Woodo
Guest
+1! Speaking for the Henson Park faithful I can tell you first hand that the average Sydney RL supporter will sooner just hop to another code than another team. The Swans and the Sydney FC boys would laugh all the way to the bank if this was seriously implemented.