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On Tuesday, ARL commission chairman John Grant proudly told the Australian sporting public he’s going to “scour the world” to find a replacement for departing CEO Dave Smith.
You would think that would be the very last resort. The only other time he did just that he came up with Smith who had an impeccable track record as a banker, but whose knowledge of rugby league would fit on a thimble.
Smith’s a Welshman, who like any other boyo will always be a rugby man. So it was no surprise he couldn’t answer the question at his first press conference as to who the Kangaroos captain was.
A more recent gaffe was Benji Barba, obviously thinking a combination of Ben Barba and Benji Marshall would make one helluva rugby league footballer.
But enough of Smith, whose three-year tenure out of an intended five was superbly covered in The Roar by long-time colleague Tim Prentice.
Grant cannot afford to make another Smith-type blunder. As for scouring the world, the rugby league world is only England, Australia, and New Zealand, which is hardly the world.
But what else could you expect from a chairman who publicly called the Manly Sea Eagles the Seagulls, and the Cronulla-Sutherland Sharks the Hawks.
Yet the same man played club rugby league under coach Wayne Bennett at Souths in Brisbane, played seven games for Queensland, and three for Australia during the 1972 World Cup.
Inexcusable blunders.
No Grant, Smith’s replacement is right under your nose.
You are searching for the likes of John Quayle and David Gallop, two of the very best sporting administrators I’ve had the privilege to deal with over 50 years.
Quayle was the rugby league supremo from 1983 to 1996, Gallop from 2002 to 2012.
These days Quayle grows olives at Denman, 135 kilometres west-nor-west of Newcastle, where he’s also lending his wide expertise to rejuvenating the Newcastle Knights.
Gallop’s doing the same as CEO of the Football Federation of Australia, which constantly leaves a grin of satisfaction on Frank Lowy’s face.
Neither would ever think of returning to rugby league under the current set-up.
So who could replace Smith?
Try Phil Gould, Andrew Demetriou, Todd Greenberg, Shane Richardson, and Graham Annesley.
Gould would be a superb choice, but why would he give up his lucrative contracts as Penrith supremo, Channel Nine expert television commentator, Triple M radio contributor, and widely read Fairfax Media columnist.
No way.
Demetriou certainly improved the AFL during his 11 years as the boss, and even though he would know more about rugby league than Smith and probably Grant, there are too many lifelong rugby league potential CEOs to go outside.
Greenberg is the NRL’s head of football, a wide brief, who came from the Canterbury-Bankstown Bulldogs as CEO, with strong credentials to be the new front man.
The same applies to Richardson, who after 11 years as Rabbitohs boss, is now the NRL’s head of game strategy and development which requires vision, and Richardson has plenty of that requirement.
And last, but by no means least, Annesley refereed 244 first-grade games, and he was a mighty good whistler. He became the NRL’s operating officer, then minister for sport in the NSW Parliament, and is currently the CEO of the Gold Coast Titans.
That’s a quality field, Grant, there is no need whatsoever to “scour the world’.