Rugby league forever standing still

Expand soon and aghressively, and if it doesn't work then there will be no major harm done. Do you think the AFL would have gone under if GWS had been a failure? Of course not!

By the looks of it, since the Force is going broke, that Perth can't even support one team. And please clipper, don't try and pass off your anti-rugby league stance off as any type of relevant fact or opinion. Everybody can see straight through it and just reinforces you got nothing important to say when it comes to league/union matters. All you do is look anything positive that said about League, then like a petulant little child who's been told something they don't want to hear, try to tear it down in a in a hissy fit. If this isn't the case, give me evidence to the contrary. But I guess something the doesn't exist is pretty hard to find.

Just so you know, I have no problems with my team getting the chop from the professional league if it meant it was better for the future of rugby league. As a Glebe supporter, I think I have every right to say that.

Suns also have the best AFL player in the land transplanted there - Ablett Jnr. Titans have QLD public enemy no 2. Greg Bird (i'm going with Gallen as 1)

Of course when there are so many obvious inconsistencies which have influenced conditions that have prevailed and still do,any comparison is not comparing apples with apples. I'm not concerned who agrees or disagrees with me,I'm just presenting facts that are recorded since 1995 the start of the SL war and from grassroots back even further. Birdy supports my view as he is a RL fan, also is fully aware of the historical differences which make drawing comparisons open to conjecture. Just as In Brief supports your views and both spend a fair whack of time on rl threads ,as some sort of raison d'être. I could ramble on about Monday nights ,poor Sydney transport,no NRL teams in SA and WA,but its pointless,because once again its not apples with apples. " The Suns get more than the Titans" Perhaps !! do the Suns have Monday night football?.Do they have plenty of parking facilities available?Did the Sun's organisation do the wrong thing by local tradespeople ATT? Have the Suns had drug problems like the Titans had in the past?Do the Titans get the largesse the suns get from Head office?And where did the Titans finish 2015? Compare the Tv ratings for Titans v Suns in Qld. Don't underestimate the Titans long term, with a new management team,a huge junior base,and being competitive regularly. And take note of the poor scheduling for Titans's games.From 2018 teh NRL will control, scheduling.

Whenever people lament whatever NRL decision is in favour at the moment, I think they tend to not consider how the NRL may be bound by the terms of whatever is in the contra they signed with the broadcasters. As far as we know, they have a deal to provide 8 games per week and for that, they receive an agreed amount of money. I'm not sure what provisions there are in the current contract for the inclusion of another team or two during the term of the current contract but it seems that there probably isn't much leeway for the current deal.

We have to agree to disagree once again - nothing unusual in that (or with birdy supporting your view). Still, do you think m hughes comparison was a fair one? Comparing two teams that have never made the finals with the Storm, who have had a very sucessfull run.

Birdy.I look on him as the gift that keeps on giving.

Yeah killing off North Sydney was pretty bad it should of been manly instead

CC , As always love your work, Just don't understand you wasting your talent on someone like clipper. I get off on all his posts that RL upsets him . I picture him as an 18 year old being dragged off the field by his mother saying no son of mine is playing such a rough game as this. Only she didn't realise he was playing u/14 's at the time.

Here we go,The comparisons are flawed as I have explained prior. So comparing 20 years to 30+ years ,a longer history in the Northern states,a salary cap scandal,a SL war ,huge marketing campaign by one compared to the other,a far bigger media coverage by one over the other,still poor TV ratings after 30 plus years ,a far smaller junior base in the south is an OK comparison.And two teams in each non heartland state ,compared to one. Pull the other one it's playing Dixie. The TV ratings may well be 23% of the Fox Footy audience,but their respective crowds are down so they must be helping with the 23%.

Yes, comparing the Storm to the Swans is an OK comparison, both have been similarly successful, which may contribute to the Swans being consistently the most attended team in Sydney, but they don't have huge TV ratings, although as Mr Football notes 23% of the fox footy audience comes from NSW and QLD, so having 2 teams in each market must help with that percentage.

Ah yes Clipper (and his old hobby horse the Storm) who continue to receive token media coverage in Melbourne especially from the Fairfax organisation,and where they have been one existence for 20 years,compared to the Swans in Sydney 30 plus years.And also in a state(NSW) where VFL has had a stronger presence than rl has in Melbourne for decades.As you compared the Storm crowds with AFL crowds in Melbourne. The Storm have never received anything like the largesse the Suns and GWS have,even when owned by News. And yes we have a team in Sydney,that has won flags and been consistently in the semi finals.Received huge sums in marketing assistance,And of course the COLA.Yet the Tv ratings have remained tres ordinaire.Plus plenty of support from the Sydney media with fluff pieces. Dare I suggest the Super League war was the gift that kept on giving to the Swans in the late 90s early 2000s.

m hughes - is that really a fair comparison? Suns and GWS who have been flogged in their early years, Suns going backwards last year, both never having made the finals compared to the Storm who are just about always in the finals and have won a few GFs, yet they still are thousands short in attendance of the worst AFL team in their market - at lease the Suns get more than the Titans.

Melbourne is a much larger market than Perth.

Expansion is possibly the most written about topic on the League thread and will continue to be so until the NRL formulate a strategy around this topic. Much has been written about the possible locations and I can only assume that the NRL head honchos are presently viewing and learning as much as they can about the potential markets. The second Brisbane team is a no-brainer and my preference would be either of Ipswich or the Brothers bids. Ipswich would need funds for an improved stadium but the Brothers would utilize Suncorp Stadium. This team will provide a derby game for the Broncos in their home town but also provides an additional QLD derby game for the Cowboys and Titans. The Brisbane Bombers bid is just nonsense and the NRL would be best to ignore this completely as it offers nothing compared with the Jets or Brothers. The league will need to add another expansion side so as to have the 9 game weekend that the AFL currently enjoys and the associated boost in TV $$ that goes with that. Is it Perth? If so then please do not call them Western, West or anything to do with the Reds. This team needs a clear Perth name and a new identity completely separate and in no way associated with Super League from the 90’s. Utilise a Western Sydney Wanderers form of community engagement to assist with choosing colours, branding and the nickname of the Club and get people involved from the ground up. The extra timeslot would do wonders for the East Coast market viewing. There is already a stadium to utilize that the NRL do not need to put a dollar into (unless they wish to assist with upgrading the Western and Northern Stands) but they will need an Elite Training Facility and they will need plenty of $$$ to prop them up for 10-15 years initially (much like GWS and GC Suns in the AFL). The question on Perth is: Does the NRL have the stomach to commit multi millions in the short to medium term to prop this Club up while they establish a niche? Is it Wellington? A very small market in which to base a new team and if the crowds at the Hurricanes and Phoenix fixtures are any indication of the city’s willingness to attend live sport this will definitely put a dent in the NRL aims of achieving a higher average crowd attendance. It will also affect the Clubs bottom line as match day attendance and expenditure would be very limited compared to teams like the Broncos and Bulldogs. The positive is that this will provide two NZ derby games each season. Is it the Central Coast Bears or Central Queensland. Central Coast brings in yet another NSW team and is not going to assist the long term growth of the game in any meaningful way. The people are already League fans and watch/play the game. You are preaching to the choir here. Central Queensland would require the QLD Government to fund a brand new stadium, which means that they will be competing with the established Cowboys for those funds as they too want a new city stadium. Additionally, they will need people to do what they do for the Cowboys and travel huge distances to get to games in Rockhampton regularly and it is a very small market compared with other options. Very unlikely options in the short to medium term are Adelaide, Tasmania and Northern Territory. Adelaide does not have the care factor or knowledge about the game and I can’t see the NRL going into both Perth and Adelaide at the same time and spending huge $$$$ to prop up two teams at the same time. Tasmania and NT do not have the populations or economy at this time to be considered. The Melbourne Storm would be a very good case study for the NRL if they look to go into Perth and/or Adelaide. They were placed in a city fanatical about AFL and since 1998 have generally been an exceptionally high performing team. They still have a ton of work to do on the TV viewing figures and average crowd numbers with their highest average crowd being a touch over 16K. We have yet to see how the team will be impacted by a few years in the doldrums at the foot of the ladder, particularly post Bellamy/Smith/Cronk/Slater. Bearing that in mind we should also consider that Melbourne is more than double the size of Perth and Adelaide with very similar AFL football cultures. Lastly - please stop suggesting the Titans to be cut. This administration are doing very good things for this Club and setting it up for the long term amidst all the Searle nonsense of years past.

Muzz and CC, You both might be onto something . SOO being the most watched and anticipated sporting series in Australia ,added to our desire to spread our game without destroying the fan base of our heritage clubs. SOO may well be the solution. Scrap the NRL altogether, no clubs. Have a 20 round SOO series with a GF if they are 10 all at the end of the regular season. Club supporters will gladly exchange their shark, tigers and roosters toys for cockroaches and cane toads. In the middle if the season , to help with player fatigue and burnout , we can have 3 stand alone international weekends. Australia V Victoria Australia V Western Australia Australia V winner of NT V Tasmania All the boxes are ticked. No player burnout, no need for costly expansion, no more badly run clubs no one gets left out .

Yep and so has pure capitalism which is why sensible people realise it is all a balance of freedom and protections are required to ensure the future of something such as a company, market or society. People that preach one or the other are generally screw loose nut jobs that we best ignore. To say that there are no incentives offered, outside of those inherent to the action itself, is actually arguing for increased regulation to deliver benefits that the "market" does not. If the underperformers are always going to underperform isn't that the consequence in a competition? Even then that's if you believe in the old thinking that all "poor" are just "poor" because they are lazy and have no concept of pride, self worth or relative wealth which seems to have been debunked in modern thinking where there is support for a view that investing in providing the opportunity to "under performers" with inherent disadvantages to upwardly migrate is in the long term interest of an economy. Also worth mentioning that what the NRL really does with things like the salary cap etc is use it's monopsony as the only purchaser of the raw inputs of rugby league to artificially cap wages and conditions which is more the result of an unfettered capitalist society than the centrally planned communist one

Like all expansions it would be a long term plan

Doug there is one thing that you have to remember about Barry and others like him. That although they make strong arguements and they have the history to back up what they are saying, they are mostly Sydney team fans that can't/don't/won't think past outside of their teams (dogs, manly, eels, Penrith, bunnies, roosters, dragons, sharks) and that having more teams out thier to challenge for the premierships that thier team should be winning is impossible and offensive to consider. That is should be Bulldogs v manly or eels v roosters for the gf every year and so on . even having the Sharks win is impossible for them. ( don't worry sharks I have faith you'll get there one day) They forget that it hasn't be the nswrl since 1994. Funny enough Canberra won that year another non Sydney team.