Trouble in Parradise: A history of internal warfare at the Eels

The events of the past month have taken long-suffering Parramatta Eels fans to depths unimaginable, beyond even consecutive wooden spoons of the 2012-13 seasons.

With arguably the best geographic nursery of talent in the country, as well as the league’s third-largest membership base, a recurring question from Eels fans and foes alike has been “how did it come to this?”

The late, great coach Jack Gibson famously proclaimed “Success starts at the front office”. With 25 different directors, six CEOs and five head coaches over the past seven years, it is not entirely surprising that the Eels’ internal warfare has taken its toll on the team’s pursuits of success.

Any discussion about the Eels’ front office inevitably starts with one man: Denis William Fitzgerald.

After a seven-year playing career as a prop for the Eels (including representative stints for NSW and Australia), Fitzgerald moved into the secretary role at Parramatta in 1978 and oversaw the club’s golden years of four premierships – 1981, 1982, 1983 and 1986.

This marked the high-point of a 30-year reign, which was subsequently characterised by inconsistency. The Eels missed the finals from 1987-96, and despite a resurgence in the late ’90s and early 2000s, including a grand final loss in 2001, fans began to agitate for change.

Not helping Fitzgerald’s cause was an increasing ego, which came with his seemingly immovable position. He proclaimed himself ‘The Emperor’ of Parramatta and became the go-to executive for journalists seeking a sensational headline.

Fitzgerald was alleged to be involved in branch stacking with a ‘votes for vouchers’ program that gave free meals in exchange for support. He also oversaw financial losses at the leagues club, which contradicted the lavish $400K salary he was paid.

As the club continued to struggle for on-field success, the voices of his detractors grew louder.

Chief among these were 1986 premiership winning players and club legends Ray Price, Eric Grothe Sr and Brett Kenny. In 2009, they put together a rival ticket named “3P – Parramatta, Pride and Passion”, which gathered strong support from the success-starved Eels members, gaining more than double the votes of Fitzgerald’s incumbents in the club’s bitterly fought May 2009 election.

This saw Fitzgerald unceremoniously dumped, and commenced a period of spitefulness and vitriol that has characterised the Eels’ front office ever since.

The 3P board initiated an investigation into Fitzgerald’s alleged ‘vouchers for votes’ program, and attempted to strip Fitzgerald of his Eels’ life membership. A purge of Fitzgerald appointed executives also followed.

Heading the 3P ticket was relatively unknown Sydney accountant and businessman Roy Spagnolo. Spagnolo was a long-time Eels tragic with a significant property empire, who was well known to Parramatta players and staff. He was popular among the playing group, having lavished them with lunches and free drinks since his introduction via future CEO Tony Zappia in 2000, and also previously held manager/advisor roles with players Luke Burt, Fui Fui Moi Moi and Eric Grothe Jr.

However, following his election in 2009, wrinkles began to appear in Spagnolo’s previously anonymous background.

In July 2009, prominent Sydney Morning Herald journalist Kate McClymont reported several irregularities in Spagnolo’s business track record. Despite Spagnolo’s wealth, McClymont noted a string of property development failures, which had left significant debts, usually with the same liquidator being appointed, and a pattern of suspicious activities that were investigated by the Australian Taxation Office for alleged ‘Phoenix’ type arrangements.

McClymont also noted Spagnolo’s association with ‘colourful’ members of the Australian Italian community, including disgraced real estate agent Pat Sergi (named at the Woodward royal commission into crime figure Robert Trimbole), convicted fraudster Roy Mittiga, pub owner Vince Lombardo (who was associated with the adult entertainment industry), and Tony Labbozzetta (who lobbied against the deportation of Mafia figure and convicted drug dealer Francesco Madafferi).

Despite this, thanks to a famous performance from young fullback Jarryd Hayne, the 3P ticket enjoyed initial success, with the Eels racing to the 2009 grand final despite a weak opening to the season.

New coach Daniel Anderson instilled an attacking style of play which greatly suited the Eels’ young and flamboyant players. Facing a Melbourne team loaded with star players, the Eels eventually succumbed in the grand final, extending the premiership drought for hapless fans.

Ironically, the Storm were subsequently stripped of their title, having been found guilty of systematically rorting the salary cap.

However, with a narrow grand final loss under their belts, Eels fans began to hope the tide was turning. The club had signed Hayne to a long-term contract, and set about trying to re-sign the squad that had taken them so close in 2009. Bookmakers installed them as premiership favourites, but the optimism quickly turned into disappointment, with Hayne largely anonymous after his breakout 2009 season, and other key players, like five-eighth Daniel Mortimer, dropped to reserve grade.

The team was unable to make the top eight, and with reports of tension among the playing group, Spagnolo and his team stepped in and fired Anderson as coach, less than one year after making the grand final.

New coach Stephen Kearney, the lauded World Cup winning coach of New Zealand, was appointed in 2011, however further disappointment followed for Eels fans, with the team narrowly avoiding the dreaded wooden spoon thanks to a final game of the season victory over the Gold Coast Titans. The team went on to gain consecutive wooden spoons in 2012 and 2013, with Kearney sacked and fans’ morale at an all-time low.

It was this backdrop that saw another former player from the 1986 premiership side, Steve Sharp, announce his intention to challenge the 3P ticket for control of the Eels board. Sharp assembled a team he called ‘ParraFirst’, with a platform of reforming the complicated club structure and constitution.

Since leaving rugby league, Sharp had worked in the plumbing industry, and most recently was employed by the NSW Government’s Fair Trading department, in a consumer affairs role. The ParraFirst team included a diverse group of relatively unknown and inexperienced businessmen – in hindsight, unusual for a club with an annual turnover of around $80 million.

Although Spagnolo’s team had turned around the financial performance of the leagues club, which was now generating profits, members had lost confidence in Spagnolo thanks to the Eels’ on-field performance and lack of big-name recruits. Sharp was ushered into power with a massive majority of votes.

Sharp continued the reign of vindictiveness that was seen in the directors before him, making a complaint to the NSW licensing body surrounding alleged improper behaviour of former directors, including Grothe Sr (who had continued to sell meat products to the club after his appointment as a director) and Mario Libertini (who had not declared his interest in pizza dough sales, despite being a director).

These actions resulted in more bad blood between the warring factions and a culture of bitterness which almost certainly culminated in existing Eels staff leaking information on salary cap breaches to the NRL and media.

Perhaps the most subjective assessment of the atmosphere can be found in the NSW Independent Liquor and Gaming Authority’s (ILGA) 2015 final decision into alleged irregularities under Spagnolo’s reign.

This document annexeed thousands of pages of evidence, and essentially summarised that, despite not acting dishonestly or in bad faith, the former 3P directors and officers were guilty of not being “fit and proper” by reason that they had “not demonstrated the degree of knowledge and skill that the Authority would expect from a reasonably competent director of a club of this scale”.

Tellingly, the report further noted that the ParraFirst members were “not gracious winners”, and “considers it likely that, in this closely contested environment, antipathy among rival groups seeking control of the Club ran both ways.”

On May 3, while announcing the NRL’s findings following its review into salary cap disclosures, CEO Todd Greenberg labelled the Eels “the most poorly managed club in the NRL”. Indeed, it is a source of great amusement for rival fans that, unlike other high-profile salary cap scandal, such as the Bulldogs and Storm, all the Eels have to show for their sins are two wooden spoons and a consistency of Septembers free from the rigours of finals football.

Yet, despite Parramatta’s failures, clearly the NRL is incentivised to ensure a sustainable Eels team, with the AFL and football making a strong push into traditional rugby league heartland in Sydney’s west.

As members and stakeholders plan for the future following the latest setback, they would do well to remember this beacon of wisdom from the ILGA report:

“The Club and its membership may consider the wisdom of electing directors for sentimental reasons, rather than a demonstrated capacity to run an enterprise of this scale.”