Politics is a ruthless, take-no-prisoners business. Australian rugby league? According to those who’ve had a go at both, it’s far worse.
That’s why I wonder – after reading a Q&A with Peter Beattie that colleague Phil Rothfield did in Sydney’s Daily Telegraph – whether the former Queensland premier knows what he’s got himself into.
Firstly, he says he won’t take the job unless the new club and state delegates on the Australian Rugby League Commission vote for him. That’s tempting fate.
But secondly, he straps himself to the mast marked ‘expansion’ – the favourite word of many fans and the least favourite of many clubs.
Asking the current clubs to vote for expansion is like, as they say in the classics, asking turkeys to vote for Christmas. A TV rights pie that is tipped to get smaller, divided more ways.
These are clubs, remember, who are trying to stop their players travelling internationally for internationals on a weekend where there are no club games. Who killed off the World Club Series after three years. Who screwed every last cent out of the NRL.
It seems woefully naïve of Beattie to say he’ll “stake my future in the game on this. We can’t have the clubs and head office at loggerheads. We are only going to make this game even better if we work together.”
If it is true “if we’re having barnies, we’re only undermining the game” then Peter better invest in a spade and one of those hardhats with a light on the front. There’s plenty of mining to be done.
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Hope you’re renting at Balmain, Peter. Your move south may prove somewhat premature; your professed love of Wests Tigers home games at Leichhardt is about to be put to the test. You could be there lining up for the gates to open and be the last person out, you’ll have so much time on your hands.
I like Beattie’s idea of, essentially, promotion without relegation. You show in the state leagues that you are up to it, and you might get the 18th franchise (assuming Perth is the 17th).
This sort of incentive for NSW and Queensland Cup teams is what those competitions need – imagine associating every success and failure of the Hunters, Fiji, the West Coast Pirates, Ipswich and Central Queensland with ‘that will/won’t help their chances of an NRL licence’. Fantastic.
Perth is an interesting one. Everyone involved in the WARL is now an NRL employee, so it would be difficult for them to accept an offer to join, say, Super League – even if Andrew ‘Twiggy’ Forrest is willing to finance it.
But with direct flights soon to start from Perth to London, the NRL doesn’t have infinite time to make its intentions known.
Also, I’d like Beattie to take an interest in the International Federation – certainly more of an interest than the ARLC is currently showing by allowing itself to be represented there by a soon-to-be-former chairman. Ideally, Beattie should sit on the RLIF himself.
John Grant is RLIF bound. (AAP Image/Paul Miller)
Of course, the clubs won’t openly oppose Beattie’s appointment. They’ll probably even vote for him. Then they’ll try to wear him down, play politics, give with one hand a take with the other. He’ll think that a lifetime in politics has prepared him for it, but…
As someone I know is fond of saying, with the clubs what’s theirs is theirs and what’s yours is theirs too. And now they’re getting two seats on the ‘independent’ commission.
Now, I’ve had a couple of clubs complain that I’ve painted them unnecessarily negatively, got phone calls and emails insisting they love the game and aren’t the sticks in the mud I’ve portrayed them to be.
But the Denver game still isn’t on. Work with Beattie just the way he says he wants to, guys.
Prove me wrong.
Malo
Guest
Yeah they need 4 new teams, 2 in qld , central coast and another Nez side
Charlie
Guest
Peter Beattie. OMG! What a ridiculous suggestion. If you want the NRL to be about one person, Peter Beattie, then go ahead. He will make a mess of it but without a massive tax payer funded spin machine to cover fo him there will be nowhere to hide. I love league, please don't do this!
elvis
Guest
80 billion in debt, and nothing got done while he was premier in case it affected his popularity.
Drongo
Guest
‘Singlehandedly stuffed Queensland’. Care to explain exactly what is ‘stuffed’ about Qld and how Peter Beatie caused it? From where I sit, it all looks pretty fabulous. Peter was a good and very successful Premier. Is a good man. Was and still is very popular. His only real fault, doesn’t drink and a bit of a party pooper.
woodart
Guest
league isnt big enough in welly to support a nrl team. various aussie teams have bought games to the caketin over the years ,but the crowds have slowly dwindled. an aussie rules team has been playing one game a year in welly for the last three years and each year the crowd number has halved.league is slowly loosing ground in New Zealand and nrl games arent helping .
Fred
Guest
And no, Ipswich or Logan do not have GDPs of more than 20 billion.
Qlder, qlder.
Guest
Yep, Beattie is also a narcissist who now happily bags the party that gave him everything he has as a News Limited employed Murdoch stooge. What he knows about rugby league could be written on the head of a pin in texta.
Marco
Guest
Just like Greenberg, Beattie will feed the media and fans spin they want to hear. Just like it's always been. Stadiums, expansion,women's league etc. Fans love this talk, but nothing much seems to happen.
BA Sports
Guest
There are actually 9 Melbourne based teams (Richmond, Western Bulldogs, Carlton, Hawthorn, St Kilda, North Melbourne, Collingwood, Melbourne and Essendon) plus Geelong. They all average over 30,000 to home games except North Melbourne. This is largly because a) the culture of the AFL in Melbourne and b) Those nine melbourne teams splay their home games at two venues - The MCG and Etihad (or whatever it is called now). So fans have to travel the same distance no matter if there team is home or away. As we know in Sydney, that simply isn't possible and we know away fans don't travel especially Manly, Penrith and Cronulla - and given the traffic and distance, it is understandable. So you can't compare the two. As for the lost fans... The Magpies cracked 8,000 in attendance four times in their last season. The Tigers at the all sacred Leichhardt had six crowds below 8,500. If you scroll through the Leichhardt crowds from when they began to regularly keep them in the late 1950's, there is no discernible growth in those crowd numbers. Balmain were not growing over a 50 year period. If you haven't got a club with the potential to grow - why not go to another market with potential? If you lost 40,000 fans in Sydney (where you have enough fans to absorb that and have the foundation to let it re-grow through future generations) and gained greater than 40,00 fans in a new market like Perth - surely that is a win? Or better yet - You do what the Lions did for a while and a Sydney Club relocate 8 games for the first few seasons (they will still have 4 home games in Sydney plus other away games in Sydney anyway), you may lose some but not all of those Sydney fans and you gain the new fans.
Fred
Guest
Their "far more fans" would simply be Broncos fans switching to a new team - i.e bringing nothing to the game. PNG, Perth, Wellington, Adelaide would all bring new fans.
Big Daddy
Guest
Emcee and RandyM, I think they will need more than locals and state league player's unless they become feeder club's to an NRL team. I think it's a great idea for both regions and will need to be competitive to justify inclusion in NRL.
Bearfax
Roar Guru
Those clubs such as Glebe and Newtown, could be absorbed effectively into neighbouring teams. But what of North Sydney? Its become a Rugby League desert, losing probably around 10-15000 regular supporters from the game. Then there are the amalgamations of St George and Illawarra and the West-Balmain mix. In both instances total crowds now attending those games are as much as 10-15000 short of of the total of the individual teams regular supporters. I wonder how many St George supporters go to Illawarra matches and how many Balmain supporters go to Campbelltown fixtures. The game has lost up to 40-50000 supporters in the Sydney region in the past 20 years. This despite an almost 25% population increase. The AFL have 8 Melbourne based teams and Geelong on the periphery. The NRL has 8 Sydney based teams and one on the periphery (St George-Illawarra). The AFL has no problems with its 8 + 1 Melbourne teams and it has a marginally smaller population. I would suggest its not the number of teams that present the problem but rather how the game is being promoted. I'm for expansion, but if the Sydney sides are economically viable why lose more supporters by relocating them. Add outside teams, sure, but not at the expense of viable teams already in the comp.
Scott
Guest
Good article Steve. Beattie has the kahunas to make hard decisions. If the game expands to the correct markets both commercially but more importantly from a junior development and participation level, the new TV deal will draw greater $ from wider markets which means clubs will still get their fair share.
BA Sports
Guest
Oh you mean like the South QLD Crushers and the average home attendance of 8,854 they got in their last two seasons of their three season existence.. In comparison to say... the Adelaide Rams with an average home attendance of 10,985 over their two seasons... "Far more fans" hey...
Choco Muffin 911
Guest
"On The Teat" Pete.
BA Sports
Guest
no.. Newton were playing as recently as the 80's, the Balmain Tigers as recently as 1999. Point is moving or removing teams from the Sydney basin is something that started at the end of the 1908 season (Cumberland) and has happened repeatedly over the next 100 years. There was then Annandale, Glebe, University (1937) Newton in 83, the 4 merger clubs in 98 and Norths/Manly and Souths in 99... Unfortunately they brought back Souths... it isn't a new thing for clubs to go by the wayside one way or another in Sydney. If one of those six merger clubs or Souths had gone to Perth in 1998 - the game would be so much more established as a national league, but we lost 20 years because of narrow sightedness and people not willing to make a tough decision - like the AFL did with South Melbourne in the 80's and FItzroy (two foundation clubs) in the 90's.
Henry Hill
Roar Rookie
Brisbane is still an existing market though. The NRL needs to expand into new markets to grow the fan base, which is why Perth and Adelaide need to be considered.
Emcie
Roar Guru
WA already has a state league that they can draw from
Jeff dustby
Guest
Oh dear, are you trying to compare 2018 with sides from 100 years ago ? You are a special one aren't you ?
Jeff dustby
Guest
Considerably more than that The average Brisbanite has 100 times the earnings of a PNG person It's also not one of the worlds most dangerous places Expansion is not places dots on a map A second Brisbane side would have more fans than a side in Adelaide