The Parramatta Eels will play against the Canterbury Bankstown Bulldogs in Round 10 on Friday night, and as an Eels supporter and a general fan of rugby league, this is an issue.
The first and most obvious issue is that this is one match on the NRL calendar that Eels fans crave above all and it can and should be used to open the first four rounds of the season. To kickstart the year you want the fans to be passionate and driven; rivalries should be the major selling piece in achieving this passion and drive.
Yes, an argument could be made for making supporters wait for such rivalries, it could create a want and desire for the games ahead which could be true, until you break down the draw and realise you play most teams twice in a season and you can have the best of both worlds because the rematch is on the horizon.
This brings me to the second issue: too much of a good thing is a bad thing. We were lucky to see one of the other great rivalries in the match against the Penrith Panthers in Round 1’s battle of the west, but we also saw a repeat of this rivalry four weeks later. We also met the Sea Eagles in the second game of the year only to play them again five weeks later.
In fact after ten rounds of NRL the Bulldogs will be the sixth team Parramatta has played in the opening ten weeks – the Canberra Raiders are the only other of these teams that will have played once, and they only play them once this year.
(AAP Image/Craig Golding)
With two matches each against the Sea Eagles, Tigers, Panthers and Sharks, where is the balance and where is the desire when the opening nine rounds are like Groundhog Day?
The game is becoming stale, and the solution is to try something new and fresh. An idea suggested by Parramatta CEO Bernie Gurr is to break the competition into two eight-team conferences. Each conference plays within themselves once, amounting to seven matches opening the year. Then they combine to play teams from the other conference, amounting to eight matches.
By Round 15 everyone has played each other once, and we then finish of the year playing the second round of the conference, amounting to another seven matches, finishing up with a 22-match competition.
East versus west, north versus south – there probably isn’t a perfect mix, but neither is the current format. A major positive to the reduced competition is that it opens the door for all representative games to be standalone on weekends, and with the rise of the Pacific nations and the women’s game, this doesn’t need to be only Origin and the Anzac test.
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On a final note, the topic of expansion is always in the media, and the NRL seems to have no real model to achieve this. Maybe instead of procrastinating they should look at a second-tier competition, with the grand finalists from the new competition replacing 15th and 16th-placeed teams in the first-tier competition.
Open the market, expand to the Pacific nations and to regional areas of Australia, bring back Newtown, Western Suburbs and the Bears.
Lastly, control the salary cap and remove the grey area of third-party deals. Make player salaries public and transparent.
Crosscoder
Roar Guru
The sooner a Perth side and a 2nd Brisbane are added to the NRL,the better.It would make scheduling a lot easier, in terms of local derbies,placing teams for that horrible 6pm Friday time slot. Why would anyone in their right mind have local derbies on a Thursday night as happens now? 6pm Tv ratings on Fox hardly set the world on fire, why not a Sunday afternoon time slot couldn't do any worse, and at least afford families the opportunity to attend. FTA TV is on the decline over many contents, streaming is getting bigger, and who knows what new technology is around the corner. Hence the reason the NRL has spent $150m on a Digital Dept,as a backup for the future.. The code needs to reduce the number of premiership rounds to 22,have one round for internationals. IMO it's overkill ATM.
Ben Wilson
Roar Rookie
Speaking about schedule rethinks how about we give the rep players a break and taking a month off during origin time- we preach inclusion in our sport yet kiwi english and polynesian players are excluded from origin and must watch on in wonder as a spectator. I do not wish to change origin in any way- would love to see an origin winner play a kiwi/eng/pacific island tournament winner thou. Lets take a break and give rep week some support. Representing your country will always be the highest honor and allowing all nationalities to compete means the best players play. We could do double headers, the international game would become competitive. We could showcase our game to the world.
Big Daddy
Guest
Do you really think that they would take any notice. I think they have a real problem understanding what the public wants. But they have had enough years and still can't work it out. I think they pander to chanel no 9 and Fox .
mushi
Roar Guru
I'd like fans to come up with their full scheudle and submit it to the NRL
Nat
Roar Guru
Newcastle supporters always make the effort but make no mistake it is an effort for those who live in town but moreso those who make the trek in to support their team. As a % Canberra supporters working bankers hours would be as high as anyone but their crowds can be low too in those instances. A fair portion of NQ supporters travel hundreds of KM to support their team. By comparison, Hurstville to SCG is 23km. Redfern to SCG - I could walk. Heavy traffic, take a train, It's 500m further from Sydney Central to SCG than Roma St to Suncorp and tens of thousands do that. I guess we should exploit regional supporters because Sydneysiders cannot fathom a game not in their backyard.
Your kidding
Guest
The schedule is a joke. For example, they had the grand final replay between the Storm and Cowboys up against the opening season AFL game in Melbourne. Then there were complaints about the low attendance at the NRL game. How can dumb decisions like this can be continuously be made is baffling. Plus teams playing each other twice within 4 weeks, Friday night Broncos, big games played at 6pm Friday etc. Very amateurish. Luckily some of the double headers and creative counting of crowds have masked over poor attendances. The NRL has control over scheduling and is doing a crap job of it. A lot of people were expecting things to improve but it's no better than before.
CraigT79
Roar Rookie
Totally Agree, even without the conference idea ensuring everyone plays once before the 2nd round of games should be a no brainier. I think the point of Burnie Gurrs Idea was to spark the conversation and get some kind of change, but instead it went mostly unnoticed and the NRL has continued on their merry way creating a joke of a drawer where you can play 4 teams twice in 9 weeks. It was also about finding a justifiable way to reduce the games played and hence reduce player fatigue by allowing for the standalone origin and tests series. We want to see our teams play at full strength and still have our Origin Fix, I feel for the Dragons this year with an estimated 6 players likely to be picked for NSW, not to mention two key players potentially heading overseas for the Denver Test.
Tommo
Guest
My other issue is the Bye. The Bye was instigated when there was an uneven number of teams, rather than to give the sides "two weekends off a year". For those worried about "player burnout", remember there also used to be a mid-week knockout competition...(Wednesday nights). As for scheduling, well it used to be simple...all games were played Sunday @ 3pm except for match of the round which was on Saturday @3pm...
Tommo
Guest
I believe it would be easier for the crowd to get to those games in those timeslots. Witness the impressive crowd at Newcastle on Friday night.
Nat
Roar Guru
I think the NRL is too small and centralised for a conference system. a 100yo comp with the bulk centered in Sydney already has plenty of rivalry; Souths/Easts, Souths/Dragons, Manly/WT, Parra/Penrith, Parra/Dogs, Dogs/WT (no doubt more) as they date back to suburban pride and (maybe) some GF battle from years ago. I cannot imagine a Parra supporter (as an example) buying a Penrith flag for a conference title game against Manly. I think we would need to expend to multiple teams in every capital city along with regionals. In that instance, if your A Sydney team was knocked out, you may support B team through the finals because they represent your city.
Paul
Roar Guru
The Americans have had conferences in their major sports for years and are still whinging about it, mostly because the conferences are far from equal. This applies not only across the conferences but within conferences This would be the case right now if you had a north versus south conference. In the south would be Saints, Warriors, Storm, Rabbitohs, Roosters, Sharks, Raiders and maybe Parra. This gives 6 teams in the top 8 and the team coming last in one conference and the rest in the other. The simple answer is not to schedule more than one game against another side till the second half of the season. In other words, each side plays whom ever once in rounds 1 - 12 and once in rounds 13 - 245.
CraigT79
Roar Rookie
I think the idea for the conference is to create further rivalry across the competition. If your team isn't performing you may be forgiven for cheering another team through the final series from your conference.
Nat
Roar Guru
I think we all agree the schedule is ludicrous as there doesn't seem to have any reason why some teams should be playing each other twice in only a few rounds. I cannot see the point in 2 conferences though unless your just lookig for some type consolation 'conference winner' title. Surely it's less complicated just to the majority of teams play each other twice.
Nat
Roar Guru
Why should "those games" be shifted to regional areas?
Cadfael
Roar Guru
On the 8 team conferences, I like the idea but 8 teams isn't enough. Yo games a week, not Expand to 20 teams and play two 10 team conferences.
Cadfael
Roar Guru
Rugby union does it but those games are live from NZ.
Edward Kelly
Roar Guru
I imagine that the schedule was out-sourced to a 5 minute company with no NRL experience. It is a mess.
Tommo
Guest
the schedule is a farce. Last year you had the "Heritage" clash between StGeorge Illawarra and Souths at the SCG...at 6pm on a Friday night...and then had the NRL complain about a low attendance. I know many fans of both teams who were ropable as they were unable to get to the game as they were just finishing up work, or had to travel from Gosford / Canberra etc. Many would have gone to the game if it had been at 8pm. When will the NRL finally figure out it is suicide to schedule games in Sydney at 6pm on Fridays? Those games should be limited to NQLD, Newcastle or Canberra...or better still gotten rid of.