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Once again, the NRL hauls itself from a week of both real and confected dreck into an incredible weekend’s football.
We’re coming to the business end of one of the most exciting finals series I can remember. Six games, three decided by one point, and most in the balance into their closing stages.
Even the one real blowout, when St George Illawarra belted Brisbane in Week 1, was enthralling, as we either indulged in schadenfreude at the Broncos’ effort or wondered out loud that surely even the Dragons couldn’t let the game slip.
Week 2 saw two pulsating games full of tension, angst, aggro and dumbfounding decisions with huge consequences.
I don’t follow any of the teams, left but I was absorbed in the two contests and for a neutral, that closeness of competition is what the NRL finals brings year after year.
But as close as the games were, this weekend’s preliminary finals tell a familiar tale. Of the 28 preliminary finalists under the current finals system (including 2018), 25 of the participants had finished in the top four.
That’s a comprehensive rebuttal to those of us who thought a team from outside the top four could wreak some havoc.
Preliminary final weekend brings some fantastic matchups and questions. Can the Sharks and Bunnies get up again after tough, sapping battles? Does Shane Flanagan put Paul Gallen out there knowing his shoulder is busted and he might not get through 80 minutes, let alone a potential grand final?
Photo by Mark Kolbe/Getty Images
Can Mitch Aubusson really cover Latrell Mitchell’s absence for the Roosters? Can Cameron Murray repeat his game-changing efforts for the Bunnies under even more pressure than before? Should Greg Inglis even be out there (answer: no)?
Finally – How will the rested teams play this? Are the Storm and Roosters going to try to go to work early and coast home, or will they get ready to grind and rely on being fitter at the death? I’m going with the latter, mainly because those two can’t help themselves – they love a grind and that’s what they do.
From 12 preliminary finals under the current system, eight times the team who had the week off has won. That’s reasonably comprehensive, but small as it is, at least there’s a chance fans of Cronulla and Souths can hang on to.
This weekend we’re also going to farewell some true legends of rugby league, with Cronulla’s Luke Lewis, and Melbourne’s Billy Slater and Ryan Hoffman possibly fronting up for the last time. Depending on the outcomes, more players might pull the pin too.
It’s going to be a huge weekend which demands and deserves a huge audience.
This week there’s a lot of focus on crowds and TV ratings, particularly after the NRL announced following the regular season that crowd numbers were up. On top of that, the NRL handsomely swatted the AFL’s regular season ratings.
Those figures have well and truly flipped now.
Even though the quality of the games in these AFL finals has been putrid, they’re easily outrating the NRL.
Let’s be honest though – does that really bother you? Personally, the whole code wars about ratings doesn’t interest me and, if anything, the gap should be wider.
Have a think about this: the AFL’s four remaining teams are four of the most heavily supported teams in the competition and report a combined membership total of 300,798 people.
The combined membership total of the NRL’s 16 team competition is 332,996 people.
Whatever one fan thinks of the other game and how they market, value and count memberships, there’s a fundamental difference in how both groups enjoy their chosen sport.
AFL fans in Melbourne go to games, NRL fans in Sydney don’t. No amount of excuses about stadium locations or public transport inadequacies change this.
Photo by Cameron Spencer/Getty Images
To paraphrase something I saw on social media this week – in Sydney, a train could drop fans literally at the front gate of the stadium and people would still not go because they weren’t being carried to their seat.
What’s the solution? Play games at local grounds in Cronulla, Penrith and such? Maybe for Week 1, maybe for Week 2. But at some point, you’ve got to give more fans access to a game of finals football and they need to be played at the premier venues.
On Friday night, Melbourne will play Cronulla at the same time as an expected 100,000 people will be literally across the road in the MCG. The Storm will get a decent crowd, but it’ll be tough to sell the place out.
If you’re not going to a game because it’s on TV, fair enough. That’s your choice. But if you then sit on the couch and ridicule or lament the empty stands, you’ve got to at least have the self-awareness to admit that you’re part of the NRL’s crowd problem.
In any event – watch for Saturday’s game at Moore Park to be chock full and then people to complain that it wasn’t played at Homebush so more people could get in.
I’m really looking forward to this week’s games. Regardless of history, both ‘underdogs’ are a genuine chance to win and that’s just the way it should be.
I just hope that from the highs of the weekend, we don’t find ourselves inexorably drawn back into talking about anything but the grand final and the teams involved.
Weekends like the one just gone, full of high-quality, engrossing matches are the reason why the game of rugby league has always been able to rescue itself from drowning in the relentless negativity and ridicule from vested interests.
(And while it’s easy to say so, it’s not entirely the media’s doing. Players and administrators can be found happily drilling holes in their own boat.)
But the day may come when the drama on the field might not be enough to rescue the game from the drama off it. What happens then?