'One of the game's heartlands': Matty Johns' surprising pick for 18th NRL team

How about base them in Townsville, they can set up their headquarters and training facilities near to and share the new stadium.

Johns is better than anyone of you chicken folks. PNG love rugby. 8 Million plus population has full support for the PNG Hunters. PNG Government is very much into Rugby and sports in general. You have any idea how people here react when it comes to NRL? especially State Games leading to Grand Finals. PNG loves rugby. Why not PNG? I totally agree with Johns to include PNG to be the 18th NRL team.

That's how the Warriors operate, OS.

bring back the Bears even if on the Central Coast. They should have never been booted out in the first place.

I was wrong with that schedule. Just make it a 23 teams, 23 week 22 game normal season and every team gets a bye. Just add an extra week of finals to give everyone that rival / important game fixture. Or make it 24 teams, and have conferences with games against everyone twice in your conference and only play some teams outside your conference.

1. NZ is a small country, population 4,855,955 as of Thursday, May 13, 2021. 2. Rugby is played all over the world mostly as a minor sport. 3. Rugby is big in NZ and they beat all other countries regularly. The Warriors will get some support from NZ but it isn't enough to support two teams. Perth, with 2.667 million is a new market with potential that the NRL can support. RL is bigger in WA than it is in Victoria.

So say NRL goes to 23 teams, 26 week comp, 11 games a week (one team has bye). You play every team once and then you play another four games against local / important rivals (excluding finals where you might get to play that team you lost against earlier in the season, and it becomes a big thing playing against them again). PNG don't really add to the TV market, but it strengthens the international game, so PNG government pay the NRL $13 million a year etc to play in the comp, and then the NRL gives PNG team a grant of $13 million to spend that money on wages and costs for running their team the same as the rest of the NRL teams. You do it this way to ensure they are spending the same money on their team as all other teams in the competition for competition integrity and salary cap. PNG team will need further funding from their government to cover their additional club costs etc. But every team pays their own travel costs. What it means is that the NRL gets a bye every week without having to fund an odd number of teams with the tv broadcast of 11 games a week. Then you have 17) Dolphins, 18) Brisbane Jets (both teams tap into juniors and fans and strong corporate support) 19) NZ 2 (some rl fans, taps into juniors and pacific) 20) Perth 21) Adelaide (small juniors, national comp, makes volume of national conversation grow around RL, sponsorship from blue chips + new audiences) 22) Hawaii (franchise fans + future juniors and pacific juniors foundation + Aussie/NZ players will want to move there to play - US betting market and a small US tv deal. If Betting market and tv rights can pay for this team then it grows the international game in the pacific and RL as a whole) 23) PNG (self sustained, they fund the bye, they pay to get into comp and they mostly have PNG players, train and based in Cairns (cuts their away travel costs) and play most home games in Port Moresby . Then state competitions have QLD CUP - PNG reserve grade NSW CUP - Fiji, Warriors reserve grade, NZ2 reserve grade, Hawaii reserve grade (which picks players from Hawaii, Tonga, Samoa and other pacific nations). Fiji could end up being a second NSW cup team for an NRL team, and Hawaii might go two NSW cup teams, one traditional Sydney team and one their Pacific team. You expect that Pacific and PNG players that are first generation born in Aus/NZ, came from the Pacific/PNG as a child or as a teenager are going to play for any of the NRL teams. You also fund the Cup teams so that players can come out from those places and play in the Cup teams. Then you have end of year international Rugby League as per usual with the main Pacific nations of PNG, Samoa, Fiji, Tonga, Aus, NZ. You leave space for the smaller Pacific nations to play their tests and you find a way to include USA in the tests schedule as they are represented by Hawaii in NRL, and have their own amateur comps in US.

I understand the differences. IRL organise tournaments and test matches. They also seem to save nations from themselves as we’ve seen with Tonga and Samoa lately. The fact they have no money means they don’t help nations develop their talent. That falls back to governing body of each nation by hosting matches and driving commercial revenue from national sides. Unfortunately those governing bodies in smaller nations haven’t been redirecting the funds towards adequate development.

Speaking as someone born and raised in Fiji, I can assure you there are profound differences. Language for one. Also Fiji is part Melanesian and part Polynesian. Every nation has it way. RU understands this. RL seems to think that it's the NRL way or the highway. For the PNGRL to be "seen" not to be working is the fault of the IRL. It's not the NRL's duty to oversee IRL work.

In my experience I believe they could work on field due to Melanesian culture. The PNG public might not want that but if they were truly honest with themselves, they would understand they haven’t produced the way they should. 9-10M people with huge percentages that play the game and Olam is the only PNG developed talent to play NRL in 18 years since Bai. One of the main reasons Olam has made it in Melbourne is because he and Tui Kamikamica live together. Which is why I believe a team could work. Fiji with less than 1M people have produced more talent in those 18 years. PNG should do well and the world loves PNG RL and there’s people who want to help them. For some reason there seems to be a mentality that “this is PNG and this is how we do it” which is fine except it doesn’t seem to be working. When traditional Rugby Union island Nations are producing more RL talent and have leapfrogged them at international level.

Thanks for sharing links. I still think RL should persist with NZ and in particular the NRL with the Warriors. I think that with a second team, the volume of content (games and news) in NZ will cause the casual fan to take a bigger interest in RL. I have full faith memberships can be rebuilt and the game can prosper in NZ with two teams. It almost feels like RL has no choice but to expand in NZ. It also gives Warriors a rivalry, someone for each team to define themselves against, broadcasters and betting companies a game a week in NZ. Something Mascord has been going on about for a decade is that it doesn’t matter so much the quality of the content but the volume of the content. That being said there is no way that a second side with players from RL, RU even Mitre 10 Cup, Pacific Players etc wouldn’t make the Second Side a local success. Most Pacific supporters just want to see their players play and they get it, and their support between the codes is interchangeable. NZ locals will come around. I currently support a RL, RU and an AFL game a year. It can be done.

PNG and Fiji would never work. PNG needs to field its own team.

PNG Hunters are already based in QLD for 2021 and next year. The Hunters pay their own way into the Q Cup funded by sponsorship money. PNG government are loaning money via ScoMo hand over fist so not sure you can get them front up for PNG-NRL. Especially given they are staring down the barrel of Covid crisis and widespread corruption. Personally I think NZ2 would be a mistake, there’s just not a market their to support that. I do however like the idea of team based in Hawaii but who funds that if you don’t get the market? I think that frontier has to come after we capture the pacific nations who actually play the game already.

Promoting international RL doesn’t develop talent in pacific nations. It just makes governing bodies richer unfortunately. It’s not the NRL’s job to develop other nations talent. They should invest but currently it’s not their mandate. The NRL don’t even share intellectual property like coaching / refereeing resources with emerging nations.

Australian business run as a PNG franchise would be the only chance of making it work.

PNG and Fiji might work but the 4 of them? No real chance. By “might work” I mean the players, agreeable board? Absolutely no chance!

Asia Pacific Rugby league, basically looks after the Pacific nations, it’s a subsidiary of the international RL. The problem with the IRL is that they are flat broke - hence the push to get the World Cup going this year because they were so far down the hole with UK government funding the way. The NRL know they are penniless and try to bully their way to their favour (presumably to gain control of international RL). It’s believed that neither organisations or CEO’s are on speaking terms. It’s not NRL’s responsibility to develop talent other than Australian talent. IRL don’t have money to develop talent internationally as they can barely afford to put on tournaments / test matches. So pacific nations are left to develop their own programs. APRL are helping Samoa save themselves from themselves. They have just help Tonga get past themselves also (almost there). PNG overthrew their governing body 10 years ago. So while you could put great team together on the field. I dare say making it out of a boardroom might be the toughest part!

Hey we almost have the same name, wow. My Landcruser Ute is manufactured by Toyota. Best car I have ever owned. I love it and I love international RL. See ya Jimbo ( or is it Nelson).

Thanks for the insight . I always learn something on this site , it would be great to showcase talent and passion and sport has always been a great platform for crossing divides .

Couple of things with the story: I am only being a little bit facetious when I say that the NRL have effectively 16 Pasifika teams already, so Johns doesn't need to reinvent the wheel here. And 7 hours flight time Townsville to Port Moresby?? It might be if you are flapping your arms to get there. Anyone with a passing understanding of Papua New Guinea politics and business will know of the endemic corruption that almost defines the country. To think the NRL could base a team in Port Moresby is just pie in the sky stuff.