‘All-out civil war’: Angry NSWRL threaten ARLC over funds

In 2023 the NRL expands to a 17-team competition. Already with a 16-team competition, no team plays every other team twice. That is what the competition should have. A home and away game against each team in the competition. It is now at the point where it is becoming more viable to split the competition into two conferences to ensure its viability. Already the season is too long. Specifically, from the player's perspective, they barely get a break when the season ends before the next pre-season begins. It also makes things difficult to squeeze in representative games, particularly Origin. This becomes fatiguing for elite players, who can suffer from burn out. There has to be a more sensible way to grow the competition than to just keep adding teams until finally all teams play each other only once! "As for expansion, if you don’t expand then you die." That is the mantra the NRL keeps saying, and they use as their casus belli for their war with the NSWRL. In the past, the NRL have alluded to the fact that there are too many teams in Sydney. This makes it difficult for the NRL to expand without having a competition that is bloated with teams when there is not enough elite talent to support this growth without it having a detrimental effect on the quality of the product as a whole. Abandoning grassroots development will only exacerbate this problem. The problem with the debate about culling Sydney based teams is that the supporters of teams that are not affected by this process are eager to see it happen while supporters, like myself, who support a Sydney based team have no interest in seeing their team merged, relocated or relegated to a second tier competition. Been there, done that. Never again, thanks!

I will ignore the lawyer paid to confirm the opinion of his client. The NSWRL lawyer will say the opposite V'Landys thinks he has the power here and has sided with the clubs to shore up his power, but who is right here will end up being decided by the courts

My money is on V’Landys. It would surprise me immensely if Politis and Peponis resigned for anything other than self interest, rather than in support of Mr Nobody who was nobbled in the lead up to elections. They don’t want to be possibly fatally wounded by what will likely be a defeat. This way they can come back and say, ‘ Look, that other business was nothing to do with us’. Brett Walker SC is no fool. If he has ticked the box it’s game over.

Ok thanks for that however the NRL lawyer has made the following statement " “the NSWRL has fundamentally failed to follow its own constitutional processes in relation to the February elections to the NSWRL Board.” As always in these things, they are never as simple as they seem.

The conflict of interest is that Mezzatesta is a paid employee of an affiliated club. Mezzatesta can not be an independent director (key word is independent, which is the role he is standing for), as he is paid by Cronulla. That goes against the constitution of the NSWRL

You are on to it Glory B. The are a few of us here that have been alluding to this here for a few weeks . It's big stakes, content, future rites, control of even the intellectual property. I think it's a corporate grab of ugg boot proportions. But anything that takes funding away from grass roots development and lower competitions to me seems self-destructive . Especially when you look at how AFL pours money into participation and expansion.

This is about redirecting funds from grass roots and country league to give more to NRL clubs

NSWRL say it is a conflict of interest but do not say what that conflict is. A conflict of interest might be if he lives in, works for, has a close relative who works for QRL or has previously shown allegiance to QRL but I don't know that any of them apply so what it is, I don't know. The NRL are supposed to have investigated and feel that their assertion is bogus hence the demand that elections are re-held.

Another way of looking at it is that the NRL hijacked without permission or authority a sport that had 110+ years of building, volunteers and participation behind it, all without shedding an ounce of effort themselves. Then without any feedback or consultation with grass roots League they bastardise it by glitzing it up for TV, manipulating the rules and piggy backing on it's success, to make as much profits annually as the entire cities of Melbourne and Brisbane combined. The sport became a business and lost even more of it's humanity. Then they turn their backs on their benefactor and say "we'll take your best players but don't expect any help". They not only refuse to feed the duck that laid the golden egg but now they refuse to even acknowlege them. Petty, short sighted and utterly, deeply ungrateful. The parallels between an unappreciative rich arrogant spoiled millennial and a elderly, indignant and impoverished great grandparent is obvious and tragic.

I'm disappointed at the lack of detail in all the reports. - What was the rule that prevented Mezzatesta running? - Why did the same rule not exclude Peponis and Politis (given all three seem to hold the same role in different clubs)? - Has anyone else ever been excluded under the same rule? . .

Hi Glory, Why do you think that the NRL is trying to reduce the number of Sydney based teams ? In my view this would not make any sense particularly when (if ?) there are other avenues to interstate expansion are available. Only an organisation that was vested in one place would want to deny that expansion opportunities largely live outside of traditional rugby league heartlands. Does anyone know what the supposed conflict of interest is between NSWRL and Dino ? I can find little on it on the internet. As for expansion, if you don't expand then you die. That is why the AFL have pumped so much money forcing their product into none traditional and neutral areas. Its pretty obvious that we need to at least push into some of those same areas particularly where there is financial benefit. I want to see our sport go from strength to strength and to be played in every city in Australia. I want every rugby league game on free to air not get its nose pushed out by a never ending expansion of that awful game and if NSWRL is getting in the way of that then you can guess what I think NSWRL should do.

Fully agree that this game needs to be spending its money on the game not lawyers but sometimes you have to stand up for what you believe is right.

True, but it is these kinds of political power plays by the two state governing bodies that is at the root of why this game has struggled for decades. NSWRL still believes that it has the right to dictate what happens in the game and how the game should be run. It is high time that the NRL under the auspices of Peter Vlandys ran every aspect of Rugby League in this country. This is a case of the tail trying to wag the dog as it has done for decades.

We have been dancing around the elephant in the room on football forums for years now. The NRL want to expand the game into other states and geographical regions to increase its broadcasting boundaries and increase their market share. At present, the competition has expanded as far as it can without imploding back in on itself. At present 56.25% of the teams in the competition come from one capital city alone. The NRL quietly believes that their ambition to expand the game into other states and untapped markets is undermined by the 9 Sydney teams bottleneck. It cares not that 6 of the current top 9 teams are Sydney based clubs. Remember, this isn't about the competitiveness of sides in the competition, but rather about boosting revenue streams by expanding their product into new demographics, new time zones and new commercial opportunities. The NRL biding their time and trying to thin the herd. They have a long game strategy which will only come to fruition after a game of musical chairs between the 9 Sydney based clubs with the sole purpose of reducing the number of Sydney based teams.

Forget the game just play politics. this what p####s off the fans