Tradition be damned: It's time to take grand final away from Sydney to highest bidder

Hands up if you support a team based in an area that you don’t live near? I have mine up.

Okay. Now keep your hands up if you are happy to hit the highway to go and see a few games during the season. Yes, that’s what I thought.

You have no problems travelling to support your team. Same here.

Alright, now for those of you that do live near their team, have you ever made a road trip for an away game? Grabbed your mates, loaded up on snacks, hopped in the car, and had a footy adventure? Yep, I knew it, and I bet you had a blast.

One more question. If your team made it to the grand final, would you be happy to hop on a train, or get on a plane, or fill up the petrol tank, and get your butt to wherever it is they were playing? Yep, me too.

ARL Commission chairman Peter V’landys has not so subtly floated the idea of moving around the location of the NRL grand final, and I for one am all for it.

(Photo by Matt King/Getty Images)

And for the life of me I cannot believe there are still people stuck in the past and who think this is a bad idea, or that people will not go to it.

NSW Premier Dominic Perrottet and Queensland counterpart Annastacia Palaszczuk are busy getting their arguments and chequebooks ready to try to convince V’landys why their state should hold the grand final.

I’ve got bad news for them: it won’t just be a battle between the cockroaches and the cane toads.

Dan Andrews will be getting ready to throw his hat in the ring to have it at the MCG and Jacinda Ardern will be getting all her sheep in a row to hold it over in New Zealand.

We are already heading to Perth for an Origin match this year. Watch Mark McGowan put up his hand to host another rugby league spectacle.

In 2015, more than 82,000 fans crammed into ANZ Stadium to watch the Brisbane Broncos and the North Queensland Cowboys fight it out in one of the most exciting grand finals. Two teams that are based in a completely different state packed out the ground.

And do you know why? Because some of their fans live in NSW, others were happy to travel to support their team, and the rest just love the footy and wanted to be able to witness a grand final.

Thanks to COVID, last year’s Penrith Panthers versus South Sydney premiership battle was held at Suncorp Stadium and only 75 per cent capacity was allowed.

(Photo by Chris Hyde/Getty Images)

And do you know what? Every available seat was snapped up. And NSW fans didn’t even contribute to the numbers because they weren’t allowed to travel!

It was all Queenslanders – whether supporters of either side or just fans of the game so excited to finally get to see a grand final live.

I love when a club takes one of their home games out to a regional area. The whole town gets behind both teams and the game is always packed out.

Regardless of the team the locals follow, they are just so happy to watch some live footy. An NRL grand final would be exactly the same.

My goodness, we are looking at taking a game to America next year, and people are whinging about the grand final not being played in Sydney?

It really shouldn’t matter where it is held. The Super Bowl location is changed every year, and it seems to be working out just fine.

And if your only argument is ‘but the NFL only shares the Super Bowl around to places that actually have a team’, then we will just have to tell Mark in WA he may need to sit this one out – because NSW, Queensland, Victoria, and New Zealand all tick the box.

I know the NFL and NRL are very different, but when you break it down, they are both two sports, with many teams spread far and wide, who handle their championship match differently.

(Photo by Andy Lyons/Getty Images)

One has successfully shown that it doesn’t matter if you play the best game of the year in a place where possibly no teams will be from – the fans, the locals, the mind-blowing half-time entertainment, and the ridiculous list of superstars will come.

And our sport for some reason says it wants to grow but then contradicts itself, and its fans have a sooky la la about a game that so many of them have never been to or have no intention of ever going to being shared around because it’s not fair.

It’s not tradition. Well, tradition was when we only had teams from Sydney. We are now a competition spread across three states and even over the ditch – and the fans are spread even further.

I absolutely love the idea of the grand final not always being based in Sydney. Let’s move it around, allow it to spread its wings, and make some new friends.

Sell it to the highest bidder. Draw up a rotating roster. Pull a name out of a hat, I really don’t care.

But please, don’t let stubbornness get in the way of bettering our sport. Let the game grow and allow the brilliance of a grand final day be shared by many.

We have to get out of our own way to see the light and realise how magnificent it could be.

There are countless NRL fans around the country and across the ditch that would be more than happy to travel wherever they needed to to be there to watch their team hold up the trophy.

V’landys and co just need to trust they will, and take the leap.

I’m pretty sure in the movie Field of Dreams, Kevin Costner was told, “If you book it, they will come”. Or something like that.