Magic Round 2023: Watch the NRL make a team disappear

One of the NRL’s biggest wins of the last few years has been Magic Round.

A full set of eight matches played at the one venue, Brisbane’s Suncorp, the concept has been a hit with the fans, the clubs and for the game’s coffers.

But with the Dolphins joining the competition in 2023, one of the many issues with an odd number of teams is that someone has to miss out on scoring an invite to Magic Round.

And according to Danny Weidler, in ’23 that team is set to be the Newcastle Knights.

“From what we have been told, it’s the Knights who will be punted,” Weidler wrote on the weekend.

“The way it was explained to me is that the decision was based on fan engagement at the last Magic Round. According to data obtained by the NRL, the Knights flopped – which is quite amazing when you consider the way their fans have stuck by a mediocre team.”

(On a completely unrelated matter, does anyone else get sick of Weidler changing from “we” to “me” sentence to sentence when referring to himself?)  

The issue was put to Knights CEO Phil Gardner, who gave the response of a man who has accepted his fate, saying, “We have heard rumours that we are the team to miss out next year. It’s not our major concern at the moment.”

Look, someone has to miss out. That’s just the way it’s going to be as long as there are an uneven number of teams in the comp.

(Photo by Ashley Feder/Getty Images)

As long as it’s being held in Brisbane, for obvious reasons, it’s not going to be the Broncos or the Dolphins to get the chop. The Titans get a pass too, given their proximity to the host city.

The reigning premiers should also be given a start, again for obvious reasons, and perhaps the minor premiers.

Other than those four (or five in years we have different minor premiers), every team should be in the discussion to miss out – and yes, that includes the Cowboys, because Melbourne is about as far away from Brisbane as Townsville.

But when the decision is passed down as to who misses out, the logic needs to be transparent and, hopefully, at least a little bit fair.

The most obvious way to do it is just on rotation – if you miss out this year, you won’t miss out again until every other team has missed out at least once. The chance of an 18^th team joining the league means every team missing out is unlikely to ever happen, but at least next year’s unlucky team would know they’re not getting stiffed again.

I’d suggest drawing numbers from a hat on an annual basis, with the premiers, southeast Queensland sides – or those based in the host city, should the round go on rotation – and those who have already missed out not being in the draw.

Or we simply use the ladder to make this call: come last, miss Magic Round. This would be a bit skewed due to the Dolphins, Broncos and Titans being ineligible – if we had 17 teams for all Magic Rounds, the Titans and Broncos should have missed out based on performance – but the lowest ranked team except the southeast Queensland sides has a modicum of fairness to it.

It would also have the added bonus of giving teams at the bottom of the table an extra reason to work to avoid the wooden spoon.

Instead, if Weidler’s logic is to be believed, the NRL are using what sounds like made-up logic to ensure they can utilise the most convenient sacrificial lamb.

The Knights just don’t get fan engagement in Brisbane? OK.

That could be because Newcastle have struggled on and off the field for the last decade or so, scoring way too many wooden spoons of their own. Who’s coming to watch that side?

Or it could be because, in the history of Magic Round, the NRL has given them essentially no chance to score high on fan engagement.

In 2022, the Knights faced the Bulldogs – who were the reigning wooden spooners – in the dreaded 6pm Friday timeslot. No one really talked about the Knights after their victory either because because all media and fan engagement around that game was focussed on Trent Barrett, who was sacked as Canterbury’s coach within 48 hours.

(Photo by Jason McCawley/Getty Images)

No one cares about the Knights? Maybe no one cares about the club playing the worst team in the league, at the worst time of the whole weekend.

If Newcastle had played the Broncos in the 8pm game on Saturday, they’d have got huge engagement.

Numbers may not lie but when it comes to data, it’s a garbage-in-garbage-out process. Newcastle were dealt the worst hand by the NRL, so it’s a bit rich for the same people to turn around and use a lack of engagement as the reason they can’t come next year.

And yes, the Knights men were hot garbage as a team in 2022, but that wasn’t to be known when the draw for the year was done at the end of 2021. In fact, heading into the 2022 season, Newcastle were back-to-back finalists. Yet they still played the worst team at the worst time for Magic Round.

Not for nothing either, but the Knights have been given a dud deal at Magic Round every year – facing the Tigers in 2021 and the Dogs, again, in 2019, with both those games receiving the 3pm Saturday slot.

No fan engagement? Based on those three fixtures, who’d bother to engage?

Again, someone has to miss out. And, again, the Knights were hot garbage last year. But then so were the Tigers. So were the Warriors. The Dogs pulled it out at the end but their year was overall pretty ordinary, while the reverse timeline but same outcome is true of the Sea Eagles.

For now, I guess we have to give the NRL the benefit of the doubt. When asked for comment by Weidler, a spokesperson refused to engage, giving the response, “Each team is allocated three byes during the 27-round season. The team allocated a bye during Magic Round is a factor of the overall draw and bye distribution. It is likely the team allocated the bye in Magic Round will be rotated each season.”

Maybe HQ will come out with a fair and equitable reason why a given team is missing out in 2023.

Or maybe they’ll simply saw one club in half, then make like Houdini.