RL fans who do not understand how RLIF and the international side of RL work are the most dangerous fans to the game. They offer opinions that help no one and they would rather our game continue to be small biscuits instead of the large future we have.

The dye is cast. We are doing this so sit back and pipe down.

The right ideas, the wrong conclusions.

Monday and Thursday football stinks..

We need more earlier kick-off times.. I do not care if our tv deal is smaller then.. You will see that earlier kick-off times will result in more people attending.. I hate to compare it to the AFL, but most of their games are day games and look at their attendances..

The NRL has to compete with all entertainment providers (theme parks, movies, etc.).. and you know what, going to an NRL game on a saturday night is not that appealing tbh.

There is one thing that the Broncos players and fans agree on: WE DO NOT WANT YOU DARIUS!

We don’t want Darius. We have a great squad atm. We cannot fit him under the salary cap and I believe Brisbane needs to show some loyalty to Ben Barba. Give him a bloody chance.

If Boyd comes back to Brisbane the fans will not be welcoming I can assure you.

Farrah is not a great player and his deep-seeded bile that he has been spitting towards Cam Smith, the QLD team and other personalities shows that he is very self-conscious of his own failings as a footballer.

He will never be the starting no.9 for Australia. He is nowhere near the calibre of Cam Smith.. He is inflated and he will not be remembered as a great.

According to reports the Fiji NSW Cup Team has already been approved for 2016.

Bring back the contested scrums, however they do not need to be as tedious as the one’s in Union..

Why not just keep the League scrum as it is, they bind and then once the ball is fed into the MIDDLE of the scrum then they can contest..

So no ‘Pause, touch, engage’.. with the impact resulting in the collapse of the scrum..

Rather have them bind, feed, contest.. I think that could work..

Also, if this is used more and the scrum used in RL takes on its own evolution, you could bring in some scrummaging coaches.

People who advocate the use of Suburban grounds are stifling the future of the NRL competition. The only teams that should be allowed to not play at ANZ, Allianz or Parra/New Stadium in Sydney are Manly, Penrith and Cronulla. We all know the reasons why.

We all know that there are significant plans to transform Allianz and ANZ into modern stadiums that have outstanding facilities etc, better transport connections (buses and light rail), as well as ANZ being able to form a proper rectangle. These upgrades are absolutely crucial to the ability of the clubs to move to these big stadiums and stay there.

You cannot get memberships constantly over 20,000 or even make it to 30,000 members if you are playing in dilapidated 20-22,000 seat stadiums. It cannot be done. The Rabbitohs have over 30,000 members and the Broncos have reached their highest ever with 28,000 members. If clubs want to perform like these two outstanding clubs then they have to have the facilities to accommodate these members and to attract corporate sponsorship.

I think one of the solutions to solving this attendance issue in the mean time, until more clubs start getting larger membership bases, is to allow reciprocal members rights to the games.

Earlier in the year both Dragons and Souths members could get into the SCG game despite it being a Dragons home game.. Allowing both members of the clubs to be able to attend due to their ticketed membership boosted the crowd. I think this is a good model to pursue in the future particularly for the Sydney clubs. I also think they did this with a Dragons/Tigers game.

Imagine Souths and Bulldogs ticketed members being allowed to attend an ANZ game without the away team having to buy tickets due to their existing ticketed membership. This would help. If anything, the away members would be allowed to sit in the away supporters bay, obviously due to the fact that the home team’s members would be sitting in their respective seats and vise versa.

I think this is an attractive option as not only would it improve attendances at some matches throughout the season, it would also make being a member of your club even more appealing as you might get to attend an extra however many games a season as an away member on top of your already 3/4/12 game ticketed membership..

Though I do advocate the use of smaller crowds for when out of Sydney teams play. However Gus and the Panthers offered Broncos fans cheaper tickets to the Monday night game than general admission as to encourage greater away fan attendance, and to the eye it seemed like there were quite a few Brisbane fans at Penrith to watch the game.

Despite the empty seats at ANZ, this year the Tigers and Dragons have had some of the bigger average attendances then anytime before due to them playing at ANZ, so there is progress being made.

The NRL makes great decisions and then makes terrible decisions like these.

Thursday Night football and Monday Night Football are real crowd killers.

Most of the football, especially when it gets into the winter months, should be played on Saturday’s and Sunday’s.

I have actually already seen those websites, and none of them actually show any increase in capacity or grand stand improvements for the Sharks. If anything, the linking of the Sharkies leagues club and shopping centre to the grandstand will never allow the Sharks to build a proper grandstand along that side of the field.

So the Sharks get 10% of the retail sales from the apartments which is around $40 mil or which they have already received an advance of $10 mil and they still have a debt of over $5mil.. So from the property sales in stage 1 they can expect to receive in net profit around $25 mil..

They will receive dividends of between $750,000-$1mil from the shopping and retail development next door unless they sell it, in which the sharks would receive interests payments of $9mil and 20% of the developers profit.

All of this shows that yes the Sharks will actually be financially secure in the future.. Banking of the fact that nothing disastrous in the property market happens.

However all of the development is around the stadium. The stadium is still going to be of poor quality, but you know, maybe in stage 2 they might have a stadium up grade plan. However looking at most of the architects design impression, the ET Grandstand will be enveloped by the retail precinct..

Since the Sharks will soon be the the ugly duck that became the swan, wouldn’t they want to improve the stadium so the expected 40,000 crowds can fit into shark park?

Tigers, Raiders, Warriors and Tigers have all been in terrible positions just like the Sharks except for the Warriors, which are financially secure however just problems with the clubs..

Tigers are in a restructure stage, Titans have a performance problem and the Raiders issues are because the NRL constantly shafts them and gives them barely any FTA coverage. The Sharks woes are far worse than any of these clubs.

The Warriors issue could be solved by actually creating more membership options for Kiwis in Aus.. I know in Brisbane when the Warriors play the crowd is 50/50.. If Warriors members could get more robust away memberships, you’d see their members tally increase significantly.

The Titans have not had those big moments to create tradition yet, you can’t hold them against that.. Can’t say the Sharks are full of a proud heritage.

All of what you have just said shows the Sharks are actually in a pretty poor position, albeit better than the position they used to be in..

I have not seen any news about upgrades to Shark Park so can you link me please?

The Sharks do not own the land around Shark Park anymore.. The majority of that money will be going to the developers, that was the deal.. The developers would wipe their debt clean if they could develop around the area. The only money the Sharks will get is perhaps a little bit of revenue from the people paying rent and the expectation of increased business at their leagues club and attendances due to the increased population living around the stadium.

I have huge doubts that the Sharks will be able to meet their own KPI’s. A record membership of 10,700? Please, that is a dismal number.

The Titans only problem is attendance.. The Titans have not got rid of their funk since winning the wooden spoon, when they do, you will see the crowds return to the 20,000 average that they had in their first three season. The Titans as a business have improved significantly since their old owner was removed from the CEO position.

And of course a 2nd Brisbane team or Perth team would give more to the competition than the Sharks. Most of the people who comment on this website say repeatedly that the Broncos are only rich because they are the only club for over 3 million people; well then why the hell not put in a 2nd team? You seem confused that the Broncos highest attendance in the league of 33-34,000 is bad; adding another team in to make the Broncos word harder could help increase that. A 2nd SEQ team playing out of Suncorp will bring way bigger attendance and more revenue and tv audiences to the game than the Sharks..

Let alone Perth allowing the NRL to break into a new market and have more games on a Sunday or Saturday due to the time difference in WA.. I mean. C’mon. It is obvious that a 2nd Qld and Perth team will provide huge benefits to the comp. No doubt.

Despite the pretty picture you have painted, the writing is on the wall and Cronulla have to save themselves.

It has been said numerous times now: The new benchmark system and the new Key Performance Indicators (KPI) will be brought in next year. This means that the annual grant will be less for the richer clubs like Brisbane, the Roosters, Souths etc. However the new KPI will cover members, attendances, revenue and sponsorship..

If the clubs meet their goals for such criteria, larger pools of NRL money will be opened to them. If they consistently do not achieve these KPI’s then they will have their license revoked.

It is solely up to the Sharks if they want to stay in the NRL..

Their debt was wiped out by the consortium of builders and the Pizza Shop.. However they have no major sponsor, low membership, low attendances and still have debt issues..

In 3-5 years if the Sharks want to not have their license revoked, it is solely up to them to achieve their KPI’s..

Some NRL fans are too harsh on the Sharks but some Sharks fans are putting their fingers in their ears and closing their eyes to the reality of their clubs situation.. Perform or be kicked from the comp. You choose.

It does not matter if the A-League has chosen to target the Southern Sydney area.. They chose to target North Qld and the GC and how did that go?

The NRL wants to be a thriving competition, which is why these KPI’s are needed to encourage clubs to not accept the status-quo of living year to year. This will only make the NRL stronger.

Too true Remmy. Most of the clubs that will struggle to make these KPI’s are in Sydney unfortunately..

The Titans may struggle with attendances and members however they have loads of sponsors and are profitable since their debt was wiped out.