You cant grow the game in this way!

[Perth Red]

This is all well and good, but you still haven't explained how the mechanism would work or how the NRL could create one without an all out war with the clubs that they'd lose!

And I don't buy the carrot and stick argument, no matter how good an offer is there's no way to force the NRL clubs to take it, and even just given time it's inevitable that there will be times when all the clubs refuse the deals on offer and the whole deal would fall apart.
Hell it's been tried before and it was a disaster.

Remember a few years back when John Grant said there'ed be 3 games in Perth (or however many) but only two were planned, and then the NRL went around desperately trying to get a club to commit a home game to Perth. They threw out all sorts of offers and stuff at the clubs and not one agreed to any of the deals.

I remember that the Raiders were one of the only clubs willing to come to the table and talk about it with the NRL even though the NRL had screwed the Raiders around on junior development funds or whatever only a few months earlier, I remember you being pissed right off at the Raiders when they refused mainly cause they have a deal with the ACT government that dictates that they must play 12 games in the ACT and the NRL refused to replace one of those games so that the Raiders could take a game to Perth, etc.

It didn't work then, and though it might work for a while in the future eventually it'd fall flat again when none of the clubs are interested.



Firstly the NRL have plenty more then just one SOO every three years and the test against the Kiwis every year, they have the All Stars, they'll have the Nines after next year, they'll have the Four Nations every time it comes down here, they have the Pacific tests, they'll have Lions/England tours once they start up again in a few years, etc, and their's no reason why they can add more events when necessary to fill the quota, in fact it may force them to play more tests and try more ideas for rep games, or expand on previous rep games or series, or even bring back some old ones, which wouldn't be a bad thing, but I digress.

And they wouldn't have to spread those games around to 7 cities cause the NRL would be mad to go into deals with seven cities when they couldn't meet the requirements of all those deals, that's just a logistics thing, nothing can be done about that sort of thing except adding more content... But even so there'd still be nothing stopping the clubs from taking games on the road, and it's probably inevitable that there will always be clubs that take the odd game on the road anyway, there's noway that the NRL could stop them from doing so even if they wanted to (and I see no evidence that the NRL wants to BTW), unless the NRL didn't approve any games that are suggested to be taken on the road, which would cause a lot of issues in of it's self.

And again there's no reason why the WA government couldn't go into a deal with the NRL that dictates that they play 1, 2, or 3 games a year in Perth, it's a perfectly reasonable idea, you just don't seem to like the idea cause you aren't interested in attending games like the All Stars, which is whatever do you, but it isn't an argument against the idea.



I haven't said that the Souths-Perth deal over the last few years hasn't been successful, only that it'll inevitably come to an end and the fallout from when these deals come to an end is pretty much always not worth the gains made during the deal... Those are two very different things.

Mechanisms is straight forward nrl offers a deal to any club that wants to commit to playing yearly in a city, it’s not a hard mechanism lol. Maybe no one will but given how financially screwed half the clubs are I doubtt it will be a hard sell.

I’m not interested in all stars? I flew to Brisbane to watch it lol. Fact is there is and never will be more than 2-3 games at most most years if that. There simply isn’t enough non nrl product to achieve greater exposure for the game regularly in non nrl markets.

Raiders didn’t play in Perth because they wanted more fta games and nrl simply couldn’t deliver it as they are not in charge of those decisions! Raiders choice, their loss.

yes Souths committment will eventually end. I won’t be pissed at souths when it does, they have done more than anyone to grow the game here. I and others will be pssed if when they do finish up there are no more nrl games in Perth.

 

[Perth Red]

Your Perth team agenda is blaringly obvious.

Nrl dont host weekly nrl games. The clubs themselves do, depending on home team advantage. Origins, tests and Nrl finals are different kettle of fish obviously. So now you want the Nrl to dictate to clubs who and where they should play? You can’t see the multitude of problems just in that? You say the Nrl should fund the costs to get the clubs on board. I guess they could dip into the grassroot funds or the state/affiliates money or better yet the magic money tree.

What incentives do clubs have to play games in Perth or Adelaide apart from the short term financial gain or membership increase? Because we all know that 90% of any money on the table or interstate memberships will move to the shiny new expansion club when it arrives.

With all your constant Nrl bashing and agendas not once have you spoke about your WA teams playing in the comps below the Nrl. Throwing some money at the Warl marketing and media team to promote the local team and get there name it there would be the most affective outcome both short and long term.

Lol, what agenda, this is a discussion about the fact perth doesn’t and is unlikely to have a perth nrl team and how we can grow the interest in the nrl in the face of no expansion.

Clearly the nrl has organised the Perth double header and enticed 4 clubs to play in it so yes they can organise nrl club games if they have a will to do so.

What incentive more than money and new fans? Lol

Nrl seems to be able to find many millions when it wants to, where there is a will there is a way.

I see very little value in a perth team below nrl level, will drain the wa Comp of money andplayers and adds nothing to the game here unless it is a partof player development to an nrl club.

 

[Stormwarrior82]

Lol, what agenda, this is a discussion about the fact perth doesn’t and is unlikely to have a perth nrl team and how we can grow the interest in the nrl in the face of no expansion.

Clearly the nrl has organised the Perth double header and enticed 4 clubs to play in it so yes they can organise nrl club games if they have a will to do so.

What incentive more than money and new fans? Lol

Nrl seems to be able to find many millions when it wants to, where there is a will there is a way.

I see very little value in a perth team below nrl level, will drain the wa Comp of money andplayers and adds nothing to the game here unless it is a partof player development to an nrl club.

Your agenda is even in the heading of this thread. Apparently the only thing that will grow the game is if clubs forget about their home ground advantage for the love of rugby league and the Nrl put a team in WA stat!.

Your answer to the money question is that the Nrl always seems to find it when it needs to.? What like the last couple years? You complain all the time about the Nrl spending and then on the other hand you say they can just find it somewhere? WTF?

By having World Cup games, state of origins and double headers apparently that is not classified as growing rugby league in WA? Not only that there is more money and development officers than ever before and WA juniors now have teams to strive for that play in the nsw comps. That is the definition of growing the game. Maybe not the way YOU would like but it’s still growing the game. But keep talking like rugby league isn’t growing in WA. Don’t let facts get in the way of a good story.

 

[Perth Red]

Only, no
Logical way, yes

I don’t complain about the spending, I complain about the lack of return on investment of the spending. Big difference.

There’s no point playing a big marquee game then not having anything for 12 months, requires regular and sustained exposure.
We’ve had one new DO officer position funded in WA in last 5 years, wohooo go the nrl!

JnR RL is growing well in WA, interest in nrl not so much.

 

[Stormwarrior82]

Only, no
Logical way, yes

I don’t complain about the spending, I complain about the lack of return on investment of the spending. Big difference.

There’s no point playing a big marquee game then not having anything for 12 months, requires regular and sustained exposure.
We’ve had one new DO officer position funded in WA in last 5 years, wohooo go the nrl!

JnR RL is growing well in WA, interest in nrl not so much.

You absolutely do complain about the spending. But in trump like fashion when someone calls you on it you resort back and deflect to “return on investment”. Earlier this month taipan called you on it and you did just that.

The Nrl have stated time after time since the formation of the arlc that they aren’t looking at expansion until clubs are stable. So expansion wasn’t on the table for 5 yrs but it is now. The past year the Nrl has laid the platform for expansion by increasing money, DO officers and exposure to WARL as well as introducing a junior pathway program for WA grown players to one day play Nrl for Perth.

But I guess just putting a expansion team in Perth and Adelaide without any ground work would be a lot better.

 

[The Great Dane]

Mechanisms is straight forward nrl offers a deal to any club that wants to commit to playing yearly in a city, it’s not a hard mechanism lol. Maybe no one will but given how financially screwed half the clubs are I doubtt it will be a hard sell.

That's not a mechanism, it's a crapshoot.

In that 'plan' there's no way to make clubs sign on for extended periods, only on a game by game basis, even if they do signal intent to stay over an extended period there's no way to stop them from pulling out, there's no way to insure that they do community engagement when they come to town, etc.

And again things like that have been tried before and it's failed, cause none of the clubs were interested in the deals on offer, at which point the plan falls to shit.
And the times that is has failed have been times when the clubs were more desperate for money then now! Like Cronulla-Adelaide or the extra game in Perth that everybody turned down.

And how exactly would it work?

How would the NRL be involved, how would their involvement make these sorts of agreements any stronger, cause from what I'm hearing all they would be doing is brokering a deal between a government and the club, simply acting as a middle man.
Well the AFL has been doing that for decades now and it hasn't made the deals any more stable, all it's done is given the AFL a strong position to negotiate from to rip off tax payers, which personally I'd prefer that the NRL stayed out of that sort of stuff, and it didn't give them any power over the clubs at all, and that is where the problems start, when the clubs either don't live up to their end of the bargain or piss off on bad terms.

I’m not interested in all stars? I flew to Brisbane to watch it lol. Fact is there is and never will be more than 2-3 games at most most years if that. There simply isn’t enough non nrl product to achieve greater exposure for the game regularly in non nrl markets.

It is enough if you focus your efforts instead of trying to do everything at once...

And in your average year there is always more then 2-3 games that could be taken on the road, and there's literally nothing stopping the NRL from expanding events, rejigging events, or adding events to fill the quoter...
Start with the WCC, take it out of the clubs hands and start organising it independently like a final with the RFL, and take it on the road when the needs be or sell to the highest bidder when you don't need it to be played as part of a deal in a city. There're plenty of things like that that the NRL could do.

Raiders didn’t play in Perth because they wanted more fta games and nrl simply couldn’t deliver it as they are not in charge of those decisions! Raiders choice, their loss.

The FTA thing was part of it (the lack of FTA is slowly but surely killing the club, if something doesn't change the number of Raiders fans is going to crash hard because of it), but it was more to do with juniors grants.

And what exactly did the Raiders lose on by not taking the deal?

The game wasn't going to be completely underwritten by either the WA gov or the NRL, they were going to have to refund all the members who had already payed for twelve games, the NRL refused to play any of their rep games in Canberra to off set our stadium and grant deals with the ACT government so the Raiders would have had to figure something out, it was going to leave Canberra open for the Brumbies and Giants to make a fool out of the Raiders for weekend that the game game that Canberra lost, I'm sure their was other stuff going on at the time that I'm forgetting.

But long story short the Raiders stood only to lose from the deal, the NRL offer was from memory a lump sum and to help cover rent for NIB, that was it, nonnegotiable, and the Raiders didn't need the money then and they don't need it now, and the money wouldn't have even covered the Raiders expenses by the end of it once you take into account that they would have had to figure out a way to play an extra game in the ACT (which would probably have meant paying a SL club to come down to Canberra), it would have completely f##ked their already strained relationship with the government and it would have pissed their core fan base right off as well with having a one game taken away just before the season started and the hassle of refunds and the such.

It was a crappy deal, and the Raiders are already in a terrible position to be taking games away from Canberra.

yes Souths committment will eventually end. I won’t be pissed at souths when it does, they have done more than anyone to grow the game here. I and others will be pssed if when they do finish up there are no more nrl games in Perth.

It's really nice that you wont be pissed at the Rabbits when they call it a day, but you don't represent Perth, and I can tell you for certain from personal experience with these sorts of things in Canberra that large portions of the community that have invested in the Rabbits will be pissed, very pissed.

You also say that you'll be pissed if the Rabbits call it and there's no more NRL in Perth, well that is exactly the sort of feelings that I've been talking about, and it's inevitable that the Rabbits or the WA government will call it a day (and they'll almost certainly burn bridges in doing so, cause normally the deals fall apart when either the club wants more to play there or the governments want to pay less, that's almost always how it goes), and when they do it's almost certain that none of the other clubs will want to take up a deal like the Rabbits deal, at least not straight after the Rabbits have left, and especially if it's the government that calls it, and it's those scenarios that I've been talking about, the inevitable conclusion to all of these deals that do way more damage then the progress that the games made were worth...

And you've just displayed exactly why these deals are a terrible idea in the grand scheme of things, cause eventually you are going to be very pissed off when things inevitably turn sour, and not only you but a whole bunch of people in Perth, and you're all going to be pissed and angry at the NRL when frankly speaking there wasn't really anything they could have done about it...

 

[Perth Red]

We'll have to agree to disagree. The best case I have seen of it working is Souths long term relationship with Perth. It's been 100 times more effective than sporadic games here or there and blow in clubs who don't give a sht. Benefitted both Souths, the WA grassroots and WA NRL fans starved of games. More of the same please!

 

[The Great Dane]

We'll have to agree to disagree. The best case I have seen of it working is Souths long term relationship with Perth. It's been 100 times more effective than sporadic games here or there and blow in clubs who don't give a sht. Benefitted both Souths, the WA grassroots and WA NRL fans starved of games. More of the same please!

It's nice that you think that and all that, but all the problems with plans like these happen after the deal falls apart, that's when the problems start.

Though it hasn't happened yet it's inevitable that the Souths deal with Perth will end and when it does you'll see everything that I've been talking about, it's not a matter of if but when...

 

[Perth Red]

I very much doubt it because 1. They will have fulfilled their commitment 2. They will have gone beyond expectations 3. They have done something no other club has been willing to do.

Only leaves a bad taste if they commit and don't deliver or they deliver but it smacks of a short term cash grab with no real interest in helping out the game in that region.

Souths have done more than anyone could have expected and will be very positively remembered by the WA rugby league community accordingly. Also big up to Warriors for agreeing to travel so far to support games here.

Only other club in last decade that has come close is Cowboys who came over for a pre season game and gave most of the proceeds to the WARL amd did a heap of grassroots work whilst in town. And special mention to St George who also did some really positive grass roots work when they came over.

Manly have disappointed as they haven't lived up to their commitment and Roosters who were shts when they were here, not turning up to kids clinics etc.

One positive move in last two years is both clubs involved in the game selling one game WA memberships and merch for both clubs being on sale. In the past only the "home" club did this.

 

[The Great Dane]

I very much doubt it because 1. They will have fulfilled their commitment

That hasn't stopped people from becoming disappointed and angry in the past when a club has left in similar cases of these deals all over the country, and I see no reason why similar feelings and problems wont happen in Perth.

You also ignore that once this deal is over it's very likely that either the government, the Rabbitohs, or both, will seek to renew the contract and this is one of the main areas where problems arise (with clubs wanting more for less and governments wanting to pay less, etc).

2. They will have gone beyond expectations

Firstly how so?

Secondly how does that fact negate any of the problem associated with these deals that I've brought up?

3. They have done something no other club has been willing to do.

Which is?

Besides all that, you've basically already conceded the argument when you said that if there isn't any NRL in Perth after the Rabbits call it a day that you'll be angry.

Given time that's an inevitability, maybe after the Rabbits call it a day someone else picks up a similar deal with Perth (that in of it's self causes serious problems in my experience), but it wont continue forever, eventually none of the clubs will be interested (in all likely hood none will be interested for some time until after the Rabbits have left), and eventually you'll be pissed that there's no NRL in Perth, and that is where the issues begin, when the club leaves and the people get pissed cause to a man they all take it personally, and they all feel betrayed by the club and/or the game, and those attitudes and feelings are incredibly damaging, and do extreme amounts of damage to the sports image in that community, and that sort of long term damage simply isn't worth the short term rewards that you get from playing the games.

 

[Perth Red]

Firstly how so?

Secondly how does that fact negate any of the problem associated with these deals that I've brought up?



Which is?

Firstly: They have given a long term commitment and stuck to it. No other club has done this in Perth. They have also made sure that they "put in" running coaching clinics, doing media work, donating jerseys for raffles for clubs and much else besides. They haven't just turned up, played the game, taken the money and flown off like most do in these situations.

Secondly: Anyone here who gets the hump when the deal finishes and Souths decide not to continue playing here is either ignorant of what has been achieved through them for the game here or is unrealistic about what Souths have delivered. Glad to say in the RL community I'm connected to here there is absolutely nothing but praise and gratefulness for Souths efforts, even from Souths hating other NRL club fans! The game would be a lot poorer in WA if it wasn't for South Sydney.

Third: How can you be upset if a club fulfills its commitments and has had a major positive for the game in your neglected region? The examples you have given are where clubs have done neither of these things and fans are rightly left feeling duded or short changed. The old adage "don't promise what you cant deliver" would be an apt one to avoid what you seem to think is inevitable. Deliver on your commitment, make a positive difference, be up front about what you will do and do it. Simples.

Finally I'll be angry at the NRL for not having a strategic plan to ensure NRL games are played in Perth, I wont be angry at South Sydney who, again, have done everything and more I could have wished of them. And your doomsday scenario doesn't have to play out that way. It is likely to if continued to be left to clubs. It is unlikely to if the NRL grow some vision and leadership and have a strategy to ensure it never happens. Clubs have just got $13mill grant, sadly the NRL once again missed an opportunity to attach some strings, such as this.

 

[Stormwarrior82]

Look there will come a time when the Nrl will make public the new Perth expansion team. And the incentives that souths currently receive will be taken away. Now PR you don’t care either way because ultimately you have what you always wanted in a Perth rl team, but I’m sure a souths fans has also over the years liked the fact they went to Perth to play and feel used to some extent. Dropped when they get a team. You would be nieve to think that souths fans or board would not feel that way to some extent. Souths have put just as much into Perth as Perth has them but ultimately in the end souths get 10-20 rusted on members in WA? Hardly an appealing prospect.

I don’t think it will be a overly happy ending. Would you still be sticking to your guns and be happy if souths pulled out all together 2 years out from the new Perth team entering?

 

[Perth Red]

Your assumption is not born out by the fans discussions here. Ive heard very very few people say they would not get behind a perth NRL team as either their first or second team, even life long Souths fans! IF perth ever gets a club it is inevitable, and by the nature of it, unnecessary, for these on the road games to take place. Hopefully the NRl can then invest the strategy into the next growth market.
I haven't met a single person here who follows RL who would be angry at the prospect of Perth having a club and the idea that Souths or Warriors or Manly or Storm wouldn't bring a home game here because of that.

Your both suggesting doomsday hypotheticals that are not what I see, hear or feel from the RL fanbase in WA. I don't claim to know every fans opinion but based on the communications I do see and hear I simply do not see this being a problem. Souths have gained over the years in many ways, WA RL has gained in many ways over the years, fans have gained a lot,if we get a club it will be in part to Souths commitment to the game here. It would be nice to see Souths get recognition for the support in getting us a club if that ever happens. A fixture of Souths v Pirates in perth every year maybe? I'm pretty sure a lot of the 3500 WA Souths members will continue to support them as well as get behind a Pirates club.

 

[The Great Dane]

Firstly: They have given a long term commitment and stuck to it. No other club has done this in Perth. They have also made sure that they "put in" running coaching clinics, doing media work, donating jerseys for raffles for clubs and much else besides. They haven't just turned up, played the game, taken the money and flown off like most do in these situations.

All this tells me is that either you don't really know what the Rabbits deal with the WA Government/Perth council entails or that the WA government is incompetent!

With the exception of donating signed jerseys to charity all of those things would have a mandatory minimum written into the contract if it was with the ACT government, and maybe I'm wrong, but I doubt that it'd be any different in WA...

And are you sure that the other clubs haven't agreed to a long term commitment and broken it anyway? Cause that happens all the time as well.

And maybe some of the clubs that only played one game in Perth just couldn't agree to terms with the government after a trial game/period, like the CC Mariners and the ACT government last year, and there was no commitment for them to break.

Secondly: Anyone here who gets the hump when the deal finishes and Souths decide not to continue playing here is either ignorant of what has been achieved through them for the game here or is unrealistic about what Souths have delivered. Glad to say in the RL community I'm connected to here there is absolutely nothing but praise and gratefulness for Souths efforts, even from Souths hating other NRL club fans! The game would be a lot poorer in WA if it wasn't for South Sydney.

Again you don't represent either the RL community in Perth or the people of Perth.

But even if we just accept what you are saying, they are saying that right now while the Rabbits are still around and the deal hasn't gone sour, not once the Rabbits have left. I think you'll be surprised how some opinions change once the Rabbits do leave.

Also you're ignoring the wider community, and their opinions matter as well, in fact they probably matter more then the RL fans opinions cause the RL fans are already sold on the game, the wider community isn't, so if/when the NRL expands to Perth you'll probably have turned a good portion of potential fans away cause they'll remember the sport as the sport that those clubs came from that used the city as an ATM then pissed off, that's exactly what has happened in the wider community in Canberra towards the AFL.

Third: How can you be upset if a club fulfills its commitments and has had a major positive for the game in your neglected region? The examples you have given are where clubs have done neither of these things and fans are rightly left feeling duded or short changed. The old adage "don't promise what you cant deliver" would be an apt one to avoid what you seem to think is inevitable. Deliver on your commitment, make a positive difference, be up front about what you will do and do it. Simples.

Again you say that now...

People come to think that the club values them and their support, that it's their club, and then the club doesn't renew the contract, then they feel betrayed by the club, abandoned and used.

Doesn't matter if the contract ends on good terms or if the club breaks it, or even if the government breaks it, there's always a bad outcome, it's just a slightly different bad outcome depending on which different scenario.

BTW do you know which one of these deals did the most damage in the ACT, the North Melbourne one, they fulfilled all their commitments, played every game they said they would, all the while saying that they were Canberra's team, that they'd be around for a long time, at least until Canberra's got it's own team, etc, etc, all the platitudes and usual BS, then they left at the end of their contract with the ACT government and never came back, and a lot of people felt betrayed, used, lied to, abandoned, insulted, etc, etc, etc, and it completely f##ked the AFL in Canberra outside it's already established fan base for quite a while in the ACT.

Finally I'll be angry at the NRL for not having a strategic plan to ensure NRL games are played in Perth, I wont be angry at South Sydney who, again, have done everything and more I could have wished of them. And your doomsday scenario doesn't have to play out that way. It is likely to if continued to be left to clubs. It is unlikely to if the NRL grow some vision and leadership and have a strategy to ensure it never happens. Clubs have just got $13mill grant, sadly the NRL once again missed an opportunity to attach some strings, such as this.

Firstly it's not a doomsday scenario, it's how it goes down ever time one of these deals ends, and I'd know since the ACT has probably the most experience with these sorts of deals in Australia.

Secondly what are the NRL supposed to do about it?

As we've already been though they simply don't have the power to force things like this (nor should they as it'd turn into a tool to punish clubs overnight), nor would they be able to get that sort of power unless they owned all the clubs centrally.

So why be angry at the NRL? Realistically there's nothing that they could do about it anyway, at least nothing concrete, and as has been shown with examples from the past what they can do about it isn't even slightly effective in getting clubs to take games on the road.

Your both suggesting doomsday hypotheticals that are not what I see, hear or feel from the RL fanbase in WA..

Nothing I have said is hypothetical or a doomsday scenario, it's simply reports of what has happened in Canberra every single time one of these deals has been written up and eventually fallen apart or ended, and Canberra has plenty of experience with these sorts of deals, probably the most experience of anywhere in the country.

The fact that you think what I've been saying is hypothetical shows that you have no idea what you are playing with...

 

[Stormwarrior82]

Your assumption is not born out by the fans discussions here. Ive heard very very few people say they would not get behind a perth NRL team as either their first or second team, even life long Souths fans! IF perth ever gets a club it is inevitable, and by the nature of it, unnecessary, for these on the road games to take place. Hopefully the NRl can then invest the strategy into the next growth market.
I haven't met a single person here who follows RL who would be angry at the prospect of Perth having a club and the idea that Souths or Warriors or Manly or Storm wouldn't bring a home game here because of that.

Your both suggesting doomsday hypotheticals that are not what I see, hear or feel from the RL fanbase in WA. I don't claim to know every fans opinion but based on the communications I do see and hear I simply do not see this being a problem. Souths have gained over the years in many ways, WA RL has gained in many ways over the years, fans have gained a lot,if we get a club it will be in part to Souths commitment to the game here. It would be nice to see Souths get recognition for the support in getting us a club if that ever happens. A fixture of Souths v Pirates in perth every year maybe? I'm pretty sure a lot of the 3500 WA Souths members will continue to support them as well as get behind a Pirates club.

Look, I really hope that what you say does happen and there is a good healthy rivalry that happens but I personally think it will be done half arsed and one party will be jilted.