You might be right. So has Richo been recruited by Ikin? What's the story there? I can't connect the dots. That article is pay walled
No. Richo is simply giving his opinion on what he thinks about re: SE QLD market and its future prospect with another NRL team.
It should be noted that Richo is and always will be a staunch East Tigers man. The fact he sees the value in Easts and Ipswich Jets coming together commercially, to service the booming western run from Ipswich (Goodna) to Dalby (via. Toowoomba) and beyond is common sense feasibility and merited chat.
These chats are nothing new. They’ve been discussed in the Brisbane 3 thread a number of times including tidbits of insider thinking towards it all. Further to that, while Ben Ikin and QRL are championing for a Jets NRL club servicing Ipswich and beyond but they are not the people behind it. There is no real benefit in Richo being recruited by QRL.
Richo’s opinion is borne from his time spent spearheading Firehawks bid and the incredibly last and late minute decision to go ahead and amalgamate Brisbane Jets (Jets/Bombers) & FireHawks bids together which never made headlines (and never went beyond verbal approvals) as it was too little, too late and Dolphins were already awarded the license (but it just hasn’t been formally announced to public).
This time Richo knows, as I know - that for it to be successful this next Jets bid needs to start strong with Easts and Jets together and not wait until the sun has already set to agree to do what made complete sense to begin with.
Now this isn’t me saying that those clubs are pushing ahead together at this moment but it’s what’s been discussed in the background (or at least had been discussed the last time I checked in which was months ago).