MugaB
Coach
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The MAROON Observer
This week in expansion
UN FAIT ACCOMPLI:
I really wish reporters, or at least whoever drops the quotes in their headlines (which is the detail that 99% of people read), would adopt the pretense of this not being a foregone conclusion. That it feels all but decided makes the entire process about 90% less fun.
More importantly:
Three journalists on the byline and they couldn’t craft a half decent metaphor. Ace up the sleeve is right there and that’s the laziest cliche available. You had to go out of your way to come up with the non-sensical powerful lever in the back pocket.
We had been given the impression this was more or less resolved when the salary cap was set but evidently not. The renewal of the licencing agreements remains a Powerful Lever in the Back Pocket.
You can fill in the gaps on what I would usually say about how the media have failed you with their poor imagery and lack of attention, least of all to detail, never mind that all the reporting seems to avoid pointing out that the Controlling Body is clearly unsustainably slow and administratively dysfunctional. Surely that won’t have any long-term ramifications for the sport.
Finally, I used the idiom “full support of the board” last week to describe the Newtown’s involvement in the Jetty Jet Jets joint venture. I am told by a source close to the situation that it was not unanimously supported by Newtown’s board but it was popular.
I am sympathetic to Newtown, both because of the philosophy espoused during the CEO’s appearance on Progressive Rugby League and as a potential ally in the fight against national reserve grade homogenising rugby league, and I think the JETS would be fun but it’s hard to see the case being all that compelling, whether for the Jets or the Easts Tigers, at the corporate level.
I feel - but may be wrong - the AFL is invading the Western Corridor is just really hard to get anyone to care about, both on the counts that the division between NRL and AFL is a lot less culturally fraught now than it was when I were a lad, and also the Western Corridor exists but still has large tracts of greenfield to be infilled. It will depend mostly on the broadcasters’ appetite for another SEQ team, which could conceivably be higher in three to five years if the Dolphins get it sorted and the population boom continues, or perhaps not. The fans will be generally apathetic until the Jets win something, which could be any amount of time down the track.
Nonetheless, the options here are more realistic than in PNG and more fully formed than in NZ. You could easily get to 20 with the Western Bears, the South Queensland-Newtown Jets and the Adelaide Firehawks/Bengals/(other big cat or destructive bird? Lion? Jaguar? Noisy miner?).
Players shadow boxing with each other might be my favourite genre of intermission. Unfortunately, we didn’t have space to do a full frame-by-frame breakdown of this scrape but I did confirm:
This week in expansion
UN FAIT ACCOMPLI:
I really wish reporters, or at least whoever drops the quotes in their headlines (which is the detail that 99% of people read), would adopt the pretense of this not being a foregone conclusion. That it feels all but decided makes the entire process about 90% less fun.
More importantly:
As an engineer, the back pocket is the worst possible place to install an important lever. You’d sit down and the lever would go off.
Three journalists on the byline and they couldn’t craft a half decent metaphor. Ace up the sleeve is right there and that’s the laziest cliche available. You had to go out of your way to come up with the non-sensical powerful lever in the back pocket.
No further detail is provided on where negotiations are at (one assumes that, given the example set during the RLPA negotiations, the NRL are months behind where any reasonable organisation would be) or what the potential sticking points between the NRL and clubs might be, other than the aforementioned money (which perhaps is immaterial given the example set during the RLPA negotiations, as V’Landys intends to capitulate to all demands in order to avoid a protracted discussion in which the Controlling Body could be accused of Not Getting Things Done).
We had been given the impression this was more or less resolved when the salary cap was set but evidently not. The renewal of the licencing agreements remains a Powerful Lever in the Back Pocket.
You can fill in the gaps on what I would usually say about how the media have failed you with their poor imagery and lack of attention, least of all to detail, never mind that all the reporting seems to avoid pointing out that the Controlling Body is clearly unsustainably slow and administratively dysfunctional. Surely that won’t have any long-term ramifications for the sport.
Finally, I used the idiom “full support of the board” last week to describe the Newtown’s involvement in the Jetty Jet Jets joint venture. I am told by a source close to the situation that it was not unanimously supported by Newtown’s board but it was popular.
I am sympathetic to Newtown, both because of the philosophy espoused during the CEO’s appearance on Progressive Rugby League and as a potential ally in the fight against national reserve grade homogenising rugby league, and I think the JETS would be fun but it’s hard to see the case being all that compelling, whether for the Jets or the Easts Tigers, at the corporate level.
I feel - but may be wrong - the AFL is invading the Western Corridor is just really hard to get anyone to care about, both on the counts that the division between NRL and AFL is a lot less culturally fraught now than it was when I were a lad, and also the Western Corridor exists but still has large tracts of greenfield to be infilled. It will depend mostly on the broadcasters’ appetite for another SEQ team, which could conceivably be higher in three to five years if the Dolphins get it sorted and the population boom continues, or perhaps not. The fans will be generally apathetic until the Jets win something, which could be any amount of time down the track.
Nonetheless, the options here are more realistic than in PNG and more fully formed than in NZ. You could easily get to 20 with the Western Bears, the South Queensland-Newtown Jets and the Adelaide Firehawks/Bengals/(other big cat or destructive bird? Lion? Jaguar? Noisy miner?).
Players shadow boxing with each other might be my favourite genre of intermission. Unfortunately, we didn’t have space to do a full frame-by-frame breakdown of this scrape but I did confirm:
- For a change, Brianna Clark was not at the centre of the affray.
- Jayme Fressard’s attempts to act the villain as she walked off for her well deserved binning was lame. You angry. You real angry. Everyone saw. We all know you angry. How embarrassing.
- Between Leniu, the Fifita backflip and this, the Roosters are absolutely thrumming with an eldritch loser energy. Get rid of them, they bring nothing to the league.
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