The clubs are still on time limited licenses, despite the best efforts of the nrl to get them on perpetual ones. Nothing stopping them breaking away when the licenses run out. That’s why they hold the power still Alongside the Two media partners.
Yes agreed and again whose fault is that? But anyway, that's why you do all the hard and unpleasant work while you still have years up your sleeve. Then again when the limited license is up, you demand perpetual ones. You did get that I did say that it wouldn't be easy right?
You may even fail and they eventually bin your arse to the curb, but at least we are trying. The job of NRL administrator is not there for a guy that wants to feather his own nest or be liked. It is there for whoever is in charge to better the
GAME. Like I said, get on the front foot and hold press conferences or media interviews regularly and keep informing the public what is going on and what the plan and goals are. By keeping the public informed of the noble end goal/s, it would be much harder for the selfishness of the clubs to take you out. But they still might. But to bad. We need a fighter, not a yes man that caves in to the interests of the clubs.
I am not saying to forcibly remove or move clubs from the competition. I am merely saying to rejig the ARLC's constitution so as the power lays firmly in the hands of the ARLC and not in the hands of stakeholders. Then we can make the right decisions and create KPI's with real teeth for example that actually motivate the clubs to advance and become better at being successful. All the little things that are now just to hard to get over the line because it is like herding cats that originated from all the tribes of the middle east. Suicide bomber cats everywhere that would rather detonate (even themselves) then do the right thing for the game. They are their own wost enemy.
This needs to stop if we are serious about truly advancing the game to its full potential. If we did that we would eventually leave the AFL for dead, of that I am sure. Not saying AFL wouldn't still be massively popular, they are to advanced for that, but we can and would become the definite number one sport in the country. The game is just to great not to be. It just needs to be run by smart and unselfish hands and brains for a couple of decades to get to where it should be. A truly national sport with at least one team in every major city in the country. A team on both Islands of NZ and at least a comprehensive junior and elite pathways development and academy setup on all the Pacific Islands and Papua New Guinea with an eventual eye to introduce a combined Pacific Islander team, maybe if it is viable for the game, or PNG. Hell if we did it right, in around 20-30 years, we should be debating which new team should get the next franchise, Tasmania, Darwin or PNG? Funding massively in all junior development pathways and savvy expansion is the key.
Clubs need to be stronger too. KPI's need to reflect each club differently depending where they are at. Not one same rule for all. That just muzzles the strong ones and keeps the weaker ones weak and never improving. Club land needs to be strong, and junior numbers need to increase. For example we should be able to set five year goals for junior participation and development and ten year goals and twenty year goals and so forth, with an outlook of say thirty years to have doubled all RL male participation. Female participation seeing that it is in its infancy should be exponential growth for a decade or so before it plateaus to a more normal growth curve.
The largest male growth figures should be coming from our non traditional States, something that for example the ARLC and Strom have not been able to do all that successfully for as long as the Storm have been part of the NRL and its most successful club for a big chunk of that. That to me is shameful and another perfect illustration of how the ARLC is not doing its job properly at all. The State of Victoria should be producing NRL level juniors by now, but it doesn't. Virtually none. That is a shocking and ultimately a ruinous outcome for the long term advancement of our game. Kids playing it in high volume numbers is the key. Without them we have nothing and we may as well give up and go home. Nothing happens if we don't have the kids. The game dies with the last passionate generation. Game set and match. If I was asked what the ARLC's number one charter was, the answer should always be to keep increasing kid participation and it's supporter base. Almost everything thing they do should be with that in mind. Period.
But most of this will always just stay a dream and never realised if we don't fix the ARLC and its lack of power over the shareholders. This is vital if we want a quick turn around otherwise we will just slowly keep conceding ground to our competitors and the gap between us and them will keep widening till we are a distant second. The game of RL won't die, but it will be less and less popular with each new generation, to the point that in 50-60 years, no one will much care about its legends and history, like they used to. It will be a minor sport after all that the oldies like/liked. It will have its die hard supporters of course, just like RL does in England but the main and coolest event in town will of course be AFL with its huge and full stadiums with the best game day atmosphere and hype. A game that has a strong administrative body that did all the hard lifting that needed to be done decades earlier.
