Adelaide Rams

[King hit]

Honestly that’s the key. Stop comparing apples with oranges in the southern states.

Do the AFL waste time whining that more people like the Broncos than the Lions? No. Because they know the exposure and building a small fanbase is important in its own right.

Yet the AFL and their fans go on about how the Lions are proof Queenslanders love AFL and they are national. It's far from the truth. I live in Brisbane and nobody I know cheers for the Lions or remotely cares

I went to a Lions game once and around 90% of the crowd were expats

 

[footy75]

Yet the AFL and their fans go on about how the Lions are proof Queenslanders love AFL and they are national. It's far from the truth. I live in Brisbane and nobody I know cheers for the Lions or remotely cares

really...

everyone knows the lions have been irrelevant since they dominated 15 years ago.

 

[footy75]

Bring back the Rams!
.

How good.

 

[Travitoh]

Yet the AFL and their fans go on about how the Lions are proof Queenslanders love AFL and they are national. It's far from the truth. I live in Brisbane and nobody I know cheers for the Lions or remotely cares

I went to a Lions game once and around 90% of the crowd were expats

That's the mentality of the AFL and it's people though and it's a big reason why the clubs mentioned will struggle to attract new fans.
The FFA started up the A-League and made noise about becoming Australia's premier football code and have struggled to grow as a result.
AFL people are stubborn and think they're loyal to their game but tease them with something new and they will look. State of Origin crowds and ratings will prove this.

 

[Vic Mackey]

Yet the AFL and their fans go on about how the Lions are proof Queenslanders love AFL and they are national. It's far from the truth. I live in Brisbane and nobody I know cheers for the Lions or remotely cares

I went to a Lions game once and around 90% of the crowd were expats

Meeting people from Melbourne they genuinely believe everyone in NSW/QLD are huge AFL fans. It shocks them when they meet people from there and they aren’t

 

[King hit]

Meeting people from Melbourne they genuinely believe everyone in NSW/QLD are huge AFL fans. It shocks them when they meet people from there and they aren’t

Back in 2011 I was at some big family reunion in Toowoomba and some people turned up from Melbourne. They had kids who had never left Victoria and they all wanted to talk AFL with everyone and were so pissed that nobody else watched it or cared. They asked me to come outside to kick the footy and when they handballed the ball to me. I then told them that isn’t how you pass a ball here and showed them how to pass the ball properly. They then went and stood out on the grass with their heads permanently locked at the sky.

Made a gathering I wasn’t keen on going to very entertaining

 

[King hit]

Lots of turds in that team from 1997. I remember Luke Williamson though, brave cat that wasn’t scared to put a hit on

They did have Kerrod Walters and Alan Cann who played Origin in 96. Kidwell got his start for the Rams. Goldthorpe joined in 1998 after winning NSW the SL tri series and guiding the Mariners to the WCC final the year before.

 

[adamkungl]

It was during 1997, when the local rl scene was dying out, the reds come up with an idea to send players to local junior matches to create good publicity and what not. Our club was lucky enough to get MG. He rocked up to junior rugby, either Saturday or sunday morning, drunk and made the club rope of a little area for him so he and his mates didn't have to mingle with anyone. He then spent the next few hours heckling the players on the field. Him and his mates were calling kids useless and hopeless whenever they made a mistake or missed a tackle. Laughing and telling his mates how hopeless these perth people are. Went on for hours and everybody at the club were in shock over it. On the way out of the ground we drove past MG in the parking lot, and my Mother being the fiery type yelled out ' you're a merkin of a bloke Geyer, super league deserve people like you'. He chased after our car picking a plank of wood up on the way, and when he caught up he started smashing our car up with the plank (was an old beat up HQ anyway)
He then went to my mother's window trying to throw punches and grab her, but she maced him and was able to drive off. In the paper the next day MG had a big sob story about how a car full of men tried to attack him (me, mum and my 3 siblings, all im primary school at the time) and how he has asked the club to provide him with a body guard. Nowdays MG is a moral crusader for getting players kicked out of the game for misbehavior, can't help but think what a massive hypocrit he is

This needs to be reposted
Everyone knows MG is the biggest hypocrite in Australian media but this takes the cake

 

[King hit]

This needs to be reposted
Everyone knows MG is the biggest hypocrite in Australian media but this takes the cake

 

[Timbo]

Yet the AFL and their fans go on about how the Lions are proof Queenslanders love AFL and they are national. It's far from the truth. I live in Brisbane and nobody I know cheers for the Lions or remotely cares

I went to a Lions game once and around 90% of the crowd were expats

That's the thing - The AFL don't care. They've got their little fanbase and they can say they're in every capital city when it comes to TV rights. We just put it in the too hard basket.

 

[The Charlatan]

I remember when the Tigers got dicked by these merkins 52 blot in 98.

 

[King hit]

That's the thing - The AFL don't care. They've got their little fanbase and they can say they're in every capital city when it comes to TV rights. We just put it in the too hard basket.

The Super League war f**ked up expansion especially in Perth. I spent a week in Perth a couple of years ago was told stories about how people boycotted their games, community backlash and how the local league collapsed. Even now we can only expand when TV executives want or believe it's profitable.

 

[Trollhammaren]

I remember when the Tigers got dicked by these merkins 52 blot in 98.

I remember that, was a Friday night game but it wasn't televised at all (thankfully) so didn't see any highlights. Just shook my head when I saw the scoreline.

The Magpies got up over the Rams that year though so that's something for the joint-venture.

 

[Leigh Howlett]

With the Adelaide Rams & Hunter Mariners being start up clubs for the '97 Super League seasons there was basically a draft for the clubs to get players especially in the case of the Rams, following the end of the Super League/ARL conflict a number of clubs were 'sacrificed' to reduce the number of teams.
The Reds went at the end of 1997 heavily in debt but I think that the Rams were doing OK financially before they too were axed to achieve a 14 team comp by 2000.

 

[sensesmaybenumbed]

Meeting people from Melbourne they genuinely believe everyone in NSW/QLD are huge AFL fans. It shocks them when they meet people from there and they aren’t

I was involved with a group that organised NRL games on TV in Melbourne via imparja a satellite TV from 2006-2010
We'd get anywhere from 80-150 people to Friday night games for the double header.

Everybody there relished correcting the deluded notions of any victorian who rolled into the pub demanding that the AFL get put on the television.

 

[Perth Red]

With the Adelaide Rams & Hunter Mariners being start up clubs for the '97 Super League seasons there was basically a draft for the clubs to get players especially in the case of the Rams, following the end of the Super League/ARL conflict a number of clubs were 'sacrificed' to reduce the number of teams.
The Reds went at the end of 1997 heavily in debt but I think that the Rams were doing OK financially before they too were axed to achieve a 14 team comp by 2000.

The Reds had the debts they ran up in 94-96 cleared by news Ltd when they took over. It was part of the carrot offered to jump to SL and for WARL to hand over ownership to news Ltd. Dumbdecision in hindsight lol. In theory they had no debts at end of 97 as news Ltd had underwritten them. Between news Ltd seeing more value in a Melbourne club, ARL pissed at the WARL and the need to cull club numbers our time was up before we’d really got started, like Adelaide and SQ.
Thank goodness NQ and Warriors were spared despite both clubs equally in financial strife.

 

[Perth Red]

I was involved with a group that organised NRL games on TV in Melbourne via imparja a satellite TV from 2006-2010
We'd get anywhere from 80-150 people to Friday night games for the double header.

Everybody there relished correcting the deluded notions of any victorian who rolled into the pub demanding that the AFL get put on the television.

Ah the good old days, I remember the only was to see nrl in Perth when I first got here was wait until 2am and then some games only, or find a pub with Imparja!

 

[BuffaloRules]

The Reds had the debts they ran up in 94-96 cleared by news Ltd when they took over. It was part of the carrot offered to jump to SL and for WARL to hand over ownership to news Ltd. Dumbdecision in hindsight lol. In theory they had no debts at end of 97 as news Ltd had underwritten them. Between news Ltd seeing more value in a Melbourne club, ARL pissed at the WARL and the need to cull club numbers our time was up before we’d really got started, like Adelaide and SQ.
Thank goodness NQ and Warriors were spared despite both clubs equally in financial strife.

In reality, the Western Reds decided to join Superleague before they had even played their first game in 1995 so they had well and truly “jumped” prior to 97...

 

[LESStar58]

you poor bastard...what was that like?

Been there once for a weekend. Never again.

 

[LESStar58]

In addition to that '97 WCC match vs Salford (which is the only full match replay of the Rams on YouTube), here's what remains of other Adelaide Rams highlights on YouTube:


I wonder if anyone knows who that caller is for the Rams matches (excluding the Storm match, as you can clearly see in that match it's ground footage with one camera mounted in the grandstand and the presence of in-goal touch judges (with someone adding commentary to some highlights))?

I do remember Ch9 in Adelaide broadcasting Adelaide Rams home matches in 1998 (distinctly remember that scoreboard-type clock they had on screen in the top left when highlights were replayed on the late-night sports bulletin), but stopped doing it when they moved from Adelaide Oval to Hindmarsh Stadium. Ch9 Adelaide was the only area in Australia that got to see those matches, as Fox Sports/Optus never replayed them. I would LOVE to see the match vs St George again when Fox Sports gets their own NRL channel next year.

The 4 stand-out match memories of Adelaide Rams matches that I remember at the time (since I was only 11 when they folded) were:

- their debut game v Hunter Mariners infront of a sell-out crowd at Adelaide Oval in 1997. I know Adelaide is a strong-hold AFL city, but it's such a shame that teams stopped played the odd game there a few years ago. There's definitely potential for an NRL team one day, but it would have to be in the second expansion (from 18 to 20 teams), as Perth and Brisbane 2 are the favourites for admission in the next expansion. So, it will easily be another 10+ years before an Adelaide franchise is on the cards.

- that match vs St George, only for the Tony Iro incident at the end

- when they hammered Balmain 52-0 in their first home game at Hindmarsh Stadium, the club's largest ever win. I remember Fatty and Sterlo bagging the crap out of Blocker on the first Thursday night Footy Show after that round, showing brief highlights of Adelaide's tries (only ground footage).

- their final game vs Newcastle. Adelaide unbelievably led 20-4 after 36 minutes before the Knights scored 30 unanswered points to win 34-20. Andrew Johns scoring the match-winning try with 10 minutes to go.

I believe they had quite a high club membership at the time, around 7000 or so members (maybe someone can verify this). This was a decade before the NRL started the club membership drive in the Centenary year.

Before Cooper Cronk there was Royston Lighting!