New Parramatta chairman Steve Sharp vows to again make Eels club for the people
DEAN RITCHIE THE DAILY TELEGRAPH MAY 13, 2013 12:00AM
New Parramatta chairman Steve Sharp at North Sydney Oval yesterday.
Picture: Gregg Porteous Source: The Daily Telegraph
NEW Parramatta chairman Steve Sharp has revealed why Eels members sacked the current board: "They blamed others for the mess they failed to rectify."
Sharp and his ParraFirst ticket swept to power in Saturday's elections in a historic day for the club.
The Roy Spagnolo-led board was left battered and humiliated when ParraFirst secured all five of the seats available on the Parramatta Leagues Club board, which controls the Eels' NRL franchise.
Spagnolo ran an embarrassing 10th in voting. Sharp finished first with 794 votes.
"The (current) board talked all the time about their ability to make money at the Leagues Club yet they failed to translate that on to the football field in terms of results," Sharp said. "All of a sudden it felt like a mechanical business and not a football club. There was a cultural change needed."
The new board, given a two-year reign, will assume control at an AGM tonight. ParraFirst now controls the seven-member board.
Sharp was at North Sydney Oval yesterday to watch Parramatta play a junior reps match when he gave his first interview as the new chairman.
THE PLANS
"WE want to make the place feel like a football club again," Sharp said.
"That has been missing for a couple of years. I have been going in the change rooms after the last couple of games and it just didn't feel like a football club. The same with the Leagues Club.
"We want to give the club back to the people. We want a clear, open, transparent organisation so anyone who wants to know what is going on, they can see it.
"People have been trying to reinvent the 1980s for a long time. What we need to do is be proud of that history but still go forward.
PETER SHARP
Peter Sharp scoring a try for Parramatta against St George in the 80s. Source:
"We need to be innovative and really get up to speed with some of those clubs that set the benchmark.
"We will need to look at a review of the structure of the Leagues Club and how that is functioning at the moment. We'll get straight into it."
WHY CHANGE
FEW expected such a landslide victory for ParraFirst.
"Poor results are always an indicator," Sharp said.
"There was talk time and time again that we were talking to high-quality players. Members were led to believe that certain players were going to come to the club.
"And then time and time again it didn't eventuate. The players were signing with other clubs.
"The concern was that these players were coming to sit down at the table with us - we put excellent money on the table, probably more than they could get at other clubs - yet they went away with a feeling that there was something not quite right about our club. They went somewhere else. It just didn't feel like a football club."
RICKY STUART
"RICKY has our 100 per cent, total support, as has (CEO) Ken Edwards," Sharp said. "We totally believe in what they are doing.
"(Stuart) is a great individual who has great morals and standards.
"That is all part of his coaching.
"If we can get players to the club - along with Ricky's attitude - then we will be in a good place."
THE SPAGNOLO ERA
"I DON'T want to be critical of past boards," he said. "(But) this current board that we have disposed of have blamed other people for the mess they failed to rectify.
"There was cultural change needed. A lot of people in the club felt that way and certainly the supporters and members did.
"They turned out in droves against adversity on the weekend to vote."
THE EMPEROR
DENIS Fitzgerald and Sharp are mates. Will Fitzgerald return?
"Denis has his after-Parramatta life happening now," Sharp said.
"He has a lot of things that he is involved in. We don't have any agenda to have Denis come back in any official capacity. Denis gave us advice (during the campaign) on how the constitution worked.
"He was here for 30 years and the club's constitution is very complex."
STEVE SHARP
"I HAD 12 years at Parramatta - from 1979 to 1990," Sharp said.
"I have been in the plumbing game and progressed through to the management side of things with a government agency at the moment.
"My idea of a good functioning board is that no one knows who the directors are.
"They are doing a good job in the background."
Link:
http://www.dailytelegraph.com.au/sp...b-for-the-people/story-fni3ga7r-1226640640706