Rugby League here, just like England caters to a very small geographic so trying to move a team or indeed create a team is very difficult.
Many attempts have failed like Perth, Adelaide, Illawarra, several incarnates on the Gold Coast and in time I believe the latest franchise at GC will also fail.
In fact I believe in the mid term unless Melbourne stay at the top that franchise will fail as well. A few years of mediocrity will expose the farce that the NRL created with that team.
IMO for St GI to successfully move it would need to go rural NSW or Qld and be guaranteed a membership of at least what we have in Sydney and rely on holding the majority of its existing fan base and I think that would be extremely unlikely, so I don't think moving is a viable option.
If we are indeed marketable then don't limit that option to just Sydney metro as we are a well known brand with a highly marketable image so broaden the horizons be that local or international.
The EPL and indeed super league teams court international sponsorship and benefactors and don't rely on the Tynan Motors of the world.
There are experts in the area of sponsorship $$$ so don't get some old mate of the club or some "Neddy" that is just re working old or common ground, get the bloke that understands big picture concept.
RL in general is full of old boys in so many facets of what it does and people like "Buzz" still get a guernsey as a so called expert and nit wits like Beattie get a job in admin so the game is full of amateurs and has beens and that is why Polites stands out as a beacon because he is a professional man who has a passion for his club and doesn't accept mediocrity.
I would rather go down swinging haymakers rather than throwing left jabs whilst being continually sat on my arse.
Roll the dice, spend the money to get the right people and see what the outcome is far better than being strangled by the boa constrictor we have around us at the moment.
All very valid points – however I would argue some don’t apply to NRL.
The EPL stands out as a very different prospect as this is a truly international game. Membership, sponsorship spans countries, continents – so it’s a different approach to securing sponsorship and membership. In comparison, League has a very narrow supporter base and only pretends to be international. Although there are clubs set up in Canada, US, Europe, it’s really only Australasia (including NZ and the islands) and England. Hardly a worldwide sport. We’ve got a long way to go before we can compete with the EPL.
As far as Super League is concerned, sponsorship is the same as here. We were sponsored by Jeep for a period – an international brand. Just as some Super League clubs are sponsored by international brands (Emirates for example). But both also rely on more localised support (St George Bank vs Leeds Building Society). So I don’t see anything different between sponsorship opportunities there. Additionally, I don’t know if TPAs even apply over there. It may be a completely different model. Here, much of the sponsorship revolves around QLD and NSW so that means our market is very narrow. Stepping out of the box costs money – and we’re already hamstrung in that area.
This is how I understand it works in its current format:
Sponsorship and membership are different to TPAs. TPA’s are meant to be additional payments made to the player on top of his salary cap allowance – and sponsorship dollars or club funds (including membership and Leagues club input) are excluded from that. That goes directly to the club to cover business costs. Sure, a company like Jeep may use our players to advertise them, but that would be part of the sponsorship deal and none of the money gained from Jeep would go to the players. With regards to sponsorship and club funds, reports from recent years suggest that only 1, maybe 2 teams are making a profit – and even then, it’s not a significant amount.
TPA’s, I’ve heard, are meant to be initiated outside the club, with no input from the club or the player manager. I follow a few players on Instagram and see them advertising products all the time – Puma, Gameday Mouthguards, Budgie Smugglers, XBlades etc. So I assume they are getting paid by those companies to do that. But how does that work? Do organisations approach the player and say “I want you to advertise our product, but it only applies while you are playing for the Dragons.”? Or does an external company go to the club and say “I will sponsor Ado Carr $100k for 3 years if you can get him to join the Dragons”? I daresay some TPAs are independent of club affiliation (eg. Billy Slater and QLD Bananas) so how do we get around this? Are we just not recruiting high enough profile players that companies want to sponsor? TPA’s are what lures the players because it is the only money other than the salary cap that gets paid to them. And this is where we are behind the 8 ball.
Teams like Brisbane and Melbourne have a massive advantage here because they are 1 city teams – Organisations are jumping over themselves to pay extra to keep them in their favourite clubs colours and to have the players promote their products. I lived in Brisbane for a long time and it was nauseating having Broncos on TV all the time – and I mean ALL the time. They were in everything. Then you have clubs like Roosters and Souths who have notable owners that bring contacts or financial gain. How that applies to TPAs I am not sure. But as we know, owners like News Limited have stepped in in the past to secure coaches etc. So there is impact there.
So in the end, the way I see it, unless you are a one city team or have an owner with contacts/financial clout, I don’t see that you can compete on the TPA level, which is where we are failing miserably (reportedly). Hope that WIN may provide some advantage here but given they haven’t done it to date, I’m not holding out much hope.
