If the Bears hadn't merged, demerged and then been booted, another Sydney club would have been under the criteria in 1999. It wouldn't have been Penrith, Canterbury or Cronulla. Probably the chooks or Manly.
The same is true of Gold Coast or the Crushers. If one of them hadn't been booted, the Cowboys would probably not exist today.
Was this fair? Not really, but needed to be done because of economics. My only gripe is that the criteria used looked at current (1999) finances which were skewed because of SL, and recent crowds which were also skewed due to recent form. Cronulla would have been the first team cut under the "criteria" in any year, except for 1997-1999.
The point is its silly to argue over the criteria and what happened as if that is cause to make important decissions now.
The NRL has to make a decision on expansion that is in the best interests of the game as a whole, not just a subset of the games fans who used to follow the Bears.
The best way for the game to expand is for:
* another Queensland team (Ipswich being the only viable option really) to provide more high rating Queensland matches to sell to pay TV and free-to-air, and to
* expand in Perth to provide another non-NSW/Qld licence which will have local content value to broadcasters (especially since the anti-siphoning law changes), tap into a large unrepresented market, and offer a unique time zone for broadcasts into the east coast
The Bears have little actual value for the NRL which is why no matter how good their bid, they are likely to be ignored. Thats life.