This really is a mixed bag. I think the cash that this deal will inject into the clubs and (hopefully) development will do great things.
But personally the practical details of this deal aren't great for me. I love Monday night football. Nothing makes a slow work Monday go quicker than the knowledge that afterwards i'll be able to order a pizza, pop a beer and watch a game of footy in the comfort of my own home. There's no way i'll be able to make it home in time on a Friday night for a 6:00pm game. I'll miss most of the first half at a minimum. Monday night was bad for crowds, but I can't imagine how this will be any better for anyone other than the Warriors. And God help us if the Warriors have a year at the bottom of the ladder and we're stuck watching them every other Friday night.
I'm also concerned that after years of requesting FNF games, the NRL will now award a few to Canberra....at 6:00pm. This city simply isn't capable of supporting the traffic of a 6:00pm game and regular commuters. It would be a nightmare.
But I digress. I also think people need to understand something about humans; we're naturally competitive and hate hypocrisy. There's an experiment conducted with apes whereby an ape presses a button and he gets a grape. Amazing! a grape! The ape will accept and appreciate this reward for weeks. But if you put another ape in an adjacent glass cell, and this second ape gets two grapes for pressing the button, suddenly the first ape doesn't want his one grape. Literally won't even eat it. What was once amazing and accepted is now, in direct comparison with another, unacceptable. So while I think comparisons with the AFL deal aren't helping the discussion of this deal on its own merits, I understand that we on a DNA level can't help but be a bit furious that they've been gifted more grapes. I feel like this was supposed to be our time, with no first and last rights left, and an independent commission calling the shots, but again we've been duded with less f*cking grapes than we deserve.