NRL club merger's

[docbrown]

Yes the idea of sharing it with NZers offends us. f**k NZ, it's our team.

Change is offensive.

Souffs are sellouts.

If we played at homebush they could stick their season ticket up their arse.

Easts to win.

Hope that clears things up.

Ok but there are already existing cases though of people sharing teams and still supporting them. Wests Tigers for a start.

So lets look at Cronulla seeing that the Roosters idea offends you. Perhaps adamant fans like yourself would fall away but they'd still be able to maintain a large enough supporter base in Sydney and get new supporters from New Zealanders living locally to help make up the shortfall.

Meanwhile any new memberships from New Zealand will mean overall memberships would be higher than what could get than now.

 

[docbrown]

The idea of my club moving or merging is very offensive. If Sydney was to lose one club by moving or merging are the crowd numbers really going to increase? Are the rest of the clubs going to start making more money? What other benefits are there to a club moving or merging? a more widespread comp? How many clubs do people think Sydney should have?

Crowds in Sydney - given that there's 7 games instead of 12 it might make people go to those 7 games more rather than being complacent. There's also the effect of getting New Zealander members in Sydney involved plus whatever crowds they can pull in New Zealand.

As for other clubs finances, as I've said the gates from those 10 games could be divided between them. The Sydney club that partially relocate would get a new economic base in New Zealand to support them rather than trying to compete just in Sydney.

There is of course the benefit of increasing audience interest in New Zealand and the effects thereof in terms of broadcast revenues.

 

[carcharias]

If my club died...be farked if I'd attend another game as long as I live.
Why would I?

Better cheaper and easier to watch from home.

 

[betcats]

Crowds in Sydney - given that there's 7 games instead of 12 it might make people go to those 7 games more rather than being complacent. There's also the effect of getting New Zealander members in Sydney involved plus whatever crowds they can pull in New Zealand.

As for other clubs finances, as I've said the gates from those 10 games could be divided between them. The Sydney club that partially relocate would get a new economic base in New Zealand to support them rather than trying to compete just in Sydney.

There is of course the benefit of increasing audience interest in New Zealand and the effects thereof in terms of broadcast revenues.

Of course, i didnt think about those, silly of me.

I still think moving a Sydney Club would hurt the game more then it would benefit, or atleast there is not enough benefit to justify hurting the game that much, I mean if Sydney really had two many clubs surely they would start dieing, and yes I know some might be close.

 

[betcats]

If my club died...be farked if I'd attend another game as long as I live.
Why would I?

Better cheaper and easier to watch from home.

Exactly, start messing with the clubs and you will turn die hard fans who do all they can to support their club into casual fans whos biggest contribution to the club is turning on the tele.

 

[newman]

Crowds mean f**k all except to give a good look on tele. If crowds meant shit the Roosters would have been belly up many years ago. They have more supporters than most clubs and they don't give a tuppenny where the clubhouse or home ground is

/end thread.

 

[newman]

Any new club; be it a merger, relocation or brand new entity is not going to "smash" existing crowd figures anyway. For the first year they will see good figures due to the novelty factor but when they settle in their figures will sit at or around the NRL average. If they struggle 2-3 or 4 years in there is a big chance that crowds will drop to below that NRL average. And that includes Perth.

Ill say it again. Crowds are NOT AS IMPORTANT AS EVERYONE IS BANGING ON ABOUT.

 

[adamkungl]

Ok but there are already existing cases though of people sharing teams and still supporting them. Wests Tigers for a start.

So lets look at Cronulla seeing that the Roosters idea offends you. Perhaps adamant fans like yourself would fall away but they'd still be able to maintain a large enough supporter base in Sydney and get new supporters from New Zealanders living locally to help make up the shortfall.

Meanwhile any new memberships from New Zealand will mean overall memberships would be higher than what could get than now.

I've made it pretty clear that the idea of moving, removing, or merging any current club offends me.

Any solution to the problem I will disagree with because the 'problem' doesn't exist.

 

[newman]

Crowds in Sydney - given that there's 7 games instead of 12 it might make people go to those 7 games more rather than being complacent. There's also the effect of getting New Zealander members in Sydney involved plus whatever crowds they can pull in New Zealand.

YAWN. Again, crowds are ok.

There is of course the benefit of increasing audience interest in New Zealand and the effects thereof in terms of broadcast revenues.

DocBrown. Apart from your obsession with crowd figures, I wonder, have you spent much time in NZ because you seem to be forgetting, or dont understand the value of the NZ market. I'm over there once a quarter. Auckland, Wellington, Christchurch, Dunedin. Population 4 million. The joints tiny. The national obsession is Rugby Union.

Rugby League is a distant second and that leaves bugger all market left for other teams. Wellington dont even have a bid for the next round of expansion up and running. No-one over there is calling for a second team. Officially and unoficially. They are happy with the Warriors. If you put a second team in, all you are going to do is cannibalise the existing League market, much like GWS is doing to the Swans. Why do that and piss off a group of supporters who are already invested in the game?

 

[adamkungl]

No-one over there is calling for a second team. Officially and unoficially.

Completely incorrect.

I'm for expansion, not at the expense of existing clubs.

 

[newman]

Any solution to the problem I will disagree with because the 'problem' doesn't exist.

Best post in the thread. The game aint broke. It doesnt need an NSL-A-league type shake up.There will always be more teams in Sydney, because the game was born in Sydney. Seemingly worthy regions are going to miss out at the expense of these existing teams because at the end of the day, they have more right to be there.

Im sorry but Roosters, Sharks, Penrith, Bulldogs, Manly, Souths and Parra all have more right to be represented than Perth, Wellington, Adelaide, Mt Isa, Bougainville, Kurri Kurri as it stands and thank f**k that the NRL feels this way too.

Its on the record that expansion is going to happen slowly (2 teams at a time at most) and sensibly through a bid process for new franchises. That means no mergers or relocations. This endless talk of moving and merging teams needs to stop, because it aint going to happen. We might as well be talking about how we are going to fit Jesus and Mohamed under the salary cap for the Kinights because this is how likely mergers and relocations are.

 

[newman]

Completely incorrect.

I'm for expansion, not at the expense of existing clubs.

Empirically, not anecdotally, who is calling for a 2nd NZ team? Where is the bid committee? Where is the bid? Where are the thousands of voices demanding their NRL club?

 

[adamkungl]

http://www.stuff.co.nz/sport/league/6443194/Mainland-eyes-bid-for-an-NRL-franshise

Not much happening bid-wise yet but I suspect there will be in the coming 12 months.

 

[newman]

So the boss of the NZRL has thought aloud about there being a 2nd team. The ONE PLAYER from the south island in the Warriors is also behind it. Sheesh! An avalanche of support! I dont like the Bears and Perth Red, but you gotta give them their due in that they are making a pretty damn strong case for admission through the sheer chatter and noise they generate. The only NZ peeps on here are Warriors supporters.

Anecdotally, Im in NZ all the time mate. There is honestly no demand, call or desire for a second club. Christchurch has plenty more ducks it needs to get in a row before it worries about a new sporting franchise.

 

[adamkungl]

Won't happen this time, but within 10 years almost definite

 

[bottle]

Won't happen this time, but within 10 years almost definite

Myself I'm positively ambivalent about your uncertain assuredness.

 

[Grapple]

Parramatta Panthers has a nice ring to it! I'd like to see a team like Cronulla make Tasmania a home away from home, like The Hawks do in the AFL. 3 or 4 away games a year so as not to take anything away the home ground members.

But really, surely it depends on form.... What was the crowd attendance at Parra when they made the run to the GF? It looked dead on Monday night, but could you blame them for not going?

 

[Perth Red]

I think that merger/relocation/drop down may well happen eventually. Nothing to do with crowds as I am not convinced it will make any difference but for the following reasons:
Corporate support - How many $1mill+ and $0.5mill main/sub sponsor companies are there in Sydney willing to back an NRL team? NSW now has 15 professional sports clubs looking for corporate backing with a potential extra two (Bears and West suburbs soccer team). Is there enough business support to maintain the clubs incomes to a sustainable level?
Size of comp and further expansion. The NRL needs to grow beyond its traditional areas, all sports have recognised this in Australia and beyond. How many teams can the NRL comp support? 18 is probably the max in terms of splitting of NRL grant, interest by TV in showing X amount of games, infrastructure costs to run the NRL, player pool etc. There is probably 4 or 5 exciting expansion opportunities for the NRL into the future. How do you grow the game without just adding more and more clubs to make a bigger comp?
The haves and have nots, I can see a time when this gap becomes greater and greater. Despite an increasing NRL grant from 2013 it is likely we will see an income divide opening up between clubs that will impact on competitiveness. teh salary cap will artificially keep the comp somewhat even but we can see from the clubs that regularly make the playoffs that on the whole the richer ones are the more succesful. It is likely a small number of these will come from the overcrowded Sydney region due to difficulties attracting equal corporate support.

Those are my reasons why it is likely that we see changes in teh decades ahead. of course it may not be the case, the NRL may decide it is happy with what it has and just funds all teams to a significant amount to keep them all sustainable without expandinf the game. Time will tell.

 

[docbrown]

DocBrown. Apart from your obsession with crowd figures, I wonder, have you spent much time in NZ because you seem to be forgetting, or dont understand the value of the NZ market. I'm over there once a quarter. Auckland, Wellington, Christchurch, Dunedin. Population 4 million. The joints tiny. The national obsession is Rugby Union.

Rugby League is a distant second and that leaves bugger all market left for other teams. Wellington dont even have a bid for the next round of expansion up and running. No-one over there is calling for a second team. Officially and unoficially. They are happy with the Warriors. If you put a second team in, all you are going to do is cannibalise the existing League market, much like GWS is doing to the Swans. Why do that and piss off a group of supporters who are already invested in the game?

A recent survey poll showed that Rugby League was the second most watched sport in New Zealand and it really wasn't that far behind Union at all.

More teams in New Zealand = More interest

From what I've read there's likely to be at least 1 NZ bid in when the NRL calls for expansion.

A team outside of Auckland won't cannabilise the Warriors. People in Christchurch and Wellington aren't driving to Auckland to go to Warriors matches. Two games a week with NZ interested will boost ratings, profile, sponsorships and broadcast revenue.

Regardless of whether you agree or disagree about mergers/relocations etc, a second and eventually a third team in New Zealand should be on the NRL's agenda.

I think that merger/relocation/drop down may well happen eventually. Nothing to do with crowds as I am not convinced it will make any difference but for the following reasons:
Corporate support - How many $1mill+ and $0.5mill main/sub sponsor companies are there in Sydney willing to back an NRL team? NSW now has 15 professional sports clubs looking for corporate backing with a potential extra two (Bears and West suburbs soccer team). Is there enough business support to maintain the clubs incomes to a sustainable level?
Size of comp and further expansion. The NRL needs to grow beyond its traditional areas, all sports have recognised this in Australia and beyond. How many teams can the NRL comp support? 18 is probably the max in terms of splitting of NRL grant, interest by TV in showing X amount of games, infrastructure costs to run the NRL, player pool etc. There is probably 4 or 5 exciting expansion opportunities for the NRL into the future. How do you grow the game without just adding more and more clubs to make a bigger comp?
The haves and have nots, I can see a time when this gap becomes greater and greater. Despite an increasing NRL grant from 2013 it is likely we will see an income divide opening up between clubs that will impact on competitiveness. teh salary cap will artificially keep the comp somewhat even but we can see from the clubs that regularly make the playoffs that on the whole the richer ones are the more succesful. It is likely a small number of these will come from the overcrowded Sydney region due to difficulties attracting equal corporate support.

Those are my reasons why it is likely that we see changes in teh decades ahead. of course it may not be the case, the NRL may decide it is happy with what it has and just funds all teams to a significant amount to keep them all sustainable without expandinf the game. Time will tell.

Those are my thoughts on it too. You're not just competing in Sydney against other NRL teams and not even just other sports for corporate dollars and the interest of youths. I don't want to see a divide between rich and poor teams in Sydney. With a salary cap in play what you're going to see is a bigger spend on club and support facilities and despite what people might say that can have a big effect on which teams are regularly on the top of the heap. It's not just about what players you attract to your club. It's also about how professional your operation is. It's hard to compete if you're on a shoestring. Clubs like Melbourne and Brisbane will always have an advantage as they can tap into larger media markets without other NRL competition. It's just whether or not there are enough teets in Sydney for all the piglets to suckle. Will there be runts?

 

[Teddyboy]

How to keep people is hard and there is nothing worse then seeing clubs die or in big debt but then there is nothing worse then seeing crap crowds and I don't know the solution.
Maybe Sydney could have a 2 up/2 down relegation alongside the NRL ???