NRL will not buy into AFL money war in Blacktown

[El Diablo]

http://www.news.com.au/dailytelegraph/sport/nrl/story/0,26799,24032768-5006066,00.html

NRL will not buy into AFL money war in Blacktown

By Tim Morrissey | July 17, 2008 12:00am

THE NRL has admitted it's not prepared to take the AFL on dollar-for-dollar in the battle for Blacktown.

NRL boss David Gallop yesterday conceded it would not be increasing its investment into rugby league's heartland to help counter the $30 million home Blacktown City Council is building for Sydney's second AFL team.

Blacktown has become the new frontline in the battle of the codes after the AFL promised a second Sydney team would be up and running by 2012.

AFL and Cricket NSW have invested $2 million each towards the development that includes a main oval with a capacity of 10,000, including a 1500-seat grandstand and a second practice oval, to ensure exclusive use.

Local junior rugby league clubs in the Blacktown area are outraged by the massive investment in AFL but Gallop says the NRL won't be changing its strategy in the code war.

"Rugby league has been a part of the Blacktown community for generations. We have to endeavour to maintain our investment as evenly as possible," Gallop said.

The Quakers Hill Bombers - one of the two junior AFL clubs in the Blacktown area - said the council's commitment to a new AFL stadium to attract a national AFL team to the west was not favouritism.

Club vice-president Annette Tumminello said: "The council has put a bit of money in but it's more making it a sporting complex - it's not facilities for us. It will bring revenue into Blacktown."

But president of the Blacktown City Junior League club Darren Norford said: "It's always good to have other sports but to put so much money into one sport - it's heartbreaking."

The club was booted off its traditional ground at Frances Park last year, despite its 99-year lease, to make way for the Bombers, whose patron is Blacktown Mayor Leo Kelly.

Mr Kelly said the NRL was given an opportunity to be involved in the council's vision of developing Blacktown into western Sydney's sporting capital.

The $30 million facility for AFL and cricket will drive a wedge through western Sydney with a population of 300,000 that makes up the Bermuda Triangle for NRL. Blacktown is flanked by three clubs - Penrith, Parramatta and Wests Tigers - but in four years NSW's largest city will be home to an AFL club.

NRL chief operating officer Graham Annesley said: "(The mayor's) comments are very disrespectful given the overwhelming majority of his constituents would be rugby league fans and they keep him in his job."

 

[El Diablo]

Gallop is Nero incarnate

 

[Tom Shines]

It's Blacktown FFS. Not some untapped paradise.

 

[ParraEelsNRL]

The Quakers Hill Bombers - one of the two junior AFL clubs in the Blacktown area - said the council's commitment to a new AFL stadium to attract a national AFL team to the west was not favouritism.

Club vice-president Annette Tumminello said: "The council has put a bit of money in but it's more making it a sporting complex - it's not facilities for us. It will bring revenue into Blacktown."

But president of the Blacktown City Junior League club Darren Norford said: "It's always good to have other sports but to put so much money into one sport - it's heartbreaking."

The club was booted off its traditional ground at Frances Park last year, despite its 99-year lease, to make way for the Bombers, whose patron is Blacktown Mayor Leo Kelly.

WTF?

What a merkin.

 

[El Diablo]

WTF?

What a merkin.

i'd like to know how he can boot someone off their own ground :?

Kelly seems like a right royal merkin and lets hope the good people of Blacktown vote him out next time they get a chance

 

[Engine]

I doubt it will work.

But, at least afl try to spread their game. We need to be more aggressive.

 

[ParraEelsNRL]

i'd like to know how he can boot someone off their own ground :?

Kelly seems like a right royal merkin and lets hope the good people of Blacktown vote him out next time they get a chance

I just put the TV on Foxsports news and when that fat f**k was raving about RL not helping around Blacktown, you could see Vlad in the back ground nearly burst out laughing.

You could see the smug merkin biting his lip.

I wonder how much money Vlad payed the merkin to say that sh*t :x

 

[bulos01]

what a joke
us rl ppl just sit here n do nothing about jnr teams being kicked off grounds
we have to get up n do something. start a riot...i dont care. someone needs to let this idiot no he can do what ever he wants coz hes the only person in backtown that likes afl

 

[bartman]

The $30 million facility for AFL and cricket will drive a wedge through western Sydney with a population of 300,000 that makes up the Bermuda Triangle for NRL. Blacktown is flanked by three clubs - Penrith, Parramatta and Wests Tigers - but in four years NSW's largest city will be home to an AFL club.

There's three Sydney teams that should now be safe from any future merger or relocation, if the NRL has any sense at all.

 

[nqboy]

I saw that story on FS. Kelly was reading from a AFL written script that really stuck the knife into RL.

 

[Hindyscrack]

Come on people of blactown, use your votes wisely!

Not a bad move... let the afl waste millions

 

[gong_eagle]

Hadley may have Leo Kelly on his show today

 

[KalgoorlieRed]

If Blacktown is such an RL area then why arent they out in droves protesting or petitioning??

 

[Calixte]

Kelly has next to no chance of being re-elected.

 

[Coaster]

Kelly has next to no chance of being re-elected.

Thats what we thought on the GC with Clark, but he was re-elected.

Much like Rudd i can never find anyone to put there hand up and say "i voted for him" but there must be heaps of them i guess.

We need to stop worrying about what they are doing, and start fixing our own product. McDonalds dont have good food, but they provide great marketing, cheap product, appeal to kids, and there is one on every corner. So the place is always packed. This is what the AFL are doing imo.

Us on the other hand, who are we marketing to? Nearly all night games, expensive tickets, crap stadiums, and a constant barrage from our own media about sex scandals, drinking, over rated, garbage. Its pub talk not marketing. Before we can start to move forward we need to define our market, and move it from 18-35 males to families.

 

[Man_of_Steel_1982]

Thats what we thought on the GC with Clark, but he was re-elected.

Much like Rudd i can never find anyone to put there hand up and say "i voted for him" but there must be heaps of them i guess.

We need to stop worrying about what they are doing, and start fixing our own product. McDonalds dont have good food, but they provide great marketing, cheap product, appeal to kids, and there is one on every corner. So the place is always packed. This is what the AFL are doing imo.

Us on the other hand, who are we marketing to? Nearly all night games, expensive tickets, crap stadiums, and a constant barrage from our own media about sex scandals, drinking, over rated, garbage. Its pub talk not marketing. Before we can start to move forward we need to define our market, and move it from 18-35 males to families.

Ok here's a start...

- More Sunday afternoon games encouraging families to attend
- A CEO who will always say things like "the greatest game of all", "we're the premier winter code", "our television ratings show we're number 1", forever promoting the strength of the NRL and never promote AFL
- A return to the glamourisation of the game through a marketing campaign like Simply The Best (or just bring it back)
- Perth team
- Adelaide team
- Proper TV deal to assist these new teams (financially and national coverage)
- Free to air coverage at least 3 days a week nation wide.
- Proper test series against the Lions and Kiwis in Australia during the season... which might eventually see origin scaled back to one game (if we had a proper national footprint).

All things the NRL should publicly state, setting them as clear goals and set about making it happen.

The second point would go a long way to making the rest a reality.

 

[Y2Eel]

Ok here's a start...

- More Sunday afternoon games encouraging families to attend
- A CEO who will always say things like "the greatest game of all", "we're the premier winter code", "our television ratings show we're number 1", forever promoting the strength of the NRL and never promote AFL
- A return to the glamourisation of the game through a marketing campaign like Simply The Best (or just bring it back)
- Perth team
- Adelaide team
- Proper TV deal to assist these new teams (financially and national coverage)
- Free to air coverage at least 3 days a week nation wide.
- Proper test series against the Lions and Kiwis in Australia during the season... which might eventually see origin scaled back to one game (if we had a proper national footprint).

All things the NRL should publicly state, setting them as clear goals and set about making it happen.

The second point would go a long way to making the rest a reality.

And the NRL wont even talk about this because the TV rights arent up till 2012...

Morons run our game bloody MORONS!!!!!!!!

 

[Coaster]

Ok here's a start...

- More Sunday afternoon games encouraging families to attend
- A CEO who will always say things like "the greatest game of all", "we're the premier winter code", "our television ratings show we're number 1", forever promoting the strength of the NRL and never promote AFL
- A return to the glamourisation of the game through a marketing campaign like Simply The Best (or just bring it back)
- Perth team
- Adelaide team
- Proper TV deal to assist these new teams (financially and national coverage)
- Free to air coverage at least 3 days a week nation wide.
- Proper test series against the Lions and Kiwis in Australia during the season... which might eventually see origin scaled back to one game (if we had a proper national footprint).

All things the NRL should publicly state, setting them as clear goals and set about making it happen.

The second point would go a long way to making the rest a reality.

I agree with everything

 

[saddog]

What a jibberer that old guy was on the news last night - league already has 2 wetsern Sydney academies. League set up in Penrith, rather than Blacktown, so he has the tom tits. Blacktown, Penrith, can't see a great difference myself.
Even Demetriou himself is quoted in the SMH as saying they will never surpase league in western sydney. Roy Masters article a few days ago alluded to the rubbery figures afl puts out (which include all kicks who participate in Auskick clinics, even though they don't actually play the game - ARL do not quote development clinic kids in junior numbers). In this he suggested that the numbers currently are poor, and the eight clubs out there have trouble fielding teams, and have to resort to regularly amalgamating teams to get them on the park. I was also interested to see the numbers of registered league players in Victoria was just below 1000.
What annoys me is that someone from the top in RL does not come out and pour water on the AFL fire by putting these positives forward, instead leaving it up to decent journos from SMH to research it all.

 

[El Diablo]

http://livenews.com.au/Articles/2008/07/17/Confusion_reigns_over_west_Sydney_AFL_club_deal

Confusion reigns over west Sydney AFL club deal
1 hour 44 minutes ago. | Anil Lambert-Patel

There’s confusion over the nature of the deal struck between Blacktown Council and the AFL to have a team play out of Rooty Hill, in Sydney's west.

Blacktown mayor Leo Kelly yesterday launched a scathing attack on the NRL, accusing rugby league of neglecting western Sydney and subsequently announcing he had struck a $30 million deal with the AFL.

Today Mr Kelly told 2GB’s Ray Hadley that his council will be chipping in $21 million to build training and other facilities, while the AFL has committed $2.5 million and NSW Cricket, $2.5 million.

While conceding the figures represented a great deal for the AFL, Mr Kelly was also adamant his constituents would benefit.

“Well, let’s look at the off-shoot benefits of it - $40 million through the local economy a year, it will create jobs and employment,” he told Ray Hadley.

“It’s already created an Indigenous academy out at the Rooty Hill high school.”

But when questioned about whether the training facility will necessarily mean a future West Sydney AFL side will play first-grade competition games out of the new Rooty Hill stadium, the mayor was unable to confirm that a written deal had been struck.

Although conceding that a Heads of Agreement hadn’t been signed, he later suggested a verbal contract – and some written contracts - had been agreed to with AFL boss, Andrew Demetriou.

The AFL's push into west Sydney has already been plagued with confusion, with suggestions earlier this week in the Fairfax press that the code was seriously considering a plan to launch "an Irish-dominated team in Sydney's western suburbs, which would perform before an international audience under the Celtic brand name".

The plan was quickly hosed down as idle speculation.