NZ v Poms in US

[The Great Dane]

The NRL own the players? Is that a thing?

Nice attempt at dodging the point...

They are apposed to it no doubt, so what can you do when a contract is signed? Whinge and whine, or get behind it, learn and plan better for the future?

Where's the logic?

I'm not sure if you are talking about the NRL or Nine, but in both cases there's plenty they could do legally.

In the NRLs' and NRL clubs' case they could simply refuse to release their employees for the game, and unless some of the players have specific stipulations in their contracts that state that they have to be released to play games for either the RFL or NZRL as the case may be, the NRL would be in the right and at which point if any of the players were to represent either organisation without leave from their club the NRL and/or the club would have a case against them.
They could threaten to do the above unless the RFL and NZRL come to the table and broker some sort of deal that compensates them and/or the clubs for the losses that they sustain because of the time that players are away.

Now I'm not necessarily saying that the NRL should do that, but they could, and IMO the game really does need to organise some sort of compensation scheme for clubs/organisations that lose players to internationals or even just rep-games in general, I mean pretty much every other major international sport has some from of compensation for that (normally in the form of grants to the governing bodies that go to supporting the game in said country, though obviously that isn't feasible in the case of the RLIF).

Nine on the other hand hold basically all the cards, I imagine that their contract is very clear, the NRL has to provide them with x amount of games a week per-season on x days, if the NRL fails to provide that then they are in breach of contract, if the NRL wants to change that agreement then they either need to get permission from Nine to do that or renegotiate their contract with Nine, either way Nine has the final say and could make the NRL pay dearly for it, further more I see no reason why they wouldn't enforce the contract cause in most cases moving games simply wouldn't be in Nines interest.

As an aside, frankly the NRL doesn't need to plan better for the future, they need to grow a f**king spine and stop letting people walk all over them, as soon as it came out that the the Denver game was being planned they should have been on the phone with the RFL and NZRL demanding that they be consulted and been part of the planning process from the start so that they could make sure that it had as little affect on their shareholders and the people that they represent as possible, and maybe that means that they have to piss a few people at the RFL or NZRL, or they have to demand something in return for releasing the players contracted to them, or whatever, but so be it cause it isn't their job to facilitate the growth of the sport globally (and nor should it ever be) it's they job to administer the sport in Australia and facilitate it's growth here in Australia.