WA BEARS

[bad boy bubby]

Western Bears
WA Bears
Perth Bears
West Coast Bears

wonder what will be favoured if it happens? My preference would be West Coast or WA. Dont like Western and the RL community here is much bigger than just Perth so would hope we'd encompass the state. Other main teams here are:

West Coast Eagles
West Coast Fever
Western Force
Perth Wildcats
Perth Glory

My thoughts straight away were WA Bears.
Represent the whole state.
Everyone will just call them the Bears, and I think that's fine.

 

[Get Rid of The Donkeys]

This one, if it happens, has the potential to be quite good, or an absolute train crash of conflicted interests lol.

I cannot see the Bears brand drawing decent sized crowds in Sydney. The North Sydney Bears never had a large fan base in its hey day. Their best ever season drew an average of 15k fans through the gate. An entire generation has grown up without seeing them play in the top flight and many of their older fans would be dead or in retirement homes.

So how many fans are left?

5k?

If it's as low as 5k then I doubt they'll attend all away games in Sydney.

Notths Leagues isn't all that rich, either.

Perth would benefit more from saddling up with Easts Tigers and entering as the West Coast Firehawks, based solely out of Perth Oval and have a feeder arrangement with Brisbane Tigers in the Queensland Cup. Easts have the money and probably won't get into the NRL as long as News Ltd have their way, plus they said they want to be a brand that appeals to all of Australia. Here's their chance to prove it. I can see a Perth based team with links to the wealthy Easts Tigers being popular in Brisbane, which will appeal to the broadcasters as Sydney teams don't rate well up here.

 

[Perth Red]

Just looked at Bears annual report. In 2019 they had $58mill income and a surplus of $780k. Not much but they did also have $4mill in donations, sponsorship etc, so I guess some of that could be redirected to contribute their share of funding to the new venture.

Norths Collective Annual Accounts 2020

Read Norths Collective Annual Accounts 2020 by North Sydney Leagues Club on Issuu and browse thousands of other publications on our platform. Start...

issuu.com

 

[Perth Red]

I cannot see the Bears brand drawing decent sized crowds in Sydney. The North Sydney Bears never had a large fan base in its hey day. Their best ever season drew an average of 15k fans through the gate. An entire generation has grown up without seeing them play in the top flight and many of their older fans would be dead or in retirement homes.

So how many fans are left?

5k?

If it's as low as 5k then I doubt they'll attend all away games in Sydney.

Notths Leagues isn't all that rich, either.

Perth would benefit more from saddling up with Easts Tigers and entering as the West Coast Firehawks, based solely out of Perth Oval and have a feeder arrangement with Brisbane Tigers in the Queensland Cup. Easts have the money and probably won't get into the NRL as long as News Ltd have their way, plus they said they want to be a brand that appeals to all of Australia. Here's their chance to prove it. I can see a Perth based team with links to the wealthy Easts Tigers being popular in Brisbane, which will appeal to the broadcasters as Sydney teams don't rate well up here.

Not a bad idea but with the NRL leaving the carrot dangling to Easts and Jets they arent going to get in bed with anyone as they will hold on to the distant dream of getting a license on their own some day.

I guess the hope would be to reengage the old timers then attract a new generation of WA Bears fans from North Sydney and beyond. Storm have done a good job building a solid Queensland supporter base, maybe the same can happen in Sydney for the WA Bears?

 

[MugaB]

 

[Menaiduck]

I'd be ok with a trial game and a heritage round game at NSO v Manly to start with, then move it to SFS if it actually draws a crowd, play it on a Sunday afternoon. Could become quite a boost to funds and attendances and allows the sale of a Sydney membership which includes this game and maybe 2 or 3 others against key clubs. eels, souths, manly maybe? (manly if they get their dump sorted out)

What I guess it also does is gives us an instant rivalry with Manly lol. Was there anyone else that was classed as "rivals" to the Bears?

If this comes off then believe it or not I’ll be very happy for you. WA is a must. It’s heading towards a big future with massive renewable energy projects on the horizon. A league team there is an absolute must. Good luck!

 

[Get Rid of The Donkeys]

Not a bad idea but with the NRL leaving the carrot dangling to Easts and Jets they arent going to get in bed with anyone as they will hold on to the distant dream of getting a license on their own some day.

I guess the hope would be to reengage the old timers then attract a new generation of WA Bears fans from North Sydney and beyond. Storm have done a good job building a solid Queensland supporter base, maybe the same can happen in Sydney for the WA Bears?

I cannot see young people from Sydney supporting a new team based on the other side of the country. Sydneysiders think they're superior to everyone else.

The good thing about Easts Tigers not being allowed to use their brand in the NRL is the Perth team can remain as the West Coast Pirates and use the colours yellow-orange and black to symbolise their relationship with Easts. It helps that the colours of WA are similar.

Brisbane and Perth are similar in many ways, so I can see people from here getting on board, even if it's just as a second team to support when they play against the cockroach clubs.

 

[Iamback]

Yeh Id hope we acknowledged some of WA's heritage not just Bears lol. Red Black and bit of gold would be awesome colours though! The bears logo needs an update but the colours are very strong.

Kind of in that our SG Ball Pirates played in a reds heritage jersey in 2019.

View attachment 61630

You'd think the out of Sydney teams would pull a decent crowd over there.
Souths too. Pick another Sydney team and I am sure it could be held in Sydney.

Would draw no worse then over there.
Keeps the NS fans happy
Gives Perth the pathways NS have and the corporate dollar.
Apparently they have sponsors waiting

 

[MugaB]

Just looked at Bears annual report. In 2019 they had $58mill income and a surplus of $780k. Not much but they did also have $4mill in donations, sponsorship etc, so I guess some of that could be redirected to contribute their share of funding to the new venture.

Norths Collective Annual Accounts 2020

Read Norths Collective Annual Accounts 2020 by North Sydney Leagues Club on Issuu and browse thousands of other publications on our platform. Start...

issuu.com

All depends on whats in it for them?? Are their members going to be happy with "the bears" not playing in north sydney, or are they going to be just happy to be able to watch bears home games on TV, the leagues club will be putting in, they have this notion of heritage to the brand, they are going to want something in return, to me it has to be away sydney games for very low price,

 

[MugaB]

I cannot see young people from Sydney supporting a new team based on the other side of the country. Sydneysiders think they're superior to everyone else.

The good thing about Easts Tigers not being allowed to use their brand in the NRL is the Perth team can remain as the West Coast Pirates and use the colours yellow-orange and black to symbolise their relationship with Easts. It helps that the colours of WA are similar.

Brisbane and Perth are similar in many ways, so I can see people from here getting on board, even if it's just as a second team to support when they play against the cockroach clubs.

Mate shut up... debbie downer here has the shitz cause qrl clubs weren't invited to the WA bid party, well suck it pal, the firehawks were a terrible brand, and the jets are boring.. qld has the dolphins now, and magic round, next grotd will want our 1st borns,.... go talk about singapore somewhere else, your constant poo pooing of anything regarding this thread is getting tiresome

Young people go to games, when their parents (us old timers) pay for their tix, they'll get exposure enough to follow a team someday down the track, if you think you can sway "young people" with an indigenous fire raptor, or a jet, good luck, youngins like animals, they root for fantastic creatures, superheros or warriors
The NRL is full of them... its why the branding are strong too, they are iconic..
Wtf is a crusher? Or the "suns", how boring is a giant? Wtf is a carlton blue? Seriously some of the mascots of AFL and past ARL were fkd

 

[Get Rid of The Donkeys]

You'd think the out of Sydney teams would pull a decent crowd over there.
Souths too. Pick another Sydney team and I am sure it could be held in Sydney.

Would draw no worse then over there.
Keeps the NS fans happy
Gives Perth the pathways NS have and the corporate dollar.
Apparently they have sponsors waiting

For years we've heard that North Sydney has no juniors anymore because everyone on the North Shore are now Swans fans.

No juniors on the North Shore.

No money at Norths Leagues.

No benefit to Perth.

 

[Get Rid of The Donkeys]

Mate shut up... debbie downer here has the shitz cause qrl clubs weren't invited to the WA bid party, well suck it pal, the firehawks were a terrible brand, and the jets are boring.. qld has the dolphins now, and magic round, next grotd will want our 1st borns,.... go talk about singapore somewhere else, your constant poo pooing of anything regarding this thread is getting tiresome

Your vitriol, insanity, hypocrisy and stupidity is tiresome. Welcome to my Ignore List.

 

[Perth Red]

All depends on whats in it for them?? Are their members going to be happy with "the bears" not playing in north sydney, or are they going to be just happy to be able to watch bears home games on TV, the leagues club will be putting in, they have this notion of heritage to the brand, they are going to want something in return, to me it has to be away sydney games for very low price,

You could do a 5 game Sydney membership. One 'home' game v Manly then 4 away games at decent stadium. Maybe Eels at commbank, Souths at SFS, Manly at the redeveloped Brookvale and Tigers at Commbank?
Even if it only sold 2-3k that is a boost to attendances for Sydney clubs and some revenue for the WA Bears. Would lead to merch sales in Sydney as well.

If we are going to have to take on a Sydney brand then we need to get something out of it and we keep hearing about this mythical Bears fanbase waiting to reengage with the game. Either it exists and adds strength to what's being proposed, or it doesn't in which case what's the point we might as well have a strong unique WA brand.

 

[flippikat]

If this comes off then believe it or not I’ll be very happy for you. WA is a must. It’s heading towards a big future with massive renewable energy projects on the horizon. A league team there is an absolute must. Good luck!

If WA Bears play an annual home heritage game vs Manly (North Sydney Oval), and a rivalry game vs the Roosters (Roosters take home game vs WA Bears to Gosford), I think that would cover bases pretty well.

 

[MugaB]

For years we've heard that North Sydney has no juniors anymore because everyone on the North Shore are now Swans fans.

No juniors on the North Shore.

No money at Norths Leagues.

No benefit to Perth.

You are no benefit to this thread!!!

Please like this post if you agree this twit is repetitive and just a plain ol' negative...
Whinge, whinge, whinge

 

[Iamback]

For years we've heard that North Sydney has no juniors anymore because everyone on the North Shore are now Swans fans.

No juniors on the North Shore.

No money at Norths Leagues.

No benefit to Perth.

Hasn't Roosters taught you that you don't need local juniors to have Junior rep teams?
They have a stack that live in Penrith/Parra etc but play lower grades for the Bears.

They have an u17's, u19's and a NSW Cup team. Add in the promising WA locals and you have a junior development program

 

[Perth Red]

The biggest challenge at this end I could see is the perception that it is just a relocated failed Sydney club that would be looking to move back and take the license with them at the first opportunity.
WA is incredibly parochial, think Queensland then double it! We get behind our sports teams regardless of the sport. For this to work it will have to overcome that perception. Ownership make up will be critical. Maybe a 20% Bears, 20% NRLWA (though that is now complicated since the NRL took over the WARL and in effect would mean NRL owning a share in a club which could be seen as a conflict) and 60% local business consortium would be the way to go?

I'd hope we would have at the least a WA based SG Ball and NSW cup team in alongside a Bears Sydney based Hm, SG ball and NSW cup sides. Bears LC to fund the Sydney pathway set up as it does now and WA Bears NRL club to fund the NRLWA and Perth based pathway. In effect that would be putting $4mill plus into Jnr development pathways for the new club, pretty impressive and another tick in Vlandys box.

Then time to get WA Govt to put their money where their mouth is.
New WA Bears and NRLWA Centre of Excellence and HQ at Perry Lakes or Curtin Uni. - $25mill
New west stand and roof on South stand at HBF park - $120mill
Low rent for first ten years at HBF park - $1mill a year saving
Increased funding for NRLWA for participation increase - $1mill a year increase
Healthways sponsorship for WA Bears - $1mill a year

 

[Get Rid of The Donkeys]

You could do a 5 game Sydney membership. One 'home' game v Manly then 4 away games at decent stadium. Maybe Eels at commbank, Souths at SFS, Manly at the redeveloped Brookvale and Tigers at Commbank?
Even if it only sold 2-3k that is a boost to attendances for Sydney clubs and some revenue for the WA Bears. Would lead to merch sales in Sydney as well.

If we are going to have to take on a Sydney brand then we need to get something out of it and we keep hearing about this mythical Bears fanbase waiting to reengage with the game. Either it exists and adds strength to what's being proposed, or it doesn't in which case what's the point we might as well have a strong unique WA brand.

For years I've heard Sydney RL fans complain that RL died on the North Shore when the Bears were culled. All of their fans f**ked off to the SCG to watch the fumbleball and no kid plays RL anymore.

If WA Bears play an annual home heritage game vs Manly (North Sydney Oval), and a rivalry game vs the Roosters (Roosters take home game vs WA Bears to Gosford), I think that would cover bases pretty well.

All 12 home matches should be played in Perth if we want Western Australians to see this as their team. Lions and Swans don't take home games to Melbourne.

I hope the Pirates get in over the Bears. The Pirates brand is superior and it's unique.

 

[jim_57]

Not a bad idea but with the NRL leaving the carrot dangling to Easts and Jets they arent going to get in bed with anyone as they will hold on to the distant dream of getting a license on their own some day.

I guess the hope would be to reengage the old timers then attract a new generation of WA Bears fans from North Sydney and beyond. Storm have done a good job building a solid Queensland supporter base, maybe the same can happen in Sydney for the WA Bears?

I’m sure they could find a modest amount of Sydney based fans and offer a membership package that allows them to attend a few away games every year.

Opening the door to even one home game at NSO or SFS would lead to them pushing for 2 then 4 then 6 then probably 12 at the first sign of struggle.

 

[MugaB]

Hasn't Roosters taught you that you don't need local juniors to have Junior rep teams?
They have a stack that live in Penrith/Parra etc but play lower grades for the Bears.

They have an u17's, u19's and a NSW Cup team. Add in the promising WA locals and you have a junior development program

Don't bother replying to twit here, his hatred for anything sydney is beyond comprehension, all he says is "i hear this and that" but does no reseach other than post attendances about past games, from AFL tables.... loves to talk about lions at Springfield too, reckon grotd is a closet Alf fan