Short Term Pain but for What Long Term Gain?
“It’s short-term pain for long-term gain” were the words of ARLC chairman Peter V’Landys overnight following the discontent of broadcasters and fans after the opening two games at Magic Round which saw 8 sin bins across the two games.
The question though not just for Peter V’Landys but the ARL commission and NRL itself is what is the long-term gain that they are looking for in the game. We’ve been hearing this phrase from the Chairman since he took on the role but honestly what is the long-term gain that we have been promised because honestly there doesn’t look to be an end goal for these changes.
In 2018 when Peter V’Landys took his spot on the commission I personally thought that it was a good move because as a Horse Racing Administrator has been phenomenal in making New South Wales the premier state for the sport in Australia. The appointment of V’Landys as chairman of the commission was also something I thought would be beneficial to a game that had been lacking in leadership under Peter Beattie. How ridiculous do I feel now about thinking his move to Chairman was good for the game.
The game of NRL has now become a play piece for a man with total power over two sports and an aura and ego that knows no boundaries and that is fed by certain media organisations that V’Landys gives his ear to and in turn spend their time writing fluff pieces that just boost his ego. This has become one of many problems in Peter V’Landys leadership at the NRL, the fate of the game is being decided either by a single man who wants things done his way or his Soviet era propaganda merchants in the media.
We’ve heard the term short-term pain for long-term gain right through PVL’s tenure as the boss but we’re nowhere near even seeing about what the long-term goal is for the game of Rugby League in Australia. We’ve seen new rules that nobody has asked for implemented into the game with varying levels of success. The six-again rule was not something that one fan had ever asked for prior to its introduction and certainly nobody wanted it expanded in 2021.
The set restart rule was introduced at the resumption of the 2020 season as a result to “speed the game up” more after supposed “fan feedback” according to the NRL when the new rules were introduced. The games were sped up but at a detriment to quality with more blow out results than ever seen before, only to be outdone by 2020. The rules fundamentally changed the game and then the expansion to take out offside penalties in 2021 made Rugby League a completely different looking game to the one just 12 months ago.
It doesn’t matter what stats the NRL’s puppet Graham Annesley comes out with on a Monday during his briefings, a once shrewd administrator now nothing more than the mouthpiece for the NRL and the ARL Commission, every fan knows that the 2021 product is not the game we all fell in love with or the one that we want for our game. The stats might show that things haven’t changed but the perception of the game has. Nobody is enjoying watching teams with 60%+ possession just steam roll through once competitive teams.
Is this the short-term pain that we were told? A one-sided competition after 10 rounds and a waning interest in the competition which used to be one of the most competitive in the world. This wasn’t the pain that we were promised but told it would make the game more “entertaining” and bring fans back to the game, it certainly doesn’t do that.
In 2020, the game re-negotiated it’s TV rights with the NRL allowing both Channel 9 and Fox Sports to pay less for the broadcasting rights of the competition. This deal with Channel 9 in particular short changed the fans as it meant that there was no need for Channel 9 to broadcast NSW and QLD Cup lower grades action for which had been done for the past few years. The deal also allowed Channel 9 who have had a substandard NRL product for many years now to take exclusivity on the game’s biggest occasions short changing fans plus allowing them to put the money they saved on NRL into broadcasting another sport.
What does the NRL gain out of a cheaper broadcast deal, that short-changes fans a high-quality product and actually reduces the amount of Rugby League content that is shown for fans and not highlighting the pathways to NRL doesn’t hold any gain whatsoever for fans and the rugby league.
I could sit here and keep typing about the “short-term pain” that the NRL is going through but ultimately why we are here is the latest crackdown that we’ve got, the crackdown on “high contact”. Nobody in the game wants there to be an abundance of foul play and the NRL is right to be punishing players for it but at the end of the day we play a contact sport and there has always been high contact since 1908 and there will always be high tackles in our game.
The latest crackdown is not because it is happening more frequently but as a result of the NRL coming down harder on it and then trying to make up for their own failings as an organisation after they failed to meet their own standards over the previous few weeks. The decision not to take action last weekend against Dylan Brown for his incident on Drew Hutchison as well as the contact that has happened on James Tedesco recently has played the major role in this not the “increasing number of incidents” that Peter V’Landys and co have claimed of late.
If we’re being forthright and honest, the number of reviewed incidents is actually lower as per Graham Annesley’s weekly briefing last week where he said numbers were down but NRL scrutiny is higher than ever before. The crackdown is as a response to the NRL’s own mistakes in not policing things to the right standard and ultimately now fans are the ones suffering because players are being sin binned for innocuous tackles which wouldn’t have been the case if the NRL just got everything right to start with.
The “Short-term” pain of the crackdown is not something fans are willing to get used to because it means that the product is suffering massively and it was on show last night that fans will not cop eight sin bins across two games. Fans want to watch the best players on the field and as fans we accept that there will be times where players need to be sin binned and we accept that but to use the bin for minor infringements sets the game up to go to a place nobody wants it to be.
If there was a clear long-term gain at the current point in the NRL’s management then fans would ultimately be more tolerable to the changes made in the game, but in total honesty there is no clear long-term plan other than a Chairman who wants to run the game as his pet project and how he wants the pieces to move on the chessboard with no strategy for the future. A media that as long as they get the ear of the boss will do all his talking it for him and give him a Putinesque freedom of management over a game that is heading down a very dangerous path where the short-term pain could be very long term pain..