I thought we were over this garbage, but once again Peter V’landys is “posturing” to move the NRL grand final away from Sydney should suburban grounds not receive government funding for upgrades.

Enough is enough!

I don’t care whether the end justifies the means, any potential move of the grand final from its traditional home would be a disgrace. And supporters in the Sydney heartland are the ones being held to ransom throughout the process.

The tactic is easy to understand.

Melbourne is the sporting capital of Australia, with national events such as the AFL Grand Final, the Australian Open Tennis, the Boxing Day Test and the Melbourne Cup. 

In comparison, Sydney, the largest city in Australia, only hosts the NRL Grand Final, the New Year’s Test and Origin. Already it hardly stacks up to the Victorian capital, especially given that the ARL shares Origin matches to other states.

Any threat to take away the main event on the Sydney sports calendar should be treated seriously. And if it comes to fruition, at the hands of V’landys, who suffers? You know the answer.

Is there any justification to push this extreme consequence if the government doesn’t provide stadium funding?

Anybody visiting grounds such as Brookvale, Leichhardt, Campbelltown, Endeavour Field, Belmore, Penrith Park, Wollongong or Kogarah knows that these venues are rooted in the distant past. You’ll note that I’m using the location name rather than the sponsored stadium names.

Leichhardt hill

All of these grounds feature hills to accommodate fans. No stadium should be charging top coin, as they do, for people to have to sit or stand on a patch of grass. And let’s not forget the  substandard toilets. It’s 2023 not 1963.

Do these grounds need urgent upgrades? Absolutely. Should the NSW Government fund investment in all of them? Absolutely not!

Before turning to the stance taken by V’landys, we need to consider which grounds should qualify for a publicly funded upgrade.

Endeavour Field should immediately be eliminated from any public funding. Yes it’s below standard but it’s a privately owned stadium, with the Cronulla Sharks being one of just two clubs to own their own venue. The other club is the Dolphins.

Endeavour Field is privately owned

Any investment in Endeavour Field increases the asset of the Sharks, as well as providing an imoroved revenue stream for their club through venue hire for other events. No other NRL club would be benefitting in such a way from an upgrade.

Penrith seems locked into a $350 million rebuild, but the newly elected government won’t spend any more. This would appear to eliminate the plans to acquire the Trotting Club and track for the build. The cost of doing that would be astronomical and the money could hardly be justified with no other major sport likely to stage regular events there.

If the government decides to strictly adhere to the budgeted funding, this might even change the stadium design for Penrith. In that instance, should the $350 million be redistributed across a number of grounds, including Penrith? 

So where should any money go?

Top of the list is Brookvale Oval. It’s council owned, and as such is a community asset. The Sea Eagles have a Centre of Excellence and a new stand attached to it at the northern end of the field, but the entire eastern side of the ground is a grass hill.

Brookvale Oval hill

Both Leichhardt Oval and Campbelltown Stadium can lay claim to funding, but it can’t be both. The Tigers already play out of CommBank Stadium, surely the NRL and the Tigers can’t expect the government to spend money on another two venues.

In this instance, the NRL and the Tigers need to make a call on which venue is most deserving. To split any funding between both would mean that the upgrades wouldn’t be significant enough.

Given the population, and the A League club playing out of Campbelltown, they should probably go for Campbelltown. Either one is a community asset so the Tigers deserve that one upgrade. But when it’s completed, they should play more than four games per year there.

Belmore is Canterbury’s training base and hosts a game or two each year. With the Bulldogs basing themselves at Accor Stadium, they’d have to declare an intent to relocate back to Belmore for any upgrade funding to be justified.

The Dragons are another team with more than one home base. Wollongong is a far better rugby league venue than Kogarah, but both have hills that run the length of the field. That just isn’t good enough and upgrades would be justified. Furthermore, they also earn a tick by being community assets. However, the choice has to be made about which one gets the coin.

Kogarah

Taking all of the above into consideration, Peter V’landys is holding Sydney NRL fans to ransom for the sake of funding just a few suburban grounds, with only Brookvale, one Tigers venue, and one Dragons venue being truly deserving.

It will be interesting to see what unfolds at Penrith because that could very well determine what happens with all developments.

Regardless, if stadium funding doesn’t eventuate, and the retaliation is V’landys shifting the Grand Final, how would anyone in NSW benefit? There’d be no improved facilities and no grand final. Surely that couldn’t be road that would be taken.The rugby league people of Sydney would be double punished, and the NSW economy would be dealt a blow.

Maybe V’landys is hoping that the average punter in this state will see the government as the villain.

I suspect they’ll be looking at someone else.

Eels forever!

Sixties

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