Scared reaction of Perth media dinosaurs vindicates NRL expansion call
Story by Tom Naghten
View attachment 30159
The NRL's newest team has only just been made official but Perth's media heavyweights have already got their back up.
WA Premier Roger Cook and Australian Rugby League Commission (ARLC) boss Peter V'landys are set to
confirm the inclusion of a Perth-based club into the NRL on Thursday.
In response,
The West Australian has come out swinging on the front page: "THE BAD NEWS BEARS," it reads.
"Rugby-mad Roger Cook forces WA taxpayers to pay Sydney's NRL rejects $65m to play in Perth".
For starters, the use of "rugby" tells you all you need to know about their familiarity with the sport.
Of course, there are several vested interests at play here.
For one, let's look at Seven West Media, owner of
The West.
Headed up by Aussie rules-fanatic and billionaire Kerry Stokes, don't expect the NRL to get any love from what is effectively the only paper in town.
Seven West Media also owns the Seven Network, the holder of the AFL's free-to-air TV rights, the NRL's biggest competitor.
The accompanying article in
The West adds that the, "Cook indulgence delivers questionable economic benefit to the AFL-mad State for a game with negligible local fanbase and no elite players, but will further pump up the NRL's coffers by allowing it now to chase an even bigger payment from rights holders in its next broadcast deal."
With the current NRL rights deal due to expire at the end of 2027, the ARLC is expected to add both the WA-based team and a PNG side to the competition around that time.
Any jump in the price of a broadcast deal would make waves across Australia's sporting landscape and likely be reflected when Seven - and its competitors - come to the table to negotiate a new deal for the AFL rights in 2031.
It's easy to see why Stokes and Co. aren't jumping up and down at that prospect.
While rugby league won't be unseating AFL as the main event in the west any time soon, the hostile reaction from the media powerhouse shows the threat of competition is present and vindicates the game's move to reestablish a team there.
Additionally, the assertion that there is "negligible local fanbase" is a weak one.
South Sydney have hosted three double headers in Perth in recent years, averaging an attendance of 38,700, while more than 20,000 turned up to watch the Dolphins play the Roosters in 2024.
Not to mention the sell-out crowds at Optus Stadium every time State of Origin has made the trip across.
Of course, getting fans through the gates once or twice a year is a different proposition to every second week, but to suggest there is no appetite for rugby league among the nearly 3 million Western Australians is simply untrue.
The fact of the matter is that the WA government will be pouring in less than $10 million annually over seven years to the team.
Last year, a surplus of $2.6 billion was forecast in the state budget - Cook is breaking off 0.38 per cent of that to bring a professional rugby league club to the state for the first time since the Western Reds' short-lived run ended in 1997.
Whether
The West and Seven get behind it or not, it's happening.
