Steps British rugby league can take to counter NRL player drain threat

(Even if you are under 40 please read on!)

So for old time’s sake we’ll borrow – and then dismiss - the catchphrases from two of the 70s comedy series’ characters as we discuss how British rugby league can respond to the NRL’s massively increased salary cap.

The news this week that Wakefield’s young wing Lewis Murphy could be joining the exodus of good young players to the other side of the world understandably causes alarm.

The player, coveted by the Saints fans following his displays last year, has been strongly linked with a move to Sydney Roosters.  

If the wild-eyed Private Frazer was commenting, he would already be announcing in his dour Outer Hebridean tone that: “We’re doomed!”

Change the accent, and the sentiment is not dissimilar to the “Game’s gone” mantra repeatedly trotted out by those who have fallen out of love with the game this past 20 years.

On the other hand, if Lance Corporal Jones were here, he'd be crying: “Don’t panic! Don’t panic!”

You can understand the sentiment in both, however both reactions are wrong in relation to dealing with the threat to Super League’s battle to retain and recruit in the face of the NRL juggernaut.

There’s no quick fix; the only way British rugby league can deal with this threat is to grow the game – getting more eyes on the sport through the turnstiles, on social media and on TV. Only then will it get the sponsorship and an increased broadcasting deal that can fund increased spending on players.

Saying “increase the cap” without understanding how that increase would be paid for, without going down the route of Wasps and Worcester in Premiership rugby union, is not only simplistic, but it ignores one of the other reasons we have one.

Namely, we don’t want Super League’s most valuable 'player' being the sugar daddy with the deepest pockets. The lessons of 1988-95 tells you that having one club dominate through pure spending power is not a good long-term strategy.

So here are six small steps that can be taken – by those at the top level running the game but also by those of us watching it.

1. Rugby League needs to create superstars.

Rugby league makes much of how humble its players are, the way they remain grounded and stay in touch with their roots. That is all very admirable – but that should not deter us from putting our biggest stars’ names up in lights.

If you look at the special finishes Tommy Makinson or Jack Welsby have pulled off over the years, you only wonder what profile they would have if they were doing that in union.

Tommy made an impression when he went on Soccer AM – and that is exactly the sort of show that we should be pushing our players on to.

We need to identify our key personalities and get their faces on billboards, TV and social media. We need to get those big-hits, one-handed tight-corner finishes and bewildering passages of play clipped and packed on TikTok and Twitter.

Fans are usually good at sussing out the stand-out characters on the opposing side – and you can tell by the barracking they get; Alex Murphy got it as player and coach, that carried on with the reception Andy Gregory, Martin Offiah and Sean Long regularly received.

With some young characters – and Jake Connor and Jack Welsby especially - there is a tendency for rival fans to try and put them back in the box.

Read the green-eyed experts on social media and Jack is over-rated etc and there was untold glee that he dropped a pass (while injured) playing for England in the World Cup semi.

We want our biggest stars on pedestals, not back in their box!

2. Rugby league needs to promote games as events.

Rugby league has not moved with the times when it comes to pushing and promoting games as events.

That may explain why we have seen an alarming drop off in the attendances at the big showpiece events like the Challenge Cup Finals at Wembley and the Grand Final at Old Trafford.

If the same formula is not working for the big games, we are treading water when it comes to the weekly rounds.

There is a cost of living crisis, and a tightening of belts – particularly across the post industrial northern towns that are the bedrock of rugby league. But we have to ask why it is that Women’s Super League football gates are rising 200 per cent and 47,000 watched Arsenal women play Spurs.

Rugby league does not simply have to look at their game day/night experience but longer term it has to look at structure of the competition so each game does have meaning and it is not merely a long-winded starting grid for a three-week end of season that decides the title.

3. Rugby League needs to be adventurous.

We have to start thinking outside the box and be a bit more adventurous. As sport we are no longer as audacious as the time when Alex Murphy grabbed headlines by trying to sign a suspended bad-boy Vinnie Jones.

Widnes Dougie Laughton, too, used to always have a few tricks up his sleeve when it came to recruitment and publicity.

Do we trawl the country to entice players like we used to do – a strategy that resulted in Saints recruiting a player like Cliff Watson who would become one of the World’s best forwards.

Where is the next Martin Offiah coming from?

I was disappointed, even if only from a publicity side of things, that rugby league didn’t make a move on buying up Worcester and especially Wasps when they went belly up.

It is obviously much harder to attract union players these days given their code is also professional, and in many cases operating under a bigger cap than league.

But given there has been a fair bit of displacement of players in both England and Wales in recent times, there must be opportunities to attract some players whose build would make them a more natural fit for league.

Union have shown no hesitation in recruiting coaches from league – Edwards, Farrell, Langley, Deacon and Sinfield et al are now plying their trade in union.

Making it a two-way street would be good for the game’s profile, whether we like that or not.

4. Rugby League clubs need to broaden their reach.

This is a simple point, but you have to ask yourself why is it that if James Roby and darts player Michael Smith walked around Liverpool, Manchester, Preston, Blackpool or Bolton that only one of those St Helens sporting sons would be recognised.

Rugby league is not a northern sport – it is a sport played in a handful of northern towns and is anonymous in the vast majority of the others, including some of the biggest cities. It is one of the reasons we don't get national TV coverage.

This is not an argument to come up with a wish-list of big towns and cities in the UK that would broaden that appeal. Quick fixes with no groundwork do not work – and that has been the lesson from some of the expansion policy.

However, what could work is for IMG to work with the clubs to broaden each top-flight team’s hinterland when it comes to promoting the sport.

By that each club should push into a town/county that neighbours them.

For example Saints promote their matches and their players in Liverpool, Southport and Ormskirk, Warrington could push down into Cheshire, Leigh could go into Bolton, and Wigan into Blackburn and Preston and Salford into Manchester and Bury.

Player visits could be with schools or prominent businesses.

Saints could play a Women's Super League game or a Reserves game at somewhere like Haig Avenue, Southport for a bit of publicity and give the fans a day by the seaside. 

I hear groans; maybe the returns would be miniscule – but we have to try a strategy that pulls in new fans, potential sponsors and increases a profile.

As a reminder the end goal is more eyes on the product to get a better TV deal – something we can only get by growing the game, not shrinking with the towns it currently serves. Some clubs are currently trying to get blood out of a stone in building their gates.

And with that in mind, tying in with a longer term strategy of building the game, maybe every top flight club should link with either a non-heartlands League 1 club or partner a development region, just as Salford have done with Wales.

We also have to remember that current non-Super League towns and cities like Widnes, Bradford and Halifax are still here, producing players with a strong support base that will not be ditching their colours and jumping behind their bigger top-flight neighbours.

They remain part of the rugby league family.

5. Stop moaning, start organising.

Yes, you can understand the despair of fans at times when it comes to the governance of the game, and also the gripes of players and coaches when it comes to piling on workload and extra fixtures during a campaign.

People moan, ultimately, because they care but just constantly bashing your team or rugby league generally for every issue, large and small, can have a corrosive effect.

Of course, one way of avoiding that is to always be on the ball in the decisions that are made. But this is sport, there will always be winners and losers, even when it comes to calls made by the administration.

If you were a floating sports fan, or a newspaper sports editor or a potential sponsor looking to invest in a sporting event and all you heard from those who support it was phrases like “the game is rubbish”, “rugby league is finished” and “we’ll be part time in a few years” then you’d excuse them to believing it and picking another sport to invest their time and money in.

Us rugby league folk can be contrary; defending the sport to the hilt if attacked by football fans, and especially union supporters – but become the sports own worst critics when left to our own devices.

There will always be scope for argument, debate and criticism – whether that is over competition structure, refereeing and disciplinary or the ticket price and venue of the big events.

The clubs and especially the governing body needs to be accountable for the decisions they make. Not all decisions are black and white.

I am often nostalgic about the old supporters clubs as organisations that allowed fans to band together as a collective to 'support' the parent club - but also to act as a voice for the broader membership when there are issues of concern.

Every club should have a supporters club, even if it met virtually, to channel the view of the fans – and that collective organisation would carry weight than ten thousand disparate voices carping negatively from the sidelines.

As a rule, let’s try and focus on the big stuff and pick our battles.

6. Rugby League needs international sport.

We saw from the World Cup, especially with the Wheelchair game, that international sport can get to the parts that rugby league cannot normally reach.

There were people at Newcastle for the opening England game against Samoa who had probably never been tempted by rugby league before, not even when Magic has been at St James’ Park.

We need to build on that, and use international sport as a hook to new potential fans and bigger than normal media coverage.

International sport made Jonny Wilkinson and Jason Robinson household names – that then feeds back into club attendances, TV and sponsorship. It is not rocket science, we need to play internationals.

We are, to a great extent, in the hands of the NRL in controlling the calendar not just with Australia, but no doubt the Kiwis as well. It would be wonderful to get Tonga over in a three-match Test series, but again would the NRL put their oar in.

In England we may yearn for a return of the Ashes, but if the Aussies don't play ball we also have to look after the things in our control.

In the words of Stephen Stills.

“And if you can't be with the one you love, honey.

“Love the one you're with.”

And for us, that is France.

Build it up, build on the 23,000 that watched the World Cup game in Bolton. And in future experiment in taking it to a venue off the traditional Super League track.

These are only small suggestions. There will need to be major discussion on competition structure, on which teams we want in the top flight and what hoops they have to jump through to earn that place.

But that is for IMG and the clubs to sort out.

We can’t panic, but if we simply do nothing positive to make significant steps forward and simply expect Sky to produce a bigger cheque next time out, then, in the words of Private Frazer: “We are doomed!”