November 21, 1996: It's time to deliver
This feature appeared 25 years ago today. I must have somehow missed it during my research or else I suspect the clipping would be in the book.
Sydney Morning Herald, Thursday, November 21 1996
By STEVE MASCORD
SUPER League chief executive John Ribot opened yesterday's 1997 season launch by saying, "Thank goodness we've now got something to talk about".
He got it a bit wrong. Super League has, for two years now, had plenty to talk about and it has done it pretty well.
Selling the game to the world, a better deal for the players, public and media, improved rules, high profile sponsors, American-style marketing. John Ribot might not have always been allowed to talk, but when he did he wasn't struggling for subject matter.
What Super League now has is something to do.
Make that plenty to do.
While they were held up by the courts, everyone involved in the breakaway from the staff at its Elizabeth Street headquarters to club bosses and international officials have perhaps become too good at talking for their own good.
Put simply, boys, the public now expects nothing short of perfection from you.
When a column of fixtures peeled from its backing on stage at Darling Harbour's iMAX theatre, where an enlarged version of the 1997 draw was unveiled yesterday, it was viewed as embarrassing rather than amusing.
People are more likely to forgive the ARL for being a bit tatty around the edges than they are an international media conglomerate like News Corporation.
As last month's Lions tour of the South Pacific illustrated, the performance of everyone associated with Super League is going to reflect on the movement no matter how good the games are between Canberra and Brisbane.
Yesterday's draw was as comprehensive as promised - an 18-round domestic competition, the much-anticipated World Club championship, an Australian tour to Great Britain, the tri-series, the World Nines.
Super League is backing its belief in the "product", having a go and for that it should be applauded.
But it didn't take long for the finger-pointing' and one-upmanship which will dominate the game until it is reunited, to resume.
If Super League clubs dislike split rounds so much, ARL officials said, why have they included two of them during their Origin series?
And one of the breakaway's beefs with the ARL was the late allocation of matches.
The establishment responded by allocating specific dates to matches for its first eight rounds next year. Because Super League hasn't yet signed a free-to-air television agreement, yesterday's draw included no match allocations aside from confirmation that the competition opener would be played on March 14 with a game between Canberra and Cronulla.
The World Nines was to have been held in Fiji indefinitely, but has been switched to Townsville after just one year.
"They're finding that things like that aren't as easy as they thought," ARL chairman Ken Arthurson said last night "They don't have any experience in running things, and everything they've tried to organise so far has been a disaster."
So how can Super League shrug off critics like Arthurson?
Here's where the battle for the hearts, minds and pay TV subscriptions of league fans will be decided:
Among Spectators, two dates may well decide who wins the biggest final of 1997 - Super League v ARL.
One is ANZAC Day, when the ARL stages Sydney Origin v Country Origin in Newcastle while New Zealand meets the Super League Australian team in Sydney.
Because of the unfortunate polarisation of playing talent, the ARL's rep game may well be Newcastle and Illawarra versus Sydney City, North Sydney and Manly while the Super League international will pit a large portion of Canberra and Brisbane players against a team made up largely of Auckland Warriors.
Will the international vision attract more spectators and viewers than the ARL's big smoke-against-the-bush tradition?
But the grass-roots of the battle lie a long way from the comparative glamour of the representative arena.
On Sunday April 6, Balmain take on. South Sydney at Leichhardt Oval while in Super League's split round 11, the Hunter Mariners visit Penrith Park.
Find the biggest attendance, and you’ll go a long way towards knowing which competition wins the battle for Sydney.
ARL officials were reassured by yesterday's draw that they hold the advantage on television. They believe Super League will struggle to come up with two quality games from each round which Channel 7 will be willing to show in prime time.
They argue that their best two first-round games - North Sydney-Parramatta and Newcastle-St George - outflank Super League's best that weekend, Canterbury-Canberra and Cronulla-Auckland when it comes to Australian ratings potential.
Ribot has laid down a challenge to fans in Sydney to support Canterbury, Penrith and Cronulla, along with the Test, tri-series game and final if they want the grand final.
But as he has often pointed out, Sydney league fans are arrogant.
If Super League is not even willing to guarantee the decider will be in the centre of its universe, they are just as likely to be offended and turn back to the Sydney-based establishment.
On the other hand, Super League has a pronounced advantage in the rest of Australasia and by playing a tri-series game in Canberra, the Nines and a semi-final in Townsville and a world club semi-final in Auckland, it is pressing home that advantage.
The National Basketball League was a sporting success story long before Sydney caught on.
In the representative arena, Super League appears to have already won. But the ARL is hoping lopsided scorelines in the World Club Championship games will damage the new competition's credibility.
And the establishment still has the game's biggest attraction, a traditional Origin series, up its sleeve.
Which competition structure will fans prefer? The diversity of Super League, or the predictability and reliability of the ARL comp, with plenty of games in Sydney?
In the lingo of Auckland chief executive Ian Robson, Super League is world champion at "talking the talk".
The problem is, it has the power of life and death over a 101-year-old game depending on whether it can "walk the walk".
If it can't, some of its top officials admit, there may be little rugby league to speak of in five years.
So, Super Leaguers, don't start patting yourselves on the back just yet You stand at a cross roads.