BIG ED FARISH fell asleep during a presentation by Souths co-owner Peter Holmes a Court at NRL headquarters last month.
Perhaps it was the birthday cake Big Ed may have feasted on the evening before at one of the 80 centenary functions or 179 plaque-laying ceremonies rugby league has organised in its 100th year.
By Holmes a Court's own admission, "It was a very long presentation, with slides", and the NRL's director of finance nodded off.
Holmes a Court said he presented 12 initiatives concentrating on how the game could increase its revenue.
"The revenue coming into the game is not sufficient to make the Sydney clubs or the game strong," he told the Herald.Like a government with no interest in supply-side economics, rugby league has traditionally attacked its bottom line from the expenditure side. Over 60 years, it has introduced restraints such as the residential rule, transfer fees, ceiling payments and salary caps.
Maybe it is the Sydney clubs' reliance on poker machines, but the code has neglected strategies to increase gates, sponsorship, merchandising, club memberships and even broadcasting fees.
Now, with smoking bans in licensed clubs and the NSW Government taxing poker machine revenue, rather than profit, it had to examine alternative sources of revenue.
Fortunately, during the past decade, as state and federal government grants have goitered the nation with stadiums, rugby league has been able to provide fans with creature comforts, and this is reflected in crowd growth, from 10,000 watching a Charity Shield match at antiquated Redfern Oval in 1982 to 25,000 at ANZ Stadium, Homebush Bay, on March 1.
Brookvale, Kogarah, Wollongong, Shark Park, Newcastle, Penrith and Leichhardt have all had facelifts, while the Storm, subsidised by News Ltd to the tune of $8 million a year, are expected to move into profitability after 2010, when they move to a new, Victorian Government purpose-built rectangular stadium.
In the same way it has relied on pokies, the code has been benevolent with the broadcasters, agreeing to live telecasts against the gate and, unlike the AFL in Melbourne, imposing no blackouts.
But a $780m broadcasting deal the AFL fluked as a result of a war between two of the nation's richest men - the late Kerry Packer and Kerry Stokes - has soured NRL club officials.
"If rugby league rates so well on pay TV, why aren't we getting more?" they ask.
Well, if you are half-owned by a media company which also half-owns the pay TV company, it may provide a clue to the answer.
Rugby league receives $100m a year from TV, and the next deal is six years away, meaning the squeeze on costs will continue.
Staff levels at the NRL and ARL are dreadfully inadequate, certainly compared with the combined administration of the AFL/VFL.
The NSW/ACT AFL division has a staff of 60, including 12 working in Blacktown alone.
The NRL may have had oysters, pigs on a spit and vitamin water at its launch at Birchgrove Oval on Thursday night but the code has always paid its administrators subsistence wages and expected they work long hours.
In his presentation, Holmes a Court said: "There is no silver bullet. But everything has to be done better, including membership drives. There hasn't been much on the radar with initiatives to increase club member numbers."
Maybe the dozing Big Ed had heard it all before.
After all, he knows that any revenue initiatives by the NRL can potentially draw it into conflict with its 16 clubs.
If Telstra is the code sponsor, it makes it hard for a club to do a deal with Optus.
Conflict is the basis of rugby league: ball-carrier versus tackler, attack versus defence, field position versus completion rates, (Roosters chairman) Nick Politis versus Holmes a Court, NRL co-owners ARL versus News Ltd.
This season looms as an angst-ridden, confrontational, challenging one.
The code's overworked administration has taken on three additional burdens apart from the NRL premiership and a State of Origin series.
It will debut the Toyota Cup, the under-20s curtain raiser competition to NRL matches; organise the centenary functions; and, finally, run a World Cup in October-November.
Like Big Ed's slice of centenary birthday cake, maybe the code has bitten off more than it can chew. Or perhaps the finance director was banking some sleep for the torturous, tense year ahead.
Happy 100th birthday, rugby league? Unlikely.
