By STEVE MASCORD
NRL BOSSES Peter V’landys and Andrew Abdo have revealed they want to remodel all of British rugby league – right down to schoolkids – and are not just interested in assuming control of Europe’s elite competition.
rugbyleaguehub.com Long Reads is able to bring you this bombshell development after it was reported this morning the pair had offered to increase the level of central funding per Super League club from £1.3 million to £2.1 million under their stewardship.
The original NRL Europe blueprint as devised by Wests Tigers chief executive Shane Richardson had the Australasian governing body running the elite competition and handing out grants to the Rugby Football League to take care of grassroots, as it does now.
But ARLC chairman V’landys tells us: “You’ve got to go right down to the pathways.
“Because you need to develop players, you need to bring players up, you need to make the game popular at school. You’ve got to start on the grassroots. You’ve got to put the seeds in and the seeds will grow.
“There’s no good going for the tree when it’s already developed because it’s not going to grow all that much more.
“So you need to get the seedlings in and you need to grow it that way. It’s more than just the elite level.”
Asked if this meant the RFL would cease to exist, V’landys answered: “There’s no blueprint but there has to be drastic corporate governance change. That’s all I’ll say.
“I don’t know what the model is going to be moving forward but the current model does not work and will not work.”
NRL CEO Abdo added: “If you look at the model in Australia, the professional game and the grassroots game is all together under the commission and we’re thinking about the entire region, not just our traditional markets.
“The beauty of going top to bottom, east to west is that you can actually grow future fans for life from a young age.
“Touch, tackle and tag in schools, in clubs, is how you are effectively acquiring the lifetime value of a fan. So there’s multiple benefits other than pathway development and talent development.”
Totalrl.com reported this morning that increasing the club grant was offered when V’landys and Abdo met Super League club representatives along with the Rugby Football League and Rugby League Commercial six days ago.
The outlet speculated the offer was based on a deal the ARLC was planning to do with streaming giant DAZN and that if the arrangement went through, next year would be British rugby league’s last on Sky Sports.