Australian sport must protect its own interests: John O'Neill
Australian sport must protect its own interests: John O'Neill
Peter Lalor | May 16, 2008 Australian sport must protect its own interests: John O'Neill | The Australian
EVERY major sport agrees: the wolf at their door is the threat of cashed-up foreign clubs luring local players away. However, it is Australian Rugby Union boss John O'Neill who believes his code is the one facing the most immediate danger.
The chief executives of cricket, AFL, soccer and the two rugby codes gathered yesterday for lunch at Sydney's Tattersall's club.
The league, union and cricket bosses all admit, to some degree or another, that they face the threat of losing talent overseas in the near future.
It is something soccer has known forever, while the AFL was the only sport represented yesterday which is safely isolated from the forces of international competition.
Cricket Australia boss James Sutherland admitted the new Indian Premier League was a force to be reckoned with and may lead to a player drain, but more so for other countries than Australia.
Sutherland said he believed the International Cricket Council's Future Tours Program must be "fiercely protected" to fight the push to give the privatised IPL an exclusive window every year.
His views contradict those of the Marylebone Cricket Club's cricket council. The council consists of Steve Waugh, Mike Brearley and Geoff Boycott and recommended this week the private competition be given some oxygen.
"Players should have the opportunity to represent their country whilst being able to share in the benefits provided by participation in tournaments such as the Indian Premier League," the committee said in a statement released yesterday.
"The committee believes that Test cricket is the pinnacle of the game."
The committee accepts that there is a place for the IPL but the introduction of this tournament has brought to the fore the issue of premature retirement from the international game."
O'Neill said Australian, New Zealand and South African rugby players are being stalked by cashed-up northern hemisphere clubs.
"You have to be a realist to some extent and the more international your game is the more it is subject to international market forces," O'Neill said.
"Players will go where the money is. Doing nothing is not an option for us. Rugby has to move on to the next stage of its evolution.
"The northern hemisphere has Australia, New Zealand and South Africa in their sights and they make no secret of it. And unless we respond by taking control of our own destiny in 10 or 15 years' time we will be in a pretty ordinary state.
"The bigger the sport, the more global the footprint, the more the sheer economics become irresistible."
O'Neill, formerly chief executive of Football Federation Australia, said he remembered the Socceroos asking after the 2006 World Cup what local league, rugby and AFL players earned.
"I said on a good day, with sponsorships and the like they can get $1million a year - the soccer internationals were, on average, earning $2million," he said.
NRL boss David Gallop was a little more relaxed about the future and while admitting the salary cap would mean that sometimes players would be lost overseas, it ensured the 16 clubs survived.
