...15 years ago!

Just found this online... makes interesting reading, and also serves as a reminded that the plans from the RFL take a while in their generation and execution. So... Edinburgh franchise within the decade? Tolouse in SL in 2011? It would not be a surprise...


[urlhttp://www.independent.co.uk/sport/do-i-not-like-that----plans-spell-sudden-death-alex-murphy-the-veteran-rugby-league-coach-believes-the-sports-latest-plans-will-drain-its-lifeblood-1446560.html[/url

Absolutely brilliant.

The man is a genius off the field as well as on. Everything he says in it has proved to be true.

interesting read, good find that

What a load of complete and utter sense.

excellent read and 100% correct.....

Excellent!

Linked it on the Fax board. Hope you don't mind.

how does he do it he is a magic man

Some of the ones in SL will go out if business too, not just the ones out of it.

He always did talk out of his , Sport is a business, if clubs go bust its just tough other clubs will come along.

bull Murph talks sense and was the best number 7 ever and the cleverest, doubt there will ever be one as good.

Think you'll be in the minority there. Rings even more true today when reading the article; frightening that it was forecasted 15 years ago.

Think you'll find that sport is... well, sport actually.

Try life down here cock it aint so pleasant.

Does he have a chrystal ball

I assume then that we can live without paying players, charging at the turnstyle, taking money from Sky etc etc?


Nope, thought not.

Sport is not business.

It has to be run with some business rules, but it is sport and not business.

If sport were business, then most clubs simply would not exist, as they do not turn a profit and there is little possibility of ever turning a profit.

There are not as many money sinks in the business world as there are in the sporting world - simply because it is sport and is about competition, not profit.

If it is a business,I think your clubs financial reports would make interesting reading over the years,our current Chairman baled you out years ago.

Extremely successful on the field but not spent a penny off it,I envy all your trophies but that does not mean you have the right to belittle other clubs who frankly are ran as bad or well as Saints but do not have the Sky money to support them each year.

Absolutely uncanny read!!

AJM displays Nostrodamus like foresight!!

The only reason for what has happened in our game over the last 20 years is the RFL's obsession that we have to beat the Aussies. We copied everything they do thinking in time it would make us better than them. 20 years on and we are still behind them. I'd say the exercise has failed. Murphy was spot on with everything he said. How many clubs have gone bust, or reformed under new names. Even we did it. The game can't go on like this and the short sighted saints fan who posted on here may get a shock one day very soon. Try going over St Helens accounts and you'll see not everything's rosy even at the most succesful club in the SL era.

Don't see the "nostradamus" connection tbh. Murphy was a great player/coach in his time. Don't mean what he says here is true. Nothing much in it that is relevant to now and should stay in mid 90's where the game was on its knees. One of things I agreed with (which again is mid 90's related not now) was the crazy transfer fees at the time - we went down that road too.
He is against salary cap - proven to be wrong. He mentions nothing of ideas of how to stop the decline apart from stay as we where, where a massive clubs like Leeds & W1gan was struggling to survive for example.
This is the very 1st season of franchises for goodness sake- give it time. It took 100 years to spread the game to mainly the areas they started from in 1895, by having very little interest in spreading the game especially at club level where self interest was more important (including us).
As for clubs merging - As Barry Mac said in his book, everyone was totally against it and campaigned against it because of herritage and history etc etc.....but where was those fans since ?
So sorry if most of you agree with views from '94, but IMO they are stick in the mud views if you still agree with them. Not relevant to now.
As for RL being a sport - hmmmm. Its not anymore, just like football isn't. Its the ones with the most money - of course some exceptions that mis-spend and mis-manage their club. W1gan bought their way out of relegation trouble - was that sporting ?
But the romantic notions and having the dream of seeing small clubs like our own in the SL GF would never happen, even without the "F" word. Now 20 years ago - in Murphs era then it was possible.....

I note that one of our SL colleagues has seen fit to pass comment on here. For some home truths about how RL is run as a business, read the 'Quote/Unquote' feature in the programme for the Sheffield game! I have extracted some quotes about how RL is doing 'as a business' from an interview with a SL club chairman. He doesn't think everything in the garden is rosy - for any of them!

I've only just caught up with this thread but what a great find. By his own admission Murph will admit to not being the cleverest man in the world, but he does know about rugby league. He knew it then and he knows it now. If only our club would take a bit of notice of what he has to say - they might learn something, however they think of him as some kind of dinosaur and that what he knows only relates to the past. They're so wrong and if only they'd take the time to listen to him they'd realise this.

As he often says, 'There's only so many ways to score a try, or kick a goal - so why try to complicate things?' If only we had a few players who knew what those 'ways' were, to score a try!!

Great when you get baled out by super league and there contracts eh saints?....anyway fook um they will have to come cap in hand soon...18 MONTHS LEFT TO DRAW ON THE BACK OF A BEER MAT YOUR FRANCHISE BUULLLSHIT

If you want to talk about whether professional sport or semi-pro sport is a business or not is another matter.