On Friday night in Sydney’s Moore Park, the AFL and the NRL ran finals games side-by-side – one a preliminary final – the other a week two elimination final between Cronulla-Sutherland and the North Queensland Cowboys.
The Swans, as expected, were looking at a sold-out Sydney Cricket Ground in their match against Port Adelaide Power.
Cronulla and the Cowboys at Allianz Stadium was a harder sell.
Not because they aren’t great clubs or fans didn’t want to be there but promoting this match and getting supporters to leave the Shire, with union action and train chaos [as usual], in Sydney against a side three thousand kilometres away was always going to end how it did.
Good on the Swans.
Congratulations to the Sharks for getting through and breaking their hoodoo.
As it happens, when an AFL team from Sydney, or Brisbane for that matter, make the pointy end of the season – we hear lots and lots about rugby league’s old foe taking over.
Whether it be New South Wales, Bondi, South-East Queensland or Penrith.
Throw in Cooladdi for that matter.
Former AFL player and Channel 7 commentator Brian Taylor, a mix of Sam Backo and Steve ‘Blocker’ Roach with the self-awareness of Benny Elias, pumped his chest out after the Swans victory over the Port Powers of Adelaide and claimed Sydney as Aussie rules land.
“Next door is the NRL that looks half full,” he waffled from behind his moustache.
“No doubt AFL is the place to be at this part of town.”
The SuperFooty AFL X account, with almost one hundred thousand followers, also went on the front foot with the guile of Daryll Cullinan playing Shane Warne on a fifth day SCG pitch, comparing the 44,053 at the Swans match compared to the 19,124 next door.
Mr. Taylor was correct in the fact that the Swans had a larger crowd.
But what has been forgotten, or left behind, is the fact that the Swans didn’t even fill their blockbuster.
It wasn’t even a sell-out.
The81stminute.com understands people outside the SCG were offering free tickets for the Swans game – just minutes before the game was about to start.
Granted, this is not an unusual thing, and the NRL has been known over the years to give out their fair share of free tickets for finals matches.
Through the clickbait headlines online and the spin that comes from the south, it’s easy to forget what happened 24 hours later.
Long after the red-and-white Swans scarves were tucked away by Sydney’s elite and warmed for another week – rugby league’s old laughing stock came out at the same venue Cronulla and the Cowboys couldn’t fill the night before.
Since 1908, Eastern Suburbs have been ever-present.
Under the great Greek businessman, Nick Politis, the Roosters became a paper giant of the sport and that’s long after Easts were winning titles at the same time Edmund Barton was being announced as Australia’s first prime minister.
A club that could buy themselves out of any situation.
They have had some of the best players to ever play rugby league walk through their doors.
Won a few premierships too.
A paper giant where power and money creates expectation.
When the Sydney Football Stadium was first built in the late 1980s, the Roosters couldn’t fill the stadium to save their lives.
They never got close.
On opening night against the St George Dragons in round one of 1988, they could only manage 19,295.
Some might argue it looked more like 8000.
Eventually the Roosters started getting it right, again.
Not quite under Phil Gould as head coach but eventually with Brad Fittler – who Gould brought across from Penrith.
But even as the Roosters dominated seasons, played in four of five grand finals between 2000 and 2004, their supporter base was laughed at.
A “lack of fans”.
That is no more.
The Roosters brand is the NRL’s biggest weapon against the Swans in Sydney’s eastern suburbs.
A day after the AFL danced on rugby league’s grave for their crowd, which neither sold out, the NRL put on their second semi-final at Allianz between the Roosters and Manly.
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If you thought Cronulla fans didn’t like travelling?
Manly-Warringah enter the chat.
It didn’t matter.
The NRL week two final between the Roosters and Sea Eagles attracted almost the same crowd as the Swans did the night before.
Whether you like the Roosters or not, sombrero jokes or otherwise, they have created a brand and it’s cool to go watch the Roosters.
A neutral, Irish, French, on holiday or on a student visa at the University of Sydney?
It’s an event in Sydney’s CBD to go and see the Roosters.
Rugby league in the eastern suburbs is as sexy as the Swans could ever be.
Good for the Roosters.
They deserve it.
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