Wednesday News Headlines – March 15th, 2017
AFC Champions League
- 2017 ACL – Kashima v Brisbane at Kashima Stadium – Attendance: 6,558
AFL
- SIMON Lethlean says the AFL is doing everything in its power to arrange a home grand final for Brisbane’s AFLW side at the Gabba. Brisbane’s AFLW side deserve a home grand final at the Gabba, but the twilight timeslot of the match — one which cannot be shifted because of broadcast agreements — is problematic because of the ensuing encounter between Brisbane’s AFL side and the Gold Coast Suns at 7.05pm that night. “We’re certainly working on the premise that it will be in Brisbane because that has been our plan, for the top team to host the final,” Lethlean told SEN.
- A TURF war has broken out over the Gabba pitch with concerned cricket officials warning the first Ashes Test will be ruined if the AFL Women’s grand final and the Brisbane Lions’ first two home games are played at the ground.
- THE push for a Tasmanian team in the AFLW has received a big boost with Susan Alberti saying she will put her considerable influence behind the campaign.
- The SANFL reports that its debt has fallen to $18 million, putting the league well on track to meet its goal of being debt-free by 2021.
- Collingwood have renewed their agreement with insurance firm CGU until the end of 2022, the biggest commercial deal in the club’s history. The deal will see CGU’s slogan, ‘see it through’, remain on the back of Collingwood’s playing shirts for the next five seasons of the Australian Football League (AFL).
- Gatorade has renewed its sponsorship of the Australian Football League (AFL) for another three years. The sports drink brand will continue as the official hydration partner of Australian rules football’s elite men’s competition, and will now assume the same role for the newly launched AFL Women’s competition. The deal includes a range of branding rights and will see Gatorade support the league’s health and performance research through the Gatorade Sports Science Institute (GSSI).
NRL
- US TV Ratings – NRL – Warriors v Storm 5,000. Broncos v Nth Qld 3,000.
- Updated 2017 NRL Club Membership Count – 260,015
- NORTH Sydney’s $7 million bid to buy the Titans is set to be torpedoed with the NRL outlining their preference for a fully-fledged club on the Gold Coast.
- NRL clubs have warned the North Sydney Bears they would need $100 million to buy the Gold Coast franchise and ensure the club’s long-term future.
- The seven-member board of the Gold Coast Titans is standing strong against any attempts by Sydney-based league club, the North Sydney Bears, to take over their club in a $7 million buyout.
- Four leading Gold Coast businesses are waiting in the wings to take the Titans off the NRL’s hands. Long-time director Darryl Kelly, a building materials supplier who has poured close to $5 million into the club since joining the board in 2013, would not name members of his proposed consortium yesterday. But he guaranteed they were a bona fide group of potential owners with great plans for the Titans’ future.
Super Rugby
- AUSTRALIAN Super Rugby clubs facing the axe will continue to live in purgatory for weeks if not months to come, with furious club chiefs left in the dark about the competition’s future. It is understood the major stumbling block to any confirmation of plans beyond this season remains South Africa and how many teams it is prepared to cut: one or two. New Zealand is leading the charge for a reduction of teams, a push that is angering its Australian counterparts.
- One Australian Super Rugby team will be cut from next year’s competition, according to a South African report quoting Cheetahs boss Harold Verster. The report on the Afrikaans language website Netwerk24 is likely to further focus attention on the future of the Western Force, with Verster quoted as saying SANZAAR would reduce the cumbersome five nation competition from 18 to 16 teams — with one Australian and one South African side to get the chop.
- AUSTRALIAN rugby league legend Mark Geyer has declared he’s never seen a competition fall off a cliff the way Super Rugby has in Australia in recent years.
- Super Rugby’s fate appears to rest entirely in the hands of non-rugby people, with broadcasters and South African politicians effectively taking the lead in determining what changes — if any — are made to SANZAAR’s southern hemisphere tournament.
Other
- AUSTRALIAN officials have hosed down the possibility of the Gold Coast taking on the 2022 Commonwealth Games, after host city Durban in South Africa was stripped of its hosting rights.
