Kookaburras, Hockeyroos searching for new sponsor just weeks out from Rio Olympics

AUSTRALIA’S Olympic hockey players have lost the potential for lucrative bonuses for Rio glory due to the financial turmoil of a major sponsor.

Eddie Ockenden on the charge for the Kookaburras. Picture: Getty Images

AUSTRALIA’S Olympic hockey players have lost the potential for lucrative bonuses for Rio glory due to the financial turmoil of a major sponsor.

Only weeks from Rio, sponsor The Project Group has had to withdraw its $200,000 sponsorship of Hockey Australia.

The Project Group had also promised each member of the 16-player squads a bonus, ranging from $10,000 for a gold medal in Rio down to $5000 for bronze.

Australia’s men are the most dominant team in world hockey. The female side last month collected bronze at London’s Champions Trophy.

Hockey Australia chief executive Cameron Vale put out a nationwide call for a white knight to step in to help Australia’s elite players.

The funding also helped turn Hockey Australia into a truly equal sport, with the men’s and women’s teams paid the same wages and given identical conditions.

The dominant men’s team have a higher level of funding given their dominant past two years, but sponsorship allows Hockey Australia to fund a level playing field.

The women’s team — the Hockeyroos — are paid on average between $40,000 to $60,000 per player, so a potential $10,000 bonus represents a huge carrot.

The Hockeyroos remain a force in world hockey. Picture: PA via AP

Vale told the Herald Sun yesterday he was unsure what more the men could do to market themselves as one of Australia’s great sporting teams.

“For us as a sport it’s a major blow and it does directly impact the athletes with those bonuses for athletes winning medals,’’ Vale told the Herald Sun.

“The Project Group was a major partner below our naming rights sponsors Fortescue and Ausdrill.

“Our athletes deserve so much more and we would appeal to corporate Australia to back a sport with great integrity and is truly dual gender.

“Our men’s team can’t win any more than they have. They just win everything. I compare the Kookaburras to New Zealand’s All Blacks.

“And the Hockeyroos were an iconic women’s team sport brand before anyone thought there could be iconic women’s sport brand.

“We don’t feel we could be doing much more.”

Jamie Dwyer is among the Kookaburras’ 16-man squad who will take to the field in Rio. Picture: Daniel Wilkins

In January Optus was able to step in to help the Melbourne Stars after major sponsor Dick Smiths Electronics went into administration.

But while major corporate brands are rushing to support the AFL’s new women’s teams, they have proved elusive for Hockey Australia.

The AFL has promised its players will be paid $25,000 for an eight-week season, while fulltime professional hockey players toil the entire year for $40,000.

Vale said few Australian sporting teams were as gender equal as the Hockeyroos and Kookaburras.

“They only disparity from a funding perspective is the men earn contracts with the Hockey India league,’’ he said.

“We as an organisation have an athlete agreement where all benefits to the athletes are equal.

“They all fly economy, they all get the same benefits. There is virtually no exception to that.

“The men receive more funding from the Australian Sports Commission based on their success over the past 10 years.

“But as an organisation we use corporate sponsorship to equalise that gap as much as we possibly can.”

Originally published as Kookaburras, Hockeyroos searching for new sponsor just weeks out from Rio Olympics