Parramatta Eels salary cap: Fans should direct their rage at those responsible for this mess

THE NRL was the focus of most Eels fans, when in fact they should be storming the Leagues Club to throw out those truly responsible, writes RICHARD HINDS.

Parramatta fans have been directed their nger at the wrong people.

IT’S the fans who suffer most. We’ve heard that line a lot since Parramatta’s punishment was announced and, of course, it rings true.

The players whose hard fought six victories have been quashed and now face a desperate struggle to get back into finals contention while the club’s powerbrokers drag the NRL through the courts?

They were understandably irate when NRL chief executive Todd Greenberg delivered the bad news. Yet, knowingly or not, some Eels players were the recipients of the contents of the infamous under-the-table payments. Perhaps they should fire their agents instead of shooting the messenger.

Parramatta fans have been directed their nger at the wrong people.

Coach Brad Arthur? Wonderfully dignified in his acceptance of the tough challenge the punishment created — win 12 from 15 and still make the play-offs. It was a demonstration of the strength and integrity some of the slippery Eels in the board room lacked.

Yet, as unfair as this might seem, Arthur’s success is so far is built on a lie. He has been the seemingly unwitting beneficiary of a non-compliant team. Now he has to squeeze his squad and start again.

It is the fans who were, as ever, the innocent bystanders. The poor saps who believed their underperforming club was on the verge of a long-awaited renaissance.

Yet — predictably — the outrage of most Parramatta fans was directed at the NRL for punishing their club. As was the case with Melbourne Storm, the pathetically nonsensical “everyone cheats the cap’’ line was sprouted to defend the indefensible.

It was yet another case where the passion of fans is used against them by the conniving and the self-interested. Where the insular “us against the world’’ mentality leads supporters to grant infallibility to administrators — or in other cases, even coaches or players — who let them down, and howl about imagined persecution and NRL conspiracies.

Surely the evidence in the Parramatta case is so compelling disgruntled fans should have stormed Eels’ headquarters demanding the Gang of Five obey the NRL direction to stand down. Instead, Parramatta supporters have allowed their club to be hijacked by a succession of ham-fisted administrations who were so bad at cheating that all the NRL could take from the trophy cabinet was an Auckland Nines cup and a couple of wooden spoons.

Eels fan are organising a march to the ground for their next home game — should it be a protest?

This is not to blame Eels’ fans for the club’s plight. But the lack of outrage and calls for accountability from the club’s most important stakeholders is symptomatic of a competition where the fans voice is usually only heard on game day.

Ownership models where leagues clubs have as much control as voting members don’t help those fans trying to challenge the powers that be. At Parramatta, allegations of falsified membership records, dodgy elections and have also been rife.

But in too many NRL clubs the conmen and the corrupt have exploited docile and compliant members. Or, worse, fans who don’t even bother taking up voting rights. In that regard, it is still bewildering to those outside the game that the merger between historic Balmain and West Sydney was decided by just a few thousands votes.

NRL CEO Todd Greenberg has done his best to take the heat of the fans and players.

If fans don’t have the will or the means to hold their own clubs to account, then the NRL has seemed equally powerless. Parramatta’s economic muscle — a lucrative pokie empire and its share of media rights money — leaves the NRL with few levers to pull.

It is the great irony of NRL club administration — and the reason many top-flight businessmen refuse to join club boards — that the game’s wealth enables self-interested powerbrokers, club legends and “colourful identities’’ to run multi-million dollar business like sandwich shops.

The Parramatta disaster is merely one example of the retrograde management practices former NRL chief executive Dave Smith tried vigorously to address. But the Eels proved to be Smith’s Vietnam.

Rightly Smith’s successor Todd Greenberg has received lavish praise for the forthright manner with which dealt with Parramatta’s rorting. But over the long term, it will be fascinating to see if he can help engineer meaningful change or merely broker another uneasy peace.

Eels’ fans should stand behind those trying to clean up their club’s mess. Not those who dragged it into the swamp.

Download SuperFan NRL — the ultimate rugby league app for iOS