Adelaide Oval ‘won’t sell out’ for State of Origin opening game

An advertising campaign in AFL heartland during Gather Round has seemingly come back to bite the NRL ahead of State of Origin.

The sign has come back to bite the NRL. Photo: Matt Sullivan/News.com.au.

It’s less than a week out from the start of the 2023 State of Origin series kicking off and it seems likely that game one will not be a sell out.

The opening match of the series will be held at 53,500-capacity Adelaide Oval this season before matches at Brisbane’s Suncorp Stadium and Sydney’s Accor Stadium to host the other games.

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But The Daily Telegraph is reporting that only 41,000 tickets have been sold, leaving 12,500 tickets still available for the fixture.

While it’s much better than the last match at Adelaide Oval, which had 25,218 in 2020 during the height of the Covid pandemic, it’s still far from where the NRL would have been hoping for.

After the LIV Golf Tour and AFL’s Gather Round recently being played in Adelaide, there are claims Adelaide fans have “wallet fatigue”.

The report also claims AFL fans didn’t appreciate a cheeky attempt from the NRL to advertise during Gather Round.

A billboard in Rundle St during the event read “Real Footy is coming soon to Adelaide”.

The sign has come back to bite the NRL. Photo: Matt Sullivan/News.com.au.

“If you want to attract an AFL audience to a rugby league, I’m not sure insulting them about their game will help,” a sporting official told the Telegraph.

Gather Round brought a combined 220,000 AFL fans through the gates in Adelaide for its festival of footy.

While South Australian government officials are predicting a crowd of around 42,000, the NRL has put the figure slightly higher, although still short of a sell out.

“We are tracking towards a strong crowd number for State of Origin 1 in Adelaide with more than 45,000 fans expected,” said an NRL spokesman.

While the lack of a sell out at Adelaide Oval will undoubtedly spark calls for the matches to be divvied up between Sydney and Brisbane, State of Origin has been a success interstate.

In fact the two of the biggest crowds in Origin history were 91,513 for game two of the 2015 series and 87,122 for Game one of the 2018 series, both at the MCG.

A crowd of 88,336 in 1999 was the biggest at Stadium Australia, before the ground’s capacity was reduced to 83,500 after the Olympics.

Suncorp Stadium’s capacity is 52,500 and its biggest Origin crowd was 52,540 for game three of the 2017 season.

Perth’s Optus Stadium has twice hosted an Origin fixture, with crowds of 59,721 for game two of the 2019 series and 59,358 for game two of 2022.

Nathan Cleary kicking in front of the famous scoreboard. Picture: Brett Costello

Blues coach Brad Fittler is also a fan, saying when Adelaide was announced that it was “the fairest way to do it”.

“It needs to be there – both sides have an away game and a neutral venue,” Fittler said at the time.

Blues adviser and SEN host Greg Alexander also said that he didn’t care either way.

“I don’t think I feel strongly either way, I’m happy with the neutral venues and I’ve been involved in the last five where we’ve gone to Melbourne, Perth and this is our second time in Adelaide,” Alexander said on SEN 1170 Breakfast.

“If they scrapped it and said, ‘No, we’ll just go back to what it used to be and we’ll take it in turns of hosting two games in either Sydney or Brisbane,’ I’d be happy with that too.

“I’m happy to go with what they’re doing at the moment, I don’t mind the neutral game, but if they said, ‘That’s it, if we can’t sell out Adelaide let’s go back to, two and one, and swap it each year,’ I’d be happy with that as well.”