By Calum Jaspan and Adrian Proszenko
The boss of a news organisation that has been one of the biggest critics of the NRL’s expansion into Western Australia has been appointed as the inaugural chief executive of the Perth Bears.
Anthony De Ceglie, director of news and current affairs at 7News and editor-in-chief at Seven West Media, has been tasked with overseeing the introduction of the NRL’s 18th franchise, moving on from one of the biggest jobs in news media after just 13 months.
Perth Bears boss Anthony De Ceglie.Credit: Peter Rae
On the day of the official announcement of the Perth Bears, The West Australian, owned by Seven West Media ran a front-page headline “Bad news Bears”. Seven is also the current free-to-air broadcaster of the NRL’s chief winter rival, the AFL.
De Ceglie is arguably the closest executive at Seven to its company chair and majority shareholder Kerry Stokes. He oversees the West, which has repeatedly criticised the state’s support of the expansion team.
“Rugby league is just not a thing in WA. It is a complete non-event. There is no significant, profitable fan base in this town, and nor is there ever likely to be one,” the West’s editor-in-chief Chris Dore told the ABC’s Media Watch earlier this week, adding that the sums behind the move “don’t add up”.
De Ceglie will be replaced by Seven’s news boss in Perth, Ray Kuka – a veteran in Seven’s newsrooms. De Ceglie’s oversight of the newspaper division will not be extended to Kuka.
Originally from Western Australia, he was personally lured back to Seven West Media by Stokes in 2019 after several years at News Corp’s Sydney-based tabloid The Daily Telegraph, where he was the deputy editor under Dore.
Last year, he was elevated into the new company-wide news role after the exit of a number of high-ranking executives.
In his 13 months as Seven’s television news boss, De Ceglie completely overhauled his own team of executives running news operations in the wake of a newsroom scandal largely centred around its current affairs program Spotlight. He introduced a once-weekly comedy segment and a horoscope segment to evening news broadcasts, both were short-lived and subsequently canned.
During this period, ratings for 7News’ nightly news bulletins have fallen in the two biggest markets, Melbourne and Sydney, however have grown in the other three major metro markets in Adelaide, Perth and Brisbane.
Australian Rugby League Commission chairman Peter V’landys praised the appointment of De Ceglie as an important step forward for the code in Western Australia.
“To succeed in Perth, you need a well-connected local who knows how to get things done and has a can-do attitude,” V’landys said.
“Anthony is a brilliant operator with a proven track record and a genuine Western Australian, and I am excited about what he can do for us as we grow rugby league in the WA market.”
Peter V’landys at the announcement of the Perth Bears franchise.Credit: Hamish Hastie
The Perth Bears will enter the NRL competition in 2027, with De Ceglie joining the organisation at its inception in the coming months.
At the Bears’ launch event last week in Perth, V’landys said recent coverage of the expansion team had been “a bit biased”, focusing in particular on Seven’s partnership with the AFL.
“Well, I think the media coverage has been a bit biased, in the sense that the main newspaper here is owned by Seven West Media that has the AFL rights, let’s be quite frank,” V’Landys said.
“They don’t want us to be here because they realise we’re going to be competitive, and we’re going to take some of their lunch. And we eat a lot, so we’ll be taking a fair bit of their lunch.”
Despite the media company’s negative coverage of the NRL expansion, Kerry Stokes is said to be a long-time fan of the code and financially backed the South Sydney Rabbitohs’ legal bid to be readmitted to the league in 1999, spending millions in the process.
A source close to the billionaire, speaking on condition of anonymity, told this masthead that while Stokes is disappointed by the departure of De Ceglie, he understands the decision.
He thanked De Ceglie publicly in a statement released by Seven, wishing him “every success in his future role, which sees him return to Perth”.
V’landys is also the chief executive of Racing NSW, which is largely broadcast by Seven.
The NRL is taking its next broadcast rights package to market this year, hoping each of the free-to-air networks make a bid. However, with the AFL rights already locked in until 2031, it is unlikely Seven would be able to afford a second winter code.
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