Gary Weiss’ love of rugby league is no crime, it’s simply the best of passions

While rugby union and AFL have been the sport of top levels of business here, Gary Weiss has been working behind the scenes to build up the ‘working man’s game’ of rugby league.

Gary Weiss is executive director of Ariadne Australia, chair of Dreamworld owner Coast Entertainment, chair of Cromwell Property Group and deputy chair of Myer. Picture: David Kelly

When New Zealand born businessman Gary Weiss first moved to Sydney in 1983, he was invited by a friend to go to a Roosters’ rugby league game in the city’s eastern suburbs.

The son of European migrants to New Zealand, Weiss had played soccer as a boy, growing up in a country where rugby union has a semi-religious status, with league regarded as a fringe sport.

“It was hugely exciting,” Weiss recalls of watching his first live rugby league games in Sydney, in an interview ahead of Wednesday’s State of Origin clash in Brisbane between NSW and Queens­land. “The crowd atmosphere was great. Then we started to go to the games as a family when my sons started to follow it.”

About 40 years after his move to Australia, Weiss is now one of the country’s best connected businessmen, with strong links in Sydney, Melbourne and Brisbane.

Executive director of Ariadne Australia, chairman of Dreamworld owner Coast Entertainment, chairman of Cromwell Property Group and deputy chair of Myer, Weiss has agreed to a rare interview about his passion for league.

While rugby union or AFL has traditionally been the sport of top levels of business in Australia, Weiss has been quietly working behind the scenes to help build up the working man’s game of rugby league.

Having spent the past eight years as a member of the Australian Rugby League Commission, now headed by Peter V’landys, Weiss is looking forward to the State of Origin clash.

Wednesday’s last of three games is set to be one of the most watched sporting events of the year as the two rivals clash in the decider at Suncorp Stadium.

NSW suffered a humiliating loss in the first game on June 5, after one of its key players was sent off, with the Queensland Maroons defeating the NSW Blues, 38 to 10.

On June 26, the Blues avenged their defeat at the Melbourne Cricket Ground, thumping Queensland 38-18.

The State of Origin Series between the New South Wales Blues and Queensland Maroons is the sport’s pinnacle event. Picture: Getty Images

The stage is set for a nailbiting decider on Wednesday night.

Weiss says the State of Origin final is “one of the most important marquee sporting events in the country … It rates around 3.5 million viewers.”

The second game in June attracted more than 90,000 people to the Melbourne Cricket Ground, in a town where AFL dominates.

Weiss, an ARL commissioner since 2016, has watched the game go from strength to strength, through ups and downs including the challenging times of Covid, to a situation where it is surging well past rugby union in Australia, signing up more than 200,000 players across all ages this year and the ARLC having $250m in assets.

Its latest annual report shows the combined ARLC and its Nat­ional Rugby League have seen revenue rise from $366m in 2016 to $690m last year.

Funds available for distribution to the clubs and state bodies have more than doubled from $217m to $496m in 2023.

The ARLC and NRL have gone from a deficit of $10.2m in 2016 to a surplus of $58.6m last year.

Weiss will not comment on the demise of the once-strong rival code of rugby union as a fan sport in Australia. He says the increase in popularity of rugby league has come as the sport worked hard on fan engagement and making league a more exciting game to watch. “It’s an exciting and inclusive game for our fans,” he says.

“We have endeavoured to focus on fan engagement and listening to what they want.

“You can see it evolving in terms of initiatives which have made the game faster. There are less interruptions and more ball in play, which has resonated well with our fans.

“We just went through 200,000 player registrations for the first time.”

NSW dominates the sport with 117,282 of the total registered players this year, followed by Queensland with 70, 902.

Sualauvi Faalogo of the Melbourne Storm. Picture: Getty Images

Registration in Victoria, an AFL stronghold with only one NRL team, the Storm, reached 5545 this year, up from 3345 in 2021. National figures include more than 44,000 women players – a figure that has almost doubled in the past three years from just over 24,000.

Weiss’s invitation to join the ARLC came after a long history of personal interest in the sport.

Living in Sydney’s eastern suburbs, he became an enthusiastic supporter of the Sydney Roosters.

As his business interests expanded north into Queensland, he became known in the Brisbane investment community.

In the mid-1990s, he was invited by Brisbane stockbroker Paul Morgan to join the board of the Brisbane Broncos, a company that had listed on the ASX in 1989.

After several years, his term was up, and he resumed his interest in the Roosters closer to home.

He then became a member of the Roosters Chairman’s Club, headed by chair Nick Politis, who made his fortune in car dealerships. Politis, whose personal fortune is estimated to approach $2.5bn, is a major shareholder in ASX-listed car dealership company Eagers Automotive.

Weiss says he was “delighted” when he was asked to join the game’s national ruling body in 2016. “I accepted with alacrity,” he says. “I thought it was a real privilege to have been appointed.”

With sport becoming big business in Australia, he believes he was “approached because of my perceived business and governance skills and experience”.

“I’ve tried to bring that to the supervision and administration of the game, trying to shape decision-making through a business lens,” he says. “At the end of the day, we need to have a financially robust governing body in order to deliver what we wish to do – everything from grassroots and participation right up to the NRL competition and marquee events such as State of Origin.”

Eight years on, he has the same view, pleased to see the game progress, including the development of a women’s rugby league competition and having a three-game women’s State of Origin competition for the first time this year.

Weiss says the improved role of rugby league in Australia has been assisted by the “mix of skills and experience around the commission table under the dynamic leadership of Peter V’landys”.

Gary Weiss entertains indulges in one of his other passions. Picture: David Geraghty

One of the most powerful men in sport in Australia, the no-­nonsense V’Landys, who took over as ARLC chair in October 2019, is also chief executive of Racing NSW.

Weiss’s fellow commissioners include McGrathNicol founder Tony McGrath; former Queensland premier Peter Beattie; former footballer and coach Wayne Pearce; Indigenous human rights lawyer Megan Davis; barrister Alan Sullivan KC; and former Queensland ALP state politician Kate Jones.

Weiss is at pains to point out that he is just one member of the commission. “We operate as a team around the commission,” Weiss says. “There is a mix of skills and expertise which each of my fellow commissioners contributes as ­required.”

Weiss is particularly proud of the fact that the commission has been able to build up a financial asset base over his time as a commissioner. When he arrived, it had virtually no assets with all operating surpluses being distributed to the NRL clubs and the state bodies.

“That was a very unsatisfactory position,” he recalls.

“I’m pleased to say that over time, we have had excellent buy-in from our key stakeholders in terms of the concept of building a robust balance sheet. Today we have net assets of over $250m.”

Its property assets include the Gambaro Hotel next to Suncorp Stadium, the Quest Hotel in the southern Sydney suburb of Woolooware, near the Cronulla Sharks home ground, and the Mercure Sunshine Bay Kawana Waters on the Sunshine Coast, Queensland.

Building up the assets of the nat­ional body was a process that saw him have discussions with other sports including former Australian Olympic Committee chief John Coates, who has played a key role in building up the assets of the AOC, as well as Cricket Australia.

As a commissioner, Weiss cannot talk about his views on which team should be chosen to be the 18th team in the competition, with bids from Papua New Guinea, Perth, Brisbane and New Zealand.

Media reports speculate that the NRL could decide on the 18th team as soon as September, with the new team operating in 2027, another by 2028 and a third new team (the 20th in total) by 2032.

Australian Rugby League Commission chair Peter V’landys.

Weiss says rugby league has the potential to play an important role in Australia’s ties with the region including the Pacific Islands.

“We have had extensive discussions with the federal government in terms of using sport generally and rugby league in particular, as part of Australia’s diplomatic toolbox in the Pacific,” he says.

“We are exploring the potential to ultimately get to a 20-team competition,” he says. “But any expansion needs to be carefully considered. The financial case needs to be established.”

Weiss is pleased to see the rise in popularity of the game in New Zealand where union has traditionally dominated, led by the powerful All Blacks.

It is a sign of the times, he says, that the scheduled timing of last month’s Super Rugby semi-final in Wellington was brought forward by three hours to avoid clashing with the New Zealand Warriors vs. Melbourne Storm game at Mount Smart Stadium in Auckland the same day. “No one would have ever thought that in New Zealand a Super Rugby semi-final would have its kick-off time changed to avoid clashing with a rugby league game.”