State of Origin clash: Plenty of muscle in Legends Room at MCG

Illustration: Rod Clement

There were a few billionaires, plenty of political muscle and even a bona fide football legend in Australian Rugby League Commission chairman Peter Beattie’s Legends Room last night at the State of Origin match at the MCG.

The Melbourne-based showdown of the greatest battle in the bone-snapping NSW and Queensland-based code had some wondering before the match: who would turn up?

Nothing to worry about there.

Among the 80,000-plus in the stadium was Melbourne billionaire Paul Little (worth $1.4 billion). Also representing the richest peaks of the Stensholt Index was Sydney-based car yard billionaire Nick Politis ($1.35bn in pocket).

The local establishment was also along. Melbourne-loving Qantas chair Leigh Clifford was draped in the maroon of his Brisbane school days.

Liberal grandee Peter Costello (chair of the game’s broadcaster Nine) had a more neutral approach. “The one winner we want tonight is the broadcaster,” the also Future Fund chair Costello told Margin Call just before kick-off. Plenty of corporates were along to watch a sport often criticised for lacking the boardroom backing of its rival AFL.

Beattie, NRL chief executive Todd Greenberg and the ARL Commission’s guests included Origin boss Frank Calabria, Downer CEO Grant Fenn, Telstra’s Joe Pollard, Foxtel boss Patrick Delaney, News Corp’s Penny Fowler and Healthscope’s endangered CEO Gordon Ballantyne.

And there was Ariadne’s Gary Weiss, who along with being a mean guitarist is an ARL commissioner and chairman of Ardent Leisure.

Also along were Victorian Treasurer Tim Pallas, Liberal grandee Nick Minchin (now working alongside Stephen Conroy at Responsible Wagering Australia), NSW Sports ­Minister Stuart Ayres, his Queensland offsider Mick ­­de Brenni and their federal counterpart Bridget McKenzie.

ARL commissioner and Racing NSW boss Peter V’landys was also taking in the spectacle. Rival sporting code bosses along for research included bemused AFL boss Gill McLachlan (“Why don’t they kick the ball more?” we swear we saw him muttering) and Cricket Australia chair David Peever and his CA boardmate Mark Taylor, fresh from the day’s announcement that their CEO James Sutherland’s almost two decades in charge are coming to an end. He’ll be missed. And among that worthy crowd there was even a rugby league legend: Cameron Smith, who will undoubtedly be added to the hallowed ranks of the code’s Immortals.

A man’s castle

There’s much at stake for the six senior bankers from ANZ, Deutsche Bank and Citigroup facing criminal charges over ANZ’s $2.5bn capital raising in August 2015.

Careers are endangered. Reputations are at stake. And ACCC boss Rod Sims ’ threat of prison sentences introduces another risk: separation from well-earned trophy homes.

Mid-last year charged former Citigroup boss Stephen Roberts, 61, and wife Robyn look to have sold their expansive rural retreat in Avoca not far from Bowral for more than $8 million in favour of a move to Melbourne.

In September, Robyn Roberts paid $3.2m cash for a luxury apartment on St Kilda Road overlooking Fawkner Park, with the couple now listing the 15th floor abode as home — a long way from Sydney’s prestigious Woollahra, which they left as Roberts exited Citi.

When Citi’s also-charged Itay Tuchman was based in Sydney — Tuchman is now the bank’s London-based global head of foreign exchange — he was renting a $3500-a-week expansive home in North Curl Curl boasting a pool and panoramic views of the coastline.

Israel-born Tuchman has left behind no directorships of Australian entities and appears to own no real estate in this market, having embraced his new life in the Old Dart.

Citi is believed to have engaged Freehills to drive its defence of the charges, with managing director John McLean also on the hook for his role in the equity deal.

Margin Call understands that each of the banks and their key staff had been anticipating an announcement from Sims’ ACCC on its investigation into the almost three-year-old deal.

But the prospect of criminal charges had been considered a worst-case scenario for the bankers and was not expected.

Charged from Deutsche is veteran banker Michael ­Rich ardson, who now works at Merrills where he has taken leave from his role. The German bank is believed to have engaged King Wood Mallesons to assist.

The PNG-born Richardson, 54, and wife Shelley Richardson own what is now estimated to be a $7m-plus home in Castlecrag, with the banker controlling just a single share in the home. The remaining 99 shares are owned by his wife.

The also charged former head of Deutsche here Michael Ormaechea, 54, is also on Sydney’s North Shore in Mosman, enjoying with wife Julie Ormaechea the delights of a more than $10m mansion on Bradleys Head Road.

Meanwhile, down in Melbourne, charged ANZ treasurer-turned-chief risk officer Rick Moscati has carved out a life in Brighton — where else? — with wife Angela Moscati, for which the couple paid almost $4m more than eight years ago.

Kroger awaits his fate

Only one week — seven sleeps! — until the Federal Court makes its decision on the ownership of the Liberal Party-aligned Cormack Foundation’s $70m treasure chest.

Following a three-day hearing in the court in March, judge Jonathan Beach will next Thursday hand down his judgment on the blue-blooded family feud that pitted pugnacious Victorian Liberal Party president Michael Kroger against the grandees on the Charles Goode-chaired Cormack board.

A good decision for Kroger would make him a hero among many Liberal Victorian branches.

A bad one will have those same branches — not to mention his enemies in the party — sharpening their knives.

And all with the state election in Victoria only five months away.

Chips off the old block

Alexander Downer’s daughter Georgina isn’t the only dynastic candidate with advanced plans to get into the family business.

Also hoping to set off to Canberra is Kim Beazley ’s daughter Hannah, who happily doesn’t have the complication of having to knock off an independent to get there.

The younger Beazley will at the next federal election run in the Perth seat of Swan. (Not to be confused with the Brisbane seat of Lilley from which Wayne Swan will retire at the next election.)

To honour Hannah — and raise dosh for her upcoming campaign — one of her dad’s former staffers, Justin Di Lollo (now a consultant at British strategic intelligence outfit Hakluyt), and moneyman Paul Binsted (the former head of investment bank Lazard’s which Paul Keating went on to chair) hosted a $2000-a-head dinner for the Young Beazley on Tuesday night.

While Swan’s in Perth, the fundraiser was an Sydney eastern suburbs affair. It was held on the water at Regatta Restaurant in Rose Bay, just an inlet away from the Member for Wentworth Malcolm Turnbull’s harbourside mansion.

Swan, who along with Stephen Smith and Stephen Conroy was one of the three key parliamentary powerbrokers behind Beazley’s leadership, was along for the dinner. So was the man who briefly succeeded him as treasurer, Chris Bowen, the NSW Right’s most senior parliamentarian.

Bowen’s mentor Keating kept away, but the Prime Minister he succeeded Bob Hawke (a big Beazley fan) was there for pre-dinner drinks, as was Kim’s former chief-of-staff David Epstein, Australian Hotels Association boss Stephen Ferguson, Strategic Political Counsel’s Michael Kauter, his Labor-aligned lobbyist offsider at Hawker Britton Simon Banks, CFMEU national president Tony Maher and, for balance, Lendlease’s Ashley Mason.