How Phil Gould, John Khoury bought time at the Canterbury Bulldogs | Weekend Read
John Khoury and Phil Gould have formed a powerful alliance that appears to have frightened off any pretenders to the crown. But the jury is still out on the Bulldogs’ rebuild, writes Brent Read.
Canterbury boss John Khoury and head of football Phil Gould have bought themselves some time. Two years to be precise.
That’s how long they have until the next leagues club elections, when their rebuild of the Bulldogs will come under the microscope yet again.
The jury remains out on the club’s direction under Khoury and Gould, who have formed a powerful alliance that appears to have frightened off any pretenders to their crown.
Khoury will run unopposed next February which means the status quo will remain. In other words, Gould will basically have the keys to the castle.
Make no mistake, there is one man running the show at Belmore when it comes to the football team. That man is Gould and he has been wheeling and dealing with the best of them in recent weeks.
A bevy of players have been signed, strengthening the depth of their squad but not enough to give them a serious hope of threatening the game’s heavyweights.
They are still a long way off. So Gould will keep shopping, hence his meet-and-greets in recent weeks with Jarome Luai and Addin Fonua-Blake.
The Bulldogs should be better in 2024 but the rebuild has been a slow burn and a premiership still seems a lifetime away.
The tepid progress prompted suggestions that Khoury would come under pressure to retain the chair role at the February elections but those fears were unfounded.
He still has support of the voting members – or at least the majority of them – which represent only a small percentage of the club’s fan base.
Khoury has done a masterful job of getting the members with voting privileges on side – last year’s financial report suggested there were less than 2,000.
It’s a fraction of the Bulldogs’ support but they wield enough power to make change if they feel the need. This time around they didn’t, so the club remains in the hands of the Gould-Khoury cartel.
Rival clubs, meanwhile, aren’t exactly doing cartwheels over the way the Bulldogs have operated in recent times, particularly when it comes to relying on handouts from the leagues club.
That industry is going through a challenging time and the idea that Canterbury Leagues Club would be handing over around $5 million this year to fund its NRL operations – it is believed it was more than $6 million last year – has raised the ire of some in the community.
It has come at a time when the NRL’s funding of their clubs has reached record levels. There are no excuses any more for rugby league clubs running at a loss. They should be able to stand on their own two feet.
The Bulldogs have been their own worst enemies at times. Some of that money has gone to pay out players and staff who have departed ahead of time.
No doubt, more will need to be set aside given one player remains on mental health leave after a training ground incident and another – former club captain Raymond Faitala-Mariner – is seemingly on the outer.
The Bulldogs, meanwhile, plough on with winning their only concern. It still seems a distance away but Khoury and Gould now have two years to get it right.
It should be more than enough.
PARIS TRAVESTY? SMITH’S OLYMPICS BID SABOTAGED BY KEY LIV FAILURE
Cameron Smith had a quick look around to make sure he wasn’t in plain view and slipped into a green polo shirt with the Olympic logo just the other day.
The Nine Network, host broadcaster for the Paris Games, wanted to store some footage for later in the year and this was their last realistic chance to grab Smith.
So they took it with both hands. Smith looked a little sheepish as he posed for the cameras and who could blame him? The way things are going he may not be there – and what a travesty it would be.
Smith’s ranking slide and the improving fortunes of those around him has left his Olympic place in jeopardy, his cause sabotaged by the failure of LIV Golf to get recognition from the world rankings body.
The Olympic Games are meant to be the best of the best but not where golf is concerned. Not when Smith could be watching from his lounge in Jacksonville.
The Queenslander has had a tough trip home but make no mistake, he remains our best hope for winning a gold medal in Paris.
The fact he may not be there could be a sledgehammer blow to the Olympic team and its captain Karrie Webb. It’s a source of frustration to everyone in Australian golf, but Golf Australia chief executive James Sutherland concedes there is little they can do.
Olympic selection is based on world rankings and Smith is on the wane. His only hope is to play well in the world ranking tournaments that he is eligible to enter, the Australian PGA and Open among them.
The fact he has failed to fire this summer has left him on the back foot and scrambling to hold his spot as one of the country’s top two ranked players.
Sutherland addressed the issue this week as he sat alongside beside Australian PGA tournament director Nick Dastey, who also happens to be on the world ranking technical committee, at The Australian Golf Club.
“Nick sits on the global body of the world rankings,” Sutherland said.
“Nick can answer technically. From my perspective, we want our best players representing Australia in the Olympics.
“Every sport has this issue about who are your best athletes, how do they qualify, and you have to set a rule. Who decides who the best players are?
“I understand what you are saying. We don’t make the rules, we just abide by them. We want our best players, whoever they are, to be playing in our Olympic team.
“We want to win medals. But it is what it is. I tell you one of the really great things about this is we have eight, 10 women and men who are desperate to compete in our Olympic team.
“We have some hugely patriotic players who are desperate for the honour to play in our team.”
Smith is among them. While Jason Day has snubbed another homecoming to play in Tiger Woods’ tournament in the Bahamas, Smith is back pressing the flesh and selling the game.
Yet Day is about to go past Smith in the rankings and become the No. 1 seed for the Australian team. Day may yet turn the Olympics down.
Who knows? He pulled out of Rio in 2016 due to the Zika virus — at the time he was the No. 1 player in the world. Dastey through his role with the world ranking body is in a unique position to comment on Smith’s plight.
“I can’t necessarily go into the details of the role rankings and the system and whether that is right or wrong,” Dastey said.
“The selection for the Olympics has been set by the IGF (International Golf Federation). They have chosen to go with the world rankings.
“That is an extremely tough question to answer because there is so much more detail that needs to go into it.
“Do I think Cameron Smith is better than the 20th best player in the world as things stand at the moment? Yeah, I think he is.”
He’s not alone.
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