As Origin hits the MCG, rugby league is growing faster in Victoria than in any other state

Sheelagh Howarth is getting to used to curious calls. Three years ago she was struggling to put three teams on the park for her outer Melbourne rugby league club, the Doveton Steelers.

Now, there are 11 teams proudly sporting the club’s scarlet colours on the back of growth across the grades. Plenty of that recruiting starts with a call to Howarth’s phone.

“We have inquiries all the time. I had a mum of an under-12s girl call last night wanting to get her girls involved in the sport,” Howarth, the Steelers’ club secretary, said.

Players from across NRL Victoria and the Storm pathways pose with Storm captain Harry Grant (front row, middle).Credit: Jonathan Demos, Melbourne Storm

“And it’s not just from a playing perspective but from a coaching and administrative perspective too – one of our coaches is only 17, but she wants to take on that role.”

In the outer suburbs, Doveton’s experience is another example of Aussie Rules’ “poor cousin” finding its place, with Victorian rugby league participation levels growing at a higher rate than any other state (21 per cent last year, according to the NRL), albeit off a low base.

The NRL has just under 200,000 fully registered players nationally, most of them in New South Wales and Queensland, and Victoria provides around 5000.

These new players are not just people who have moved to the state from NRL heartland, or from New Zealand or the Pacific – plenty of them are primary school-aged kids who have seen the game on television or online and wanted to try it for themselves.

“We have a large percentage of kids who haven’t tried a sport before but saw this on TV and wanted to give it a go,” Howarth said.

Sheelagh Howarth on the field at Betula Reserve with junior players Eden (9), Nani (9), Lemafoe (9) and Evie (12).Credit: Jacob Pattison

It’s no coincidence that more than 80,000 fans are preparing to pack into the MCG on Wednesday as the NRL’s State of Origin returns to Melbourne for the first time since 2018.

The Melbourne Storm are reflecting the boom with average crowds of 20,421 this season, the fourth-best in the NRL, while they have more than 32,000 members, up from 15,367 in 2014.

Free-to-air NRL audiences on Nine, which owns this publication, are up 9 per cent in Victoria too.

“If you look at it in terms of a heat map of Australia – Victoria is showing really solid growth in a range of different areas,” said NRL chief executive Andrew Abdo.

“Outside Queensland and New South Wales, Victoria is where we are investing the most in terms of pathways and competitions.”

Abdo points to the game’s TackleReady programs that teach the best techniques to young players, and to Touch Football and the OzTag version of the game as also drawing in a wider group of players.

The NRL and the Storm both want to bring an NRLW team to Melbourne in the coming years to offer those girls just starting the chance to move to higher levels.

“For a sport which has always been the poor cousin, a minority sport compared to the AFL ... we have added two new clubs in the last two years and had huge growth, particularly, in the female space,” Howarth, who also sits on NRL Victoria’s advisory board, said.

“There are more pathways for kids – the doors are opening for them.”

The Storm are in the first year of a push to boost their local pathways in taking over the state’s junior representative sides, which play in NSW junior competitions.

The Storm will also field an under-17 girls side in NSW next year, then an under-19 women’s side the year after. The aim is to have a pool of homegrown players, should they be awarded an NRLW licence from 2028 onwards.

“There is no question that there is a great connection to rugby league in Melbourne,” Storm’s head of pathways Tim Glasby said.

“Albeit, it is more so in the outer suburbs. Those are the stronghold areas. The kids love footy, there are great participation numbers, and they are competitive with a lot of other areas [interstate].

“They love footy. They just need that pathway.”

Glasby, who played in the Storm’s 2017 premiership and Queensland’s 2017 Origin win, says the Storm know they should’ve already found more NRL players than the five Victorian-raised products, including Young Tonumaipea, Dean Ieremia, and Sua Fa’alogo who are still with the club.

Dean Ieremia scores a try for the Storm in 2022.Credit: Getty Images

“We are super proud of those guys, but we are not proud of that number,” Glasby said.

Much of the Storm’s success has come from signing the likes of Cameron Smith, Billy Slater, Cooper Cronk and Cameron Munster as teenagers and developing them into elite NRL stars.

It’s a costly investment for the Storm to fly their under-17, under-19 and under-21 sides to NSW every week or two.

Doveton have six players in the under-17 side and Howarth has already seen an improvement in their players, while Glasby noted there are potential NRL-level players coming through.

“They are competitive. There is certainly talent there, they are physically talented, but we want to expose them to higher levels of footy at a younger age,” Glasby said.

Melbourne Storm captain Harry Grant (second from left) poses with Storm junior players Stanley Huen (from Brisbane), left, Josiah Moreli (Casey Warriors), middle right, and Micah Warena (Casey Warriors), far right.Credit: Jonathan Demos, Melbourne Storm

“There are certainly guys with the talent and potential to play NRL – we just want to help them along the way.

“If we have had five in 25 years without doing that level of pathways work, then we are pretty confident we will get a lot more out of it with all the work we are putting into this pathway.”

Finding enough suitable playing fields remains a big issue across the city.

The Victorian Government, the Storm, NRL Victoria, Hume City Council and the NRL were among the contributors for the $22 million State Rugby League centre in Broadmeadows, which opened in May. Since 2014 the state government has invested in 11 different projects that have assisted rugby league clubs, including competition lightning for Fregon Reserve, home of the Waverley Oakleigh Panthers, and a four-field venue at Comely Banks Recreation Reserve in Officer for the Pakenham Eels.

But the government and local councils have growing clubs looking for more support – Doveton, for example, currently shares its pavilion and carpark with the local soccer club so can only train two nights a week, in addition to playing their games on Saturdays.

Howarth estimates their sides could easily fill the fields four nights per week, and they have already had to schedule some junior games on Friday nights, with other clubs reporting much more significant issues with grounds.

More help from the national body for trainers courses, volunteer upskilling, and sourcing equipment are high on the wishlist for clubs like Doveton.

“We are very fortunate to have a council who listens to what we need, but everyone is under pressure – you can’t build grounds quickly enough,” Howarth added.

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