Heather du Plessis-Allan: PNG in the NRL is just politics

It looks like we were never really in with a chance to get a second team alongside the warriors in the NRL, were we? 

Because it was always going to go to Papua New Guinea. 

Because it wasn’t a rugby league decision in the end, it was a political decision. 

It turns out, and they’ve been pretty explicit about it, that giving PNG the NRL team is to keep them out of military and security deals with China, and if they sign any deal like that, they lose the team. 

That's why the Australian Government is giving them $600 million to fund the team. 

This is obviously great for regional geopolitical manoeuvrings to cut China’s lunch but I very much doubt this is going to be good for the NRL. 

Do you actually think this team’s going to be any good? 

Who’s going to want to join a team based in Port Moresby, which has one of the highest crime rates in the world? 

There's probably not a lot of players, which is probably why this team is getting a tax exemption, so players get to keep more of their pay packets to make it more attractive to join the team. 

It’s also definitely why the team are building a gated compound for their players. 

So are fans ever going to travel to PNG to watch games there? 

Are they even going to bother watching this team’s games if they perform as expected? It remains to be seen, but you can probably hazard a guess. 

So sure, smart political move to cut China’s lunch, but the NRL doesn't exist to cut China’s lunch. 

It exists for the fans to enjoy. 

And you can’t say this is great for the fans. 

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