NRL CEO Todd Greenberg is doing nothing to protect the game from corruption
WHEN the NRL danced on the grave of David Gallop, the outgoing chief executive, the criticism was that Gallop was “reactive” and not “proactive”.
It left an unfair stain on Gallop’s tenure but strangely left league fans with a sense that things could be even better.
So what do we call the current NRL administration? That’s easy. Inactive.
Chief executive Todd Greenberg is invisible.
NRL CEO Todd Greenberg has faced some huge issues during his short tenure.The sum of Greenberg’s work in recent weeks is an email to clubs telling them he had stiffened the rule surround touching referees.
Many of those clubs are frustrated at the continual stream of feel-good news from NRL headquarters, lauding themselves for inconsequential decisions that seem designed for good publicity, while serious issues in the game remain ignored.
Greenberg is trying to spin his Triple M interview on Saturday, a day after reports broke that another game is being investigated for match fixing, hit all the right catchwords but really said nothing.
There was plenty of promises that the NRL will ban any player found guilty of match fixing — without any clue what the NRL is trying to actually do to catch them.
Greenberg tried to point to the good work the Commission has done since forming in 2012, saying there was no integrity unit back when he was the boss at Canterbury.
“If there was ever a problem off the field at a club, we used to just ring the media manager, John Brady, who juggled three or four different portfolios at the time,” he said.
“I think it is a fair assessment to say that there is a lot work that we have done in order to maintain the position where we’re at now.”
Firstly, Brady did not handle integrity issues, although he was often the first phone call. Gallop, the NRL boss, did. Gallop is a lawyer.
He put himself up every time to answer all the questions and assure the game’s stakeholders, the fans, they were on the job. He did that with a fraction of the budget Greenberg has at his disposal.
One of Dave Smith’s jobs when he was in the chair was to get a slice of the bookmakers’ turnover for using the NRL’s intellectual property and funnel it back into the game.
Smith believed it was worth about $30 million a year to the game and, now the deal is done, the NRL boasts 18 corporate bookmakers as partners.
Yet the NRL has done little to nothing to tighten integrity controls around the game.
Three games are now under investigation from the past two seasons.
Police have formed Strike Force Rhodium to investigate whether corruption has taken place.
Why isn’t the NRL being proactive, according to their platform?
Greenberg has known as long as any official in the game the dangers of sports betting.
He was, after all, chief executive at Canterbury when commission agent John Schell took evidence to him that Ryan Tandy was betting on games.
Schell’s sworn police statement said he met Greenberg and Bulldogs football manager Allan Thompson at Raw Cafe and “I expressed my concerns over the debt that Tandy had to me and showed Greenberg and Thompson the betting ledger that I had kept and also my phone records, which showed calls”.
Thompson’s sworn police statement said: “After speaking to Schell, I was worried that Tandy may have a gambling problem ...”
Greenberg was cleared after he denied to an independent NRL inquiry that he was told Tandy was betting on games. He did not read the betting ledger.
So what has Greenberg learned after that experience, except to talk tough and promise that any match fixer will be banned for life. The NRL has not given one concrete example it is actually being proactive about raising the integrity of the game, or even protecting it.
Former player Ryan Tandy, who died in 2014.Match fixing became a criminal act after Tandy’s conviction in 2012 ended in a light 12-month good behaviour bond.
Last Friday former Racing NSW chief steward Ray Murrihy, the best in the business, released his investigation into Manly’s integrity review.
As background, Murrihy noted that the NSW Law Reform Commission told the NSW Parliament in 2011 “that sport was becoming increasingly vulnerable to the operations of organised crime and to its adverse consequences”.
Murrihy cleared the Sea Eagles of any failings but offered eight recommendations.
The Sea Eagles should be congratulated. Calling in Murrihy was proactive. It is a lot more than can be said for the NRL.
Replies
THIS ^^^^ from Kent?
Well I'll be.....................
Thought this should be near the top.
http://www.dailytelegraph.com.au/sport/nrl/former-nrl-director-slam...
Dean Richie puts the boot into the NRL too.
Seems Greenturd is on the outer, AT FARKING LAST SCHMUCK
Look for the hidden agenda Yoda...has to lead back to Parra somehow.
I think Kent's Parra leaker has been turfed out and he now has no gossip to spin on the Eels. He has had to actually do some work now and point the finger at the NRL, which should have happened when Teflon took the top job.
Greenturd, 2 people in sworn police statements put him at a meeting where Ryan Tandy's gambling habits, records and phone calls were tabled.
"Greenberg was cleared after he denied to an independent NRL inquiry that he was told Tandy was betting on games. He did not read the betting ledger."
HOW CAN THIS KENT BE PUT IN CHARGE OF THE NRL. ONE COULD THINK HE IS EITHER
A LIAR OR COMPLETELY INCOMPETENT.
So the Kent reported this. Who knows, the Kent might be a nice Kent.
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