Incurring permanent psychic damage
What if we did QCup but worse?
Welcome to The Maroon Observer, a weekly newsletter about rugby league, Queensland and rugby league in Queensland.
Quper League
(with a chapeau to Rooner Matty for that one)
It’s the news of the weekend:
Broncos chairman Karl Morris defended the club’s decision to invite Roberts-Smith to the Dragons game.
“He is able to come to watch the Broncos anytime,” Morris said.
“He is like any other citizen out there.
“That’s within his right (to attend a Broncos match) and that’s all I want to say.”
Cool stuff, mate. Doesn’t like something a snivelling weasel would come up with at all!
Actually, that wasn’t the news of the weekend, nor was V’landys’ dithering on the same topic, nor was the Broncos failing to beat the two worst teams in the NRL in back-to-back weeks, extending their losing streak after inviting a man charged with war crimes into the dressing room sheds, nor was failing to explain why such a man’s family was extended any preferential treatment in the first place.
No, we found out on Friday night that it was two tribes going to war; it was Quper League:
This masthead can reveal a rebel Queensland Super League has been discussed in what would represent the biggest political bombshell in the 104-year history1 of the Sunshine State’s premier competition.
Several executives have met over the past month to discuss breaking away from the Queensland Rugby League’s famous Hostplus Cup competition and setting up a rebel 12-team league.
The 12-team Super League proposal includes clubs from Burleigh, Brisbane Tigers, Wynnum Manly, Norths Devils, Ipswich, Townsville, Northern Pride and Papua New Guinea.
Brian Canavan, chairman of the QRL, responded on Saturday morning via press release:
The Queensland Rugby League (QRL) categorically rejects suggestions that a breakaway “Super League-style” competition is being established in Queensland.
Any rugby league competition played in Queensland is to be administered by the QRL as stated in the Australian Rugby League Members Agreement.
…
The scenario described in today’s reporting has not been discussed with the QRL and does not reflect any sanctioned process.
The QRL established a Statewide Competitions Working Group to consider the future structure of the Hostplus Cup, including the potential involvement of the Queensland-based NRL clubs.
Wynnum Manly, Ipswich and Easts all issued denials via social media on the same morning. Then:
One of the Queensland Rugby League’s most respected board members has tendered his resignation in the wake of revelations of a proposed 12-team rebel competition.
This masthead can reveal QRL director Brendan O’Farrell suddenly resigned on Saturday - just 24 hours after it was revealed some Hostplus Cup club officials had held secret talks on a Super League-style breakaway competition.
Also a member of the Broncos Leagues Club board, O’Farrell joined the QRL executive in 2024 and was understood to be supportive of a proposal for the Queensland Cup to be expanded from 15 to 18 teams in 2027 or 2028.
My god, the drama of it all! Except… we have one person writing these stories: Peter “Stinky Pete” Badel.
His original article cites two (2) anonymous club sources to describe the frustrations (some? most? few?) clubs are feeling in the alleged push for Quper League. His story about O’Farrell’s resignation is based on a single leaked email, whose text is quoted below.
In both stories, Badel conflates these events with each other and with Micheal Luck’s recent $2 million bombshell (Luck apparently had nothing to do with Quper League) and/or the REAL REASON Ikin resigned as QRL CEO (Ikin got a different offer from a tech company, one I assume that paid much better). Sometimes reporters do this because they’re hinting at a story that they can’t fully report yet but in this case, when you strip back the hyperbole, it all starts to look thin. Consider the reported facts:
The QRL began a review of its statewide competitions after last season.
We have not heard anything further about that process and it is now June.
Some clubs may or may not have had a discussion about breaking away from the QRL but if they had, they hadn’t worked out who was going to pay for it or any of the other important logistics of such a decision (more on this in a second).
The QRL does not support a breakaway competition and four of the eight clubs publicly denied their involvement.
Ben Ikin recently resigned as CEO.
Brendan O’Farrell also resigned from the board.
That’s about it. Here’s what we don’t know:
How the QRL’s review is going, when the review was planned to be finished or what the review’s findings are likely to be.
How a Quper League would be funded or under whose auspices it would operate.
Whether the other four clubs are sitting pat ahead of an announcement or did not see the value in denying it or did not have the resources available to deal with it on game day (e.g. the Blackhawks issuing their denial on Monday night).
Whether Brendan O’Farrell is resigning for the stated or for other reasons, and whether that actually matters.
Here’s O’Farrell’s leaked email:
“I have made the tough decision to step down from the QRL Board as the Statewide Cup representative, effective 6th June, 2026,” O’Farrell writes.
“I wish to thank you for the opportunity to represent the Statewide Cup Clubs as a director on the QRL Board.
“It has been a privilege to be entrusted with this role, and to act as your voice on the Board.
“Unfortunately, my time commitments across my other responsibilities have reached a point where I can no longer give this position the attention it deserves.
“I appreciate many who have relayed frustrations to me, and I can assure you that the QRL Board is aware of these concerns and are committed to addressing them.
“Until such time as a replacement director is found the best point of contact will be the QRL chair, Brian Canavan, who I have copied into the email for transparency.”
That can read as someone who is fed up with the QRL fat cats taking forever to make a decision and preparing to become Quper League CEO, and I think that is the impression that Badel wants you to have because it is more interesting, or it can be read as someone who needs to move on from this position - for personal reasons or because they’re sick of people whinging or whatever - while in the middle of a delicate stakeholder negotiation and wants to make a professional, but quick, exit.
I’m not saying this is nothing - smoke, fire, etc - but I’m also not going to spend a lot of time considering the implications until it is more substantive. By the time you read this, Badel may have added another chapter before it runs out of steam, just like they managed to spin the Ipswich Jets would like a NRL licence, please into a week’s worth of content. Look: more 20th team chat, this time for 2029.
To the extent that it exists, it is as likely that Quper League is a negotiating tactic from some of the more fed-up clubs to extract more money, in the mould of the Grand Prix Manufacturer’s Association, as it is a plan to revolutionise rugby league in Queensland and capture all this cash left lying on the table (grand total: 15 cents).
Now, let’s spend a lot of time considering the implications. You can tell this plan wasn’t well thought through. This shouldn’t be a quote that can be given:
“They are clearly not happy with how the QRL is running the game,” said one QRL source. “But who is going to run the rebel comp if the NRL won’t fund it?”
That’s the kind of thing that should be worked out before anyone talks to the Courier Mail. The other source expounded:
“Clubs are taking the matter into their own hands,” he said. “We would want the NRL to govern a Queensland Super League competition. They provide most of the funding to the QRL anyway. This is not a move that will be taken lightly but the QRL is running dead on the future of the competition. The QRL set up a working group last October and have now disbanded that group with nothing to show for their work. Hard decisions need to be made and the QRL won’t make them. The QRL is doing rugby league a disservice in Queensland.”
Given that the QRL has a vote on the ARLC, and the ARLC runs the NRL, and the “interim” CEO of the NRL would very much like the Commission’s support to push through some significant changes in governance, how do you think the politics of that is going to play out? Seems like an inopportune time for this gambit. You might also want some advanced assurance from V’landys, despite him showing precisely no interest in non-NRL rugby league, other than one off-the-cuff comment about directly funding the statewide clubs back when the NRL and QRL were feuding.
Continuing:
“The Hostplus Cup has to stay a second-tier comp and it can do that with the NRL clubs fielding teams. If the QRL keeps the doors closed to the NRL clubs, they increase the risk of an NRL reserve grade reforming. That will mean the Hostplus Cup is history because it will be a third-tier league – and there will be no funding to fly teams around the state. The QRL needs to have the Cowboys, Titans, Dolphins and Broncos in the Queensland Cup to safeguard the competition for the long term. If an NRL reserve grade starts up, the Queensland Cup is essentially dead.”
This is all true. I’ve been saying it for years but without making such a mess of my underwear. While some have switched sides, the front remains exactly where it was.
Quper League isn’t going to solve this. Partly this is because no one has addressed what happens with junior and women’s footy - worth remembering that neither the Dolphins nor Blackhawks could scrape a women’s team together for this season but they think they can pull this off? - but the mix of clubs is wrong. The mooted eight would be the ones who see themselves as above league average but they don’t have what a Quper League needs.
If you wanted to have a theoretically commercially viable Quper League, you wouldn’t bring the Norths Devils and Bishop Park with you. Last year’s grand final attendance, played just down the road from Nundah at Redcliffe, between the very successful Devils and the Burleigh Bears, shows that the fanbase just isn’t there to sustain a key place in a smaller league. It wasn’t that much better in 2024 when they were playing the Dolphins. Further, no one cares about Easts. We all know you’re going to drop the Brisbane thing eventually. Shane Richardson is gone and you aren’t going to the NRL. The Broncos and the Dolphins will soak up any Brisbane-based attention in this competition.
What you want are clubs with a defined catchment, and the possibility of turning out a crowd, and a half decent place to play, so it looks like a real semi-professional league with a view to developing some broadcast revenue. Why does that matter? I was recently reading Nate Silver’s recounting of his time running FiveThiryEight:
The core mistake, though, was that almost nobody was thinking about how to make FiveThirtyEight a viable business. We had essentially no dedicated business people or “product” people or anyone else whose job description depended on the site being economically viable. We never developed the muscle memory or the infrastructure to be a commercial product.
Relying on the largesse of a better capitalised overlord leaves you exposed when the winds of fortune change funding priorities. A slimmed down QCup should be built to be able shoulder some of its burden commercially, even if it is mostly funded by the NRL.
There’s no planned team between Redcliffe and Townsville, which is a drive of 1300km that would take you past at least half a million people, and there’s no team between Wynnum and Burleigh, a much shorter drive through much denser suburbia, albeit that is a deficiency of the current competition but one that the status quo will find easier to address.
The Sunshine Coast Falcons are playing in a soon-to-be Olympic stadium and are based in the third largest city in the state but couldn’t make the cut. The state government just spent tens of millions rebuilding Browne Park and you’re immediately going to put the LNP offside by ditching the Capras. So much work was put in to get the Clydesdales back on the field, with their history older than the entire Gold Coast, they just got the lease on the ground from the government and we’re going to put that in the bin, apparently.
Papua New Guinea just got tens of millions of Australian taxpayer dollars for rugby league. If the Chiefs wants to use QCup as reserve grade, that’s fine, but from a Queensland perspective, if the choice is between a country that already has the resources and a town that would serve our strategic purposes, I don’t think that’s that a hard choice.
Meanwhile, Burleigh, whose suburban ground is named after a Country politician who was premier for all of seven months and played union, and Townsville, whose field is taped onto a pub-slash-casino, are included despite the fact that they would be directly competing against the Young Guns and the reserve Titans, who play in the same towns.
What are we doing here?
There are formats that could address the unwieldiness of an 18 team Cup. Consider promotion and relegation. The usual failure of such systems is either the commercial gulf between leagues (as in the PL) and/or the shallow depth of the labour market (as in the SL). Considering these facts in advance would help design a system that reduces cost, sharpens the top end while maintaining heritage and representation across the state.
A ten team Queensland League 1 could play 18 rounds with a more focussed talent pool with six teams going to the finals for the Cup, while the winner of the eight-team Queensland League 2 would get promoted for the wooden spooner of QL1 after a 14 round season and there could be a fun play-off between the QL2 runner-up and the QL1 ninth team. We’d also have the benefit of laughing at the Twotans and Twoncos being relegated.
Less travel, less games per club, putting players in more competitive situations, putting clubs where the need to be and more inventory to sell Kayo to pad out their September schedule: there’s food for thought.
We (well, I) here at The Maroon Observer are always looking for ways to improve the end user experience for you, the reader
Once upon a time, it was possible to create some profile for yourself by simply being an above average poster on NRL Twitter. While I still like posting, now to Bluesky than Twitter because I’m a lib, it does not have the same cut through. Notwithstanding that, I’ve been doing this for a while now and the fact that no one has pointed out how old that schtick has become, tells you something about the potential audience.
Fellow traveller Mike Meehall Wood posted a… I don’t even know what Substack calls them… a note? identifying other pillars of the extended Rugby League Perverts Substack Network. At least, that’s what I called it. I never sought anyone’s permission to call them “perverts”.
This is worthwhile doing from time to time because it is impossible for anyone to find everything that’s going on, even in the narrow world of rugby league writing on the internet.
I was taken aback with how much better Substack’s social function has become, even though this presages an imminent enshittification of the platform, and that real human beings, and not aspiring Linkedin influencers, seemed to be using it. I will be trying to post more notes (…?) in future.
Between that, Bluesky, which is more for me than you, and an Instagram account that I am getting the hang of, that’s the social media footprint of this operation. I refuse to engage in camera facing short form video, even though that would likely put this newsletter on a rocket to the stars, and there is also a Youtube channel that I do not have time to do anything with that, in theory, I could also post Reels to as Youtube Shorts™ but often forget to do so. There are too many places to be, none of them “good” unless you want to play by specifically ambiguous, esoterically precarious rules.
I do not and this is all tiring, so that’s what I recommend that you subscribe to the newsletter direct. You won’t miss anything and all the good stuff goes in the newsletter. The rest are tidbits to lead you to this box.
Around the grounds
Country 20 defeated City 18 (W). Country took the early lead, going 20-4 into the half time but forfeited their right to the ball through most of the second half, between errors and penalties (stop me if you’ve heard this one before), and letting City back into the game. The Mets blew through the line and could strip the opposition for numbers but left themselves too much work to do and ran out of time.
Country 34 defeated City 30 (M). After an early run of scoring for Country, it looked like it would be their day. City were not making the defensive efforts, however, once they got off the bus and got to work, City levelled the scores. Country still controlled the game through the middle of the field and managed to find more scoring opportunities. City staged a late comeback, as was the theme of the day, but ran out of time. Country complete the double, reversing their fortunes last year.
Devils 18 defeated Tigers 16 (W). This is the Tigers’ first loss since May 2024. Norths and Easts traded blows all game in a high quality affair before a binning of Narikah Orchard for a silly shot on the Devils’ kicker tipped the match in Norths’ favour. It almost looked like they’d blown the advantage before Tayla Sykes sprinted down the field for the winning score. Great tone setter for the competition.
Statewide split screening. The women’s Magpies kept the Pride at arm’s length all afternoon without completing dominating. A worthwhile first round performance. The Dolphins kicked the crap out of the Clydesdales, as expected and ending any shortlived speculation that Western had turned a corner, and Tweed did something likewise to PNG. Dudley Dotoi exploded out of the blocks to score first for Townsville and got the second try going, on the way to the Blackhawks dusting the Tigers. As much as Norths-Easts was high quality, Western-Tweed was a drag with the Clydesdales coming up on top.
Dolphins 40 defeated Cowboys 14. Did someone say, “finals footy”? Anyone? No? Look, we may just be past the mid point of the season but this is Origin sludge, so time has no meaning so I can look forward to finals if I want. The Dolphins look great and can now win tough(ish) games. That wasn't quite what this was, with six points awarded by the bunker out of insanity and another dozen from laziness (there's those Cotter habits Billy loves). The Cowboys look like a team thats going to scrape into the eight. Again, something like an achievement given where they were.
Titans 28 defeated Broncos 20. The Broncos’ sparkly jerseys made it look like they were staring in a Rock Eisteddfod production about rugby league. While my initial instinct is to belittle the Titans for not acting like they’ve been here before, the Broncos deserve what they get for this one. Brisbane had superior ball and yardage but pissed away every opportunity, and their season, while Gold Coast played their grand final. Since 2020, the Titans are 7-7 against the Broncos. That’s the third best record the Titans have against any club in that period, behind the Tigers (6-2), who have gotten three spoons in that time, and their other rivals, the Warriors (7-4).
Falcons 29 defeated Bears 22 (M). If the Falcons are the luckiest team in the QCup, then they look good while doing it. Mason Peut, Taine Couper, tip of the cap to you, gentlemen. Lots of long range production and incisive play near the line, the Falcons are exciting and fast and the Bears couldn’t keep up.
Super League highlight sprint, round 13. Leeds beat St Helens after David Klemmer got himself binned with the scores levelled and less than 10 to go. Remember Kyle Feldt? Mapapalangi was a bright spot for Cas as they fell short against Leigh. Warrington won a spiteful, referee-filled encounted with Hull FC, the latter really struggling this year. Bradford beat York with some extra polish in the battle of newly promoted teams. Jim Lenihan’s tenure at Huddersfield is off to a poor start, crushed by Toulouse with the first try scored by Ethan Quai-Ward for his new club. Wakefield and Hull KR played another aggro affair with two send offs in separate incidents - dunno why everyone in Super League is so cranky - but Wakefield had some superlative touches in attack to pick off the upset. Only (?) 12,000 turned out for Wigan’s visit to Catalans in Paris. Huge swathes of the field were covered in confetti, the main broadcast angle was weirdly high and the Warriors crunched the Dragons with some globetrotter shit. As a consolation, Sol Faataape’s mullet is outrageous.
Intermission
If Zac Laybutt gets any worse, it's going to be RONALDO (Philitonga) TIME.
Book club
Unless you’re a Dolphins fan, or maybe a very exuberant Cowboys fan, it is clearly not Queensland’s year. As a result, I am beginning mental preparations for an 8-0 wipeout across the full spectrum of State of Origin. This is mostly planning the evasions I will have to employ to avoid incurring permanent psychic damage from tedious Queensland is in crisis takes online.
The Ashley Klein debacle came very close to being one of Queensland’s great victories. Had the Maroons a better option than Jojo Fifita, the Blues wouldn’t have had such an easy time down the right hand side in the late game and that might have been enough to stop one of the tries. C’est le sport.
On one hand, having come so close, it makes sense to run it back with the same team. The baffling exception is the promotion of Briton Nikora to cover the reshuffle caused by Pat Carrigan’s absence but at least, Finefeuiaki seems to be on the bench now. On the other, if this team gets a case of the 2025 Canberra Raiders finals (which is where I am), then we’re in trouble. Slater is probably sufficiently skilled at vibes management to avoid that (I would not be) but that’s the test he has to pass.
A brave showing is not sufficient. That card has been played in game 1. The Maroons have to win. If they don’t, there may be nothing standing in the way of a Blunami.
History provides some perspective. I have spent the last few weeks working my way through The Greatest Game Under the Sun, a solidly detailed history of Queensland rugby league written in the late 80s in the style of Haddan’s Our Game or Heads and Middleton’s Centenary of Rugby League.
The focus is primarily on Queensland’s representative fortunes in interstate and intercity games and hosting tourists, as well as Queensland’s impact at the international level (highly variable), while the BRL and other club leagues are given minimal attention. There are scattered details about off-field matters, which are fascinating and support my various long-run hypotheses about the history of Australian rugby league.
The main takeaway is that Queensland really stank in some decades, regularly losing games by 30 points when that was like losing by 50. When rugby league first started, and all of the international calibre players were based in Sydney and supplanted by 15 freshly professionalised Wallabies in 1909, Queensland didn’t have much of a response in the interstate series. It took until the mid-1920s to find a foothold. In the 1960s, as the wheels start to fall off and talent migration becomes a flood2, Queensland could not compete. This was killing the Interstate series long before Origin was mooted.
With 15 of the last 20 series under our belts, it pays to remember that sometimes New South Wales has to win. Even more rarely, they have to win a lot, to feel like they’re still part of this, even if they don’t get it. You can’t win 100% of the time. Maybe this is a year we take some medicine and make it 15 from 21. If you want your children to have this too, then what comes is for the greater good.
The other thing is you don’t have to do is watch the disaster unfold.3 The Expanse comes in book form and TV form, both of which are good (I am rewatching the latter now that For All Mankind has finished, while two-thirds of the way through book 4) and either may be preferable to watching annihilation.
Upcoming slate
The NRL is in peak Origin sludge, so even the highly rated Dolphins-Roosters match will be skewed by team list announcements, especially if Katoa is in NSW camp. Titans-Tigers might be fun but it is far more likely to be bad. Then again, if Gold Coast can win, we wonder if they can close in on Brisbane on the ladder, who don’t look like winning another game this year.
As usual, the other leagues have more interesting match ups that aren’t sludgified but you’ll have to ferret those out at odd hours or different platforms. I like Cutters-Magpies in the QCup for chaos potential, Devils-Bears in the QDub and St Helens-Warrington for a who is going to lose in the semis preview.
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I wrote about the Cowboys. They’re not the most interesting in team in the league right now but in a pretty good spot nonetheless.
I will write about the Dolphins later this week and then, if I can muster the fortitude or get a response to my email to the club (subject line: Broncos host accused war criminal), the Broncos.
The club newsletters feature plenty of neat charts and notes on the NRLQ team (which I eyeball the Cowboys as the second best of the four) for the paid subscriber. Paid subscribers get full access to the Pony Pic, Bov Bull and Phin Rev, The Almanac and The Dataset™, and commenting privileges.
If you don’t want Substack clipping your ticket or to commit to an ongoing subscription, Ko-Fi is also available for one-off tips.
Stats pop
On the off chance that you were paying close attention to the Super League Elo ratings, I have added ten seasons of pre-modern matches (1986/87 through 1995/96 seasons) to seed the Super League era ratings. This follows what has been done with the NSWRL/NRL ratings. If you see a substantial change, that’s why.
Nickelware
Pretty good chance that the Dolphins take their first pennant this year, after three consecutive years in second place.
Read this
Campo - Rugby league must rise to Kane Evans’s level of courage
SportsIndustryAU - Boomtown for the NRL! The Networks & Streamers come out to play
Storm Machine - Game 755 – S29E14 Review
Rugby League Writers - Panthers Scrum Try, How Ponga Beat The Storm Slide & Roaming Ronaldo
🎧 Panic World - How the internet destroyed TV (and itself)
Notes
Former NRL enforcer Kane Evans comes out as gay, reveals dark 20-year internal battle with his sexuality. The thing that always strikes me about people coming out as gay, trans, queer is how much better they feel about themselves and life after: “I’ve had people blackmail me. I’ve had people try to throw me under the bus, I’ve had people try to deflect their problems by trying to out me. And it just built up a lot of shame, and fear and guilt within myself. Now I’ve spoken about it, I’ve shattered all those chains. They’ve lost their power. I feel like coming and speaking to you today, fear, shame, guilt – all of that, I’ve cut ties with all that. I feel peace within, and I feel like a weight has lifted off my shoulders.” Great stuff. He won’t be the last.
Maroons U19 teams announced: men and women. Off an undefeated QDub campaign with the Tigers, Enah Desic headlines the women’s team at halfback while we’ll see what the Cowboys’ Taj Lateo, who kicked the game winner in the Mal Meninga final for Townsville, has to offer for the men. A reminder that Darius Boyd is the U19s men’s coach.
Margin watch: through 13 rounds, 2026 has fallen behind 2021, even with the Tigers’ thumping, 18.2 plays 17.1. Still in front of 1995 (17.0).
I enjoyed my first experience of watching City-Country live, so think the QRL made the right move taking it off the grand final day agenda. I think it’s a compliment to everyone involved that both games seemed to be played at a level comparable to the senior statewide comps.
Badel keeps citing the “104-year history” but the Queensland Cup was only inaugurated in 1996. A 104 years ago was 1922, when the BRL formally split from the QRL, but that’s an odd place to begin talking about Queensland’s top flight of rugby league. Most people see that as a continuity back to 1909, so its either the 30 year history of the competition or 117 years.
Queensland leagues make a profit from the transfer fees but it doesn’t seem to make a difference.
I mean, I probably will up to a point, but you don’t have to.
Jack Pizzey reference in the wild!
Great writing as always.
"If you want your children to have this too, then what comes is for the greater good."
Go Queensland! By 50, this year, next year, every year, if possible.