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Channel 9 is smashing the NRL about its financial position. Meanwhile the NRL has no debt at all, while 9 has $538M of bank debt/finance leases and another $312M in operating lease obligations. Where is 9s revenue going to come from now to service that??
Their 4 top rating shows - all 3 Origins and the NRL Grand Final - aren't happening because 9 doesn't want to pay the NRL the money they signed up to. Their next best rating show - MAFS - has stopped filming. What are they going to show on TV? Old Footy Show re-runs?
Meanwhile they are talking about the NRL spending too highly on administration costs, yet paid their top 3 executives $8.3M for the 2019 Financial Year. 9's CEO Hugh Marks got just under $5M alone in 2019 compared to Greenberg's rumoured $1.5M.
Marks has overseen 9s share price drop by 33% since he was appointed yet wants to criticise the NRL for its return on 9's "investment" in NRL.....
Then we have Gus Gould the financial expert telling the NRL how it should structure itself. The same guy who paid two coaches at Penrith after the club made a $5M loss in 2018 and a $280K loss in 2019. Where was this financial advice when 9 went bankrupt in 2012?
9 is now trying to cut costs by weaselling itself out of the NRL contract. Well guess what? We all see what is happening. Maybe if 9 put effort into its NRL content instead of getting washed up players to try be comedians they might get a higher return on investment?
The truth is everyone is struggling right now, and 9 is using this to try to force the NRL to renegotiate. Does that sound like something a friend of the game would do? Does it sound like something we should expect from the "home of league"? I'M DONE!
