Let me start this piece off by using some language that the flat cappers of northern England to relate to, like gob-smacking rib tickling…
Now that we have that awkward moment out of the way I need to address the ridiculous statement put out by RFL Chairman Brian Barwick in which he stood up for Rugby League in the face of…well…reality.
After reading a couple of articles by a couple of journalists, Barwick was upset. He felt that the game was being misrepresented. That there was a general tone of doom and gloom in both articles. He chose the Rugby Football League web site as his platform to make a statement.
Barwick pumped out the same public relations fluff we have come to expect out of a Rugby Football League official. Forget the financial armegeddon the game is facing, the drain on playing talent, the non performance of the national side, and the slowly waning interest people in Great Britain have for Rugby League…forget all of that. Super League has 14 clubs (For now) and the game is going great!
Barwick then ended his statement, in which he referenced himself 22 times, giving and outline of his background and telling people not to talk the sport down.
This all prompted me to write my own open letter. One to Brian Barwick himself.
Enjoy….
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Well, thank you very much Brian. I really appreciate your point of view. Now if you could just go back to your office and do you fucking job, that would be great!
You see Brian, I don’t care who you are or what you used to do. You are just another talking head in an organisation that has been detriumental to the health and wellbeing of Rugby League across Great Britain for many, many years.
Just like that last dickhead from Tennis, you’ve come in talking a good game. The thing is Brian, talk is cheap.
You are running an organisation whose track record is so abysmal that even the people who have defended it in exchange for access and cross promotion can no longer ignore it.
People don’t just become negative towards the future prospects of a sport. It happens over a long period of time. You might think that your little statement will calm down the irrational masses, but I know better.
Rugby League supporters are sick and tired of seeing the Rugby Football League constantly fucking up. They are sick and tired of seeing the game underfunded because your organisation is completely and utterly inept.
Do you really think you are the first person to come up with a statement like this Brian? The first suit to walk in and tell the people that keep this game alive that they need to stop worrying and look forward to a bright future?
You are now running an organisation that gave up its greatest commercial asset, the naming rights to Super League, to a shipping company for free in exchange for a bunch of stickers on trucks. An organisation that managed to take a valuable commercial asset and make it worthless due to its own incompetence!
How is the free Toyota you have been supplied with by the way Brian? Running well?
For every terrible broadcasting deal, for every poorly run event, for every club that has gone bust, for every commercial deal that served no purpose other than to make life that little bit more cosy for Rugby Football League officials, the game itself has suffered.
On top of all of that, your organisation has become the gold standard for marketing bullshit as it tries to put a positive spin on everything while the foundations of the game crumble beneath its feet.
Hey, at least you’ve slipped right into that role pretty well Brian.
So with the game under funded, losing money, losing players, the top level of the sport contracting, with no real national interest…..what the fuck should we be optimistic about Brian?
Oh don’t worry, you have this job as long as you want it. You’re not accountable to me. You’re not accountable to supporters. You’re not accountable to clubs or stakeholders in the game. You work for the Rugby Football League now. You can fuck shit up all you like and you will never lose your job. EVER!
So how about we try this all over again. How about we all pretend that you didn’t toss up this morsel of self serving bullshit, and that you walked into Red Hall with no preconceived ideas about the health of the game. Lets pretend that you are a smart operator, someone that won’t suffer fools lightly. Someone that will look a RFL spin merchant in the eye and ask them to justify their pay packet in the face of declining KPI’s.
I’m willing to start all over again if you are Brian. I’m willing to see you as the man that walked into the Rugby Football League and turned it from a bloated, archaic, self serving organisation into a well run, modern sporting administration.
I don’t want to hear from you Brian. I want to see your actions speaking louder than words ever could. I want to see your reforms having a positive effect on the game.
Actions speak louder than words Brian. I hope by the time you move on from the Rugby Football League that we speak of you in glowing terms. The man that said very little, but who made things happen. You don’t need to celebrate the game. You don’t need to promote it. You don’t have to pretend you are “one of us”. Just fix what is clearly a poorly run organisation.
If you can do that, I’ll write your biography myself….
League Freak
The King Of Rugby League
BB had an interview with the London Evening Standard a few months ago, it’s on their site. Again the majority of the discussion is promoting BB then football, RU and then RL. Most notably however the interview came from his Twickenham offices and was looked down upon by a large photo of Johnny Wilkinson which hung on the wall. A semi retired journeyman used by Nigel Wood to alleviate some obvious pressure from the Stobbart fiasco.
You need to get this letter in the Briish RL press, it pretty much encapsulates what we are all thinking.