Rugby league icon calls on sport to start selling its best players better
SAM Burgess has called on rugby league to become better at selling itself.
The Warrington coach and dual-code England star knows the 13-a-side code’s product is as good as any, but not many people know that.
Promoter Eddie Hearn claimed the sport is ‘dying’ as there are no nationally known superstars.
And Burgess believes changes can propel the sport to a new level, starting with reducing the number of games.
He said as he prepares for his second season back in England after a decade in Australia, where the NRL is huge: “The game last year was brilliant, the product was outstanding.
“But I think a lot of the stuff around that needs to be better.
“Sell out stadiums. Make players known nationwide. Grow who we are. Things can be done better, no doubt about it.
“One way we do that is take some games out, there are too many with loop fixtures.
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“We’d play 22 if we played everyone home and away and it makes the product way better.
“Have a couple of bye weeks in there. In those, you play a Yorkshire v Lancashire series and make that special.
“Hull KR came to us twice last year. I guarantee if they came once, everyone wants to go and see Mikey Lewis and Jared Waerea-Hargreaves play, so they get a ticket for that game because it’s only one game.
“I’d have this conversation with anyone. I’m not coming at the game here. The game probably heard it all before. But the product’s good enough, so let’s sell it.”
Burgess has seen off the threat of the NRL to keep hold of hooker Danny Walker, who signed a new deal until 2029.
But several stars have moved down under – the latest being Warrington’s Matty Nicholson – and the man who headed to South Sydney as a 21-year-old wants more incentive for clubs to keep young English talent.
Then they can become ‘rock stars.’
He added: “Something needs to be done for homegrown players to prevent the poaching of them, so to speak.
“Players get calls from clubs all the time and they’re only human, so they take them and they put stuff in their minds, throwing dollars at them and they don’t care about the damage it leaves behind.
“There needs to be more protection to keep assets here. Then you start growing the sport on the back of those English assets.
“There’s nothing better than having the likes of George Williams, Danny Walker, Mikey Lewis, Junior Nsemba, some of these young English boys who can be rock stars of England.
“I thought Danny was out the door for a while, I thought he’d gone.
“It created a big pain in my arse last year. People come under the carpet and try to sell dreams without any concern about what it leaves behind here, the hole it leaves and the irreplaceable gap you have to fill.
“There’s got to be a bit of protection in place from a central point of view. Maybe the league can do something about it.”