Wayne Bennett backs NRL financially supporting Titans

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Wayne Bennett backs NRL financially supporting Gold Coast Titans

Wayne Bennett hopes the NRL never gives up on rugby league on the Gold Coast despite admitting sport has always been a hard sell in the region.

Bennett believes the NRL will always find it hard to win over the tourist strip but he does not think that is an excuse to give up on the region and has supported the league digging deep to keep the Titans afloat.

The NRL's All Stars match looms as another sporting casualty on the Gold Coast after initial poor sales for Friday evening's clash at Robina.

NRL chief executive Dave Smith this week stopped short of guaranteeing the All Stars fixture would remain an annual event on the calendar in the wake of the disappointing Gold Coast reaction.

But Bennett believes the concept's future should not hinge on Gold Coast sales, saying history had shown sport was a hard sell in the region.

Rugby league's Chargers, basketball's Blaze and football's Gold Coast United have all come and gone over the years.

And it is believed the Titans are battling to keep their heads above water with speculation the NRL has contributed significant funds to help them out.

Bennett is not surprised by the lacklustre All Stars ticket sales but says they have to be put in perspective.

"You've got to look at the history of sport on the Gold Coast," he said.

"Basketball, soccer, rugby league - they've all had their crisis moments.

"It's a big tourist area.

"It's transient. People are in and out of here on a regular basis.

"The lifestyle here is totally different too. You've got a choice. I know where I'd want to be - on the beach most times."

The Titans were recently in the news again with reports claiming the NRL was ready to step in and take over the Gold Coast licence due to financial concerns.

It came in the wake of ex-Titans managing director Michael Searle claiming he wants to sell his $4.4 million shareholding in the club and walk away.

For the record, Titans chairwoman Rebecca Frizelle claims the club's board boasting wealthy businessman Darryl Kelly, who owns 47.2 per cent of the club, is not in trouble.

Bennett says he will have no problem with the NRL propping up the Titans.

"If they (Titans and NRL) think they can make it work then good on them," he said.

"The game's big enough now to be able to do that. The game's never been good at that but the present administration do that pretty well.

"They're certainly supporting some clubs that wouldn't have been supported in the past. The NRL have got four clubs they're probably helping in one way or another.

"The Gold Coast is one of them and I'm happy with that."

http://www.abc.net.au/

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Titans fight hard to hang on to their turf on Gold Coast

FIVE years ago, former Gold Coast lord mayor Ron Clarke ruminated over the Suns’ signing of Gary Ablett. As newspapers ran pictures of a supersized Ablett towering over the city’s skyscrapers, Clarke — a reasonable athlete in his day — praised the AFL star.

A champion’s champion with an unblemished reputation. A motivator. An attention getter. A role model on and off the field. A guarantee of success. Ablett hasn’t let Clarke down and the Suns have reaped the benefits, gaining the upper hand in one of Australian sport’s most contested battle fields.

The Gold Coast Titans, through their own fault as much as the AFL’s heavy investment in the region, have lost ground and supporters. Junior numbers continue to grow at an exponential rate but the Titans are barely clinging on, deserted by many fans as results waned.

Hope, however, may be at hand. Daly Cherry-Evans is seriously considering a multi-million dollar deal from the Titans, to the point that he will visit the club for a second time early next week.

Clarke’s words resonate given how easily they could apply to the Queensland and Australia halfback. He may not be a champion’s champion just yet, but his reputation is unblemished. Attention getter? Tick. A role model? Tick. A guarantee of success? Tick.

Little wonder the Titans are throwing so much of their energy into the 25-year-old. Cherry-Evans is a game-changer. The sort of player who could become the face of the franchise, in much the same way Scott Prince was at the club’s inception and Ablett is at the Suns.

“Like all clubs, we would dearly love to have another marquee player of the highest calibre to help us on the field of course, but to help us off the field with our commercial viability and community connections,” Titans chief executive Graham Annesley said.

“In any sport, high-profile marketable names are incredibly important. We’re doing our best to rebuild our connection with the communities and the corporate world.

“We have credibility now, we have good governance overseeing the operations of the club from independent directors, we have done a restructure of our operation internally, we have had a review. So there is a lot of positives happening here. We’re going to be in new premises next year whether it’s Parkwood or Coomera.

“We’re going to have facilities the equal of probably anyone in the competition. So there’s good things happening here that these constant reports about impending death are not helpful. They’re unfounded, they’re speculation and they’re untrue. They don’t help us to move forward.”

What would help is Cherry-Evans. The Titans need a kill. They need to give the people of the Gold Coast a reason to believe again. They need to give sponsors a reason to fill the million-dollar void on the front of their jersey.

“You look at any club in the competition,” Annesley said.

“When they’re playing well, their crowds go north, when they’re playing poorly, their crowds go south. In the early part of the season last year when we were stringing a few wins together, we had a couple of crowds around the 20,000 mark.

“That dropped off over the course of the year when performances dropped off. There is no doubt there is support here but they want a team they can be proud of and that’s what we’re trying to build.”

They have support. NRL chief executive Dave Smith has backed the Titans, as has supercoach Wayne Bennett.

Having witnessed the demise of the Seagulls, Giants and Chargers prior to the formation of the Titans, Bennett was sympathetic to the plight confronting Annesley and his staff.

Typically a man with an idea about how to solve almost any issue in the game, Bennett admitted he was at a loss to know how to solve the conundrum facing all Gold Coast sporting franchises, but was adamant the nursery of high school talent in the region meant an answer needed to be found.

“The NRL have got four clubs they’re probably helping in one way or another. The Gold Coast is one of them and I’m happy with that,” Bennett said.

The long-term ambition is to survive without a helping hand of the NRL. Ultimately, the answer may lie with Cherry-Evans.

http://www.theaustralian.com.au/spor...-1227219149953

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Bennett can help the Titans most by building the Broncos v Titans derby.