#64 | Player Manager: Steve 'Chimes' Gillis

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Speaker 1: You know, hey is scary.
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Speaker 2: John's it. Apologies about my dickhead grandson and my Dickhead's son, Matthew, but I really appreciate it. You the follow but all the best of all you old Shaggy's out there. Good luck boys.
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Speaker 3: No, I've written on my phone this is going to be good.
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Speaker 4: People run the way.
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Speaker 1: He was going to written intro for Chimes first first time ever.
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Speaker 3: I've never I want to start doing like you know we do soft intros. I want to do a big, powerful one in there.
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Speaker 4: Music.
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Speaker 3: We've got the band, We've got the violins now. Our guest today has been involved in rugby league and sport at the highest level for over thirty years, thirteen years working in journalism before launching Sports management company in nineteen ninety three, where he has and still manages some of Australia's biggest sporting stars. In his spare time, he likes long walks on the beach reading smart novels. Welcome Steve Gillers, better known as Chimes.
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Speaker 5: Very good, very good, your research, mate, every.
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Speaker 3: Aspect especially that's my That was actually when I googled you, that's all that It came perfect, mate, Chimes. Dad's got your podcast Chiming in.
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Speaker 5: Coming in award winning podcast Chimes.
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Speaker 1: It's going, it's going fantastic, and I've had people comming anyone for everyone from Brian Flasher to Camera Surunda.
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Speaker 4: So you you've got a good listener ship out there.
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Speaker 5: Yeah, I'm enjoying it. Fell into it. Probably don't have time to do it, but we'll see it out this year.
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Speaker 1: It's funny and it like you look at listen to commercial radio except Cole and Jackie O. They do sort of long form stuff. I remember a triple Am then always going mate. No one wants to hear and talk more than three minutes time Bright get out in the high where it's just full circle. People love the long form StuffYeah.
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Speaker 5: I think some of them. I feel like I could do another episode with them. You know, you can't, can't carry it in in fifty minutes to an hour. But I'm lucky that I know most of the guys that I interview or girls so comfortable and know a bit about their background.
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Speaker 3: And we're going to talk about some of the players you've managed to manage now. But of those guests that you've had on who's been your not favorite but who's been an episode that you've just loved doing.
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Speaker 5: I mean, I've got a fear so I enjoyed Blake Steep. He tells the story about he nearly lost his dad in.
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Speaker 3: A because he's from Port and Quarry right, and he saved his dad from like a rip or something.
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Speaker 5: He's had a massive heart attack and they Blake dragged him up onto rock in the middle of the ocean and then had to swim back the shore and get help. It's an amazing story. Yeah, really good.
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Speaker 3: I was up in Port not long ago and they were all the locals were talking about it.
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Speaker 4: Or did you rescue anyone up there?
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Speaker 3: No? I didn't, But you know what talking about people rescuing people in Port because Harry Grant has saved a couple of people up at Port m corry as well. So I don't know if that means no one in Port McCory can swim chimes.
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Speaker 1: I reckon Harry's plants, anything for a bit of good publicity. Very smart made I really the Frank pernice one. I mean, Frank is such an interesting gay. He's just he's a classic.
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Speaker 5: Good fellow gentlemen. Yeah, And as the game inside out successful, you know if you if you were building a club or starting a club, he'd be the first blake you'd get if you could.
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Speaker 3: Yeah, he was being chased by Collingwood, was I think it was?
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Speaker 4: Yeah, Yeah he was.
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Speaker 1: But I mean he he was our skills coach in the ninety five World Cup and then after that he went to Irish Ruby Union, English rub Union was his assistant coach with the South African national side.
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Speaker 3: Well that's what I was going to ask you, boy. It's like he obviously he knows rugby league like the back of his hand, But do you think if you're building a club in junior development, in tennis, all these different kinds of sport, do you think he's the kind of guy that could just go and create a successful culture in any sport.
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Speaker 2: Yeah.
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Speaker 5: I think you can cross knowledge, cross share, cross promote. It's sports are similar in so many ways, aren't they. So I would think he'd be the type of blake that could handle anything. Yeah.
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Speaker 1: Yeah, I mean that's that's the thing about Melbourne. You look at the strength that the organization. You've got Craig and his assistance of course, and you know Craig is he's the Yeah, he's the figurehead of it. But behind the scenes you've got a boat like Frank. I mean, Melbourne would not be Melbourne without Frank. And then you've got blakes like Paul Bunn recruitment guy. I mean, it's such a good operation.
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Speaker 5: I do things very well. Yeah, if Melbourne ring for player, you get there as quick as you can.
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Speaker 1: Well, that's why I asked you, Chine, because it's interesting. Before you know, we'll talk about your background with journalists and everything. But just to jump forward on clubs, isn't it interesting? I reckon there's some clubs that if there's what's the salary cap at the moment chime.
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Speaker 5: It's about eleven point and a bit.
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Speaker 1: Yeah, well, Melbourne and those type clubs like Pandrith they're operative operating at fourteen million, but the fact that people go there for less and some of the other clubs are operating on seven or eight million.
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Speaker 5: Penrith have shared a lot of players, haven't they. They look to be squeaky clean the way they do it, and they produce them and rebuild and off they go again and their chance to win another one.
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Speaker 3: Well, a lot of like Penrith, A lot of clubs buy if you're looking like a stock market. A lot of clubs buy people like players at the top and then they only kind of decrease from their Penrith get them when they're juniors, when they're worth minimum wage, and they release them when they're worth a million dollars.
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Speaker 5: And they've got them queued up. They've got kids there we haven't heard of yet. We look up for a few of them that are going to play and they've got them stacked up there.
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Speaker 3: Let's hype them up right now.
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Speaker 1: You know what you want. And this is I think is just imperative for the game. They're very, very lucky of the game in the fact that Penrith know they can't stop all their young guys, but they still put so.
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Speaker 4: Much work into it.
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Speaker 1: And I remember coming through the grades at Newcastle the amount of work they put in the juniors was just insane, huge amount because the club didn't have a lot of money and you know, the junior rugby league was was their focus. As time went on and the salary cap took over, they realized that everyone was pinching their juniors and haven't put as much money into it. But those those areas that have got the huge catchment it's just imperative that they cultivate the local area. There has to be incentives for clubs to do that.
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Speaker 5: Yeah, I think there will be eventually. We're talking about that. There was a review this year about boundaries and retention recruitment for the younger players. So I think something's on the horizon there. But things are a little bit cyclical too. You can get a good group can magical bats and paramatta in the eighties and all those sorts of things. You can have a bit of LUs What is.
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Speaker 4: That we had?
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Speaker 1: You know, sorry, but we had at the time. All we won the winning Grand finals and that up. That's sort of top tier team A long time ago, long long time ago.
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Speaker 4: We have.
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Speaker 5: You watched the replay.
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Speaker 3: We watched it every week, but he won't let us watch two thousand and one because he wasn't there.
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Speaker 5: It's the one I interviewed Nick Cosseff the other week and he talks about how he feels he costs mainly that Grand Final because he didn't push up when the ball went back to you. You've been a bit hard on yourself. But he said, if anyone sees me in newcast, unless you'd buy me a beer, he said, I won that conference.
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Speaker 1: He's been hard heard heard the interview, He's been through some stuff. But we had three teams worth in other in other clubs worth of our players and the same thing. I mean, that's what Penrith are doing now. We watched the game a couple of weeks ago Tiger's Dogs. There in those two teams there were ten players who have been recently let go by Penrith.
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Speaker 3: Well, it's like and we spoke to Alex twyl about it last week where it was like, it's a it's almost a handing of the bat on. I remember back in the day when it was Melbourne Storm you look at the and somebody, you know, James Maloney, blokes like so many players had come through the Melbourne Storm system and then just been pinched. Now spread across the NRL now it's like you see Penrith, like Penrith just have their juniors and different players that have debuted there spread everywhere.
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Speaker 5: Tommy Jenkins left and came back.
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Speaker 3: Jack do the same thing, and Tommy Jenkins he might Bloody Milky might get Winger of the Year. He's going who would He's kept Paul out of money, out of a spot. Yeah, Paul always been added to man. He scored two tries in a grand final last year.
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Speaker 1: Yeah, chimes, you were a journal originally, Yeah, news limited news.
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Speaker 5: When I left school straight into journalism, Yeah, failed English. English was my bestest subject at school.
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Speaker 3: Best How do you say, how exactly how do you go out of school into that line of work.
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Speaker 5: You're going as a copy boy, so you're going to get the lunches. You don't get a job, you don't get a guaranteed job. You've got to get the lunches and run errands for the journeys. And I did it for nearly two years basically a professional ship kicker was Yeah.
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Speaker 3: So it's one of those industries where back then you literally start at the ground.
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Speaker 5: Start at the bottom, mate, and then if you're lucky enough to get a cadet chip. And they had exams, so they had to pass exams. And that's some of those guys that went into journalism out of school. We're getting hs. He was out of five hundred, they're getting four eighty four nine.
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Speaker 4: Oh wow.
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Speaker 5: They could be doctors and lawyers. They wanted to be journalists, right.
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Speaker 3: And who was the big journalist? Like obviously now you see blokes like Danny Whideler, Buzz Rossa or these who was when you were coming through? Who were the big journalists then?
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Speaker 5: On general? Mike Munroe was there, right, he was there. He was a good fella in sport. There was the Buzz was there. But Buzz was a young young put was young then. Yeah, there was Chippy Felingos and Ray Chested and and Ian Heads. He wasn't working at the time, but those sort of guys.
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Speaker 3: What was But did Buzz how he sounds now? Did he sound like that back then?
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Speaker 5: Exactly?
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Speaker 3: So his voice has never changed over time fell rough because he sound like if you envisioned what an old did you envision what an old man sounds like?
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Speaker 4: Like?
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Speaker 3: That's Buzz's voice.
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Speaker 5: Yeah, quite unique. He would have done well on the voice, I guess.
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Speaker 2: Yeah.
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Speaker 4: Identifiable.
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Speaker 1: Yeah, but he is Newcastle Blake, Yeah, sixty seven sixty seven?
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Speaker 5: But is he yeah?
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Speaker 1: Doing make coment on that.
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Speaker 4: I was just there.
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Speaker 5: I met Buzz when I was about sixteen at the races. He was out there with a couple of journal mates and he had an eski full of beer to his own.
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Speaker 3: The races and he often did you take it?
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Speaker 1: Of course I did big, big drinkers back there.
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Speaker 5: Yeah, yeah, it was big mate. So they'd go. I used to try and keep up with them. They'd go finished work, go the Evening Star and they'd have eight or ten skinners and they come back and check the paper because we get an early cop early edition, and come off the press, and then they go back drinking, and then you gather the Journalists Club. Buzz got barred from the Journalists Club and he used to get in a few fights and he was barred. And I remember one night we're trying to get in and Buzz tried to get down his hands and knees and crawl passes all this lady on the door, and she's then they were all walking past and protect Buzz. You know, he's trying to keep up. And she said, I know you're there. Phil.
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Speaker 3: When you say fights, are they verbal fights or their physical?
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Speaker 5: He was a fighter. So he tells the story He's got to fight his nose. He'll tell you he's got to fight his nose. And he used to to throw there's.
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Speaker 3: No I can't imagine him.
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Speaker 1: Hadley tells the story him and him and Buzz had to fight. One night Buzz was reading him saying, come on, come on downstairs, balls for fox sake, buzz, I'm trying to get some sleep, Get calling, calling, calling, Next when the buzz bangs on Hadley's door, Hadley opens it and just goes bang.
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Speaker 3: Dropped jobs.
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Speaker 5: Wild days.
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Speaker 3: So on your journalism, because I've heard, I've heard when you're a young journalist, there's a there's a story that you have. I've been tipped in by one of the players you manage about in action you may have had with Gus Gould.
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Speaker 5: Gussie. Oh yeah, I got offside with Gus. It's a true story of this.
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Speaker 3: You don't have to say that. We know it's true.
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Speaker 5: I was just starting out and I rang him one night. I was talking about something. I sort of kne him. I didn't really know him, but we knew each other anyway. Freddie Philer was at Penrith, just starting to make his way through the grades, you know, and he's playing first grade and doing quite who's aiding, I think anyway, just in passing. I said to Gus and I said, you you reckon, Freddy could play Origin this year. He said yeah, And I didn't say much more and I said he's that good And he said yeah, he's good, and started talking about other stuff, hamstring, team changes and all this sort of stuff. Anyway, put the phone down. I've gone, there's my story. Freddy's ready, you know, kept quoting Gas He's ready. So I wrote the story and it was back page Freddy's Ready, back bait story. Next day, Gus rang me. He said, I didn't say that. He said, I didn't say that. All you put the kid under enormous pressure, and you know, don't ever talk to me and he hung up. So rang Joey Thomas, who is a good mate of Gusses, and I said, I need your help. I said, I'm upset, Gus. I don't know how to fix it. Can you ring him and fix it for me? He said no, I said, what do I do? Joe said, I'm going to give you a bit of advice. He said, won't you listen to advices. I'm going to give you three words. Listen carefully and follow him. I said, what's what's the three words? He said, Stephen, this is what you have to do is be a man. I said what he said, be a man? I said, what do you mean? He said, if he said he's ready, ring him back and tell him, get stuff. Be a man, I said, Joe, you're right. He said, I want to hear you say it. I said, I'm going to be a man, Joe, he said, I want to hear his chewless. I'm going to be a man, he said, ringing me. So I'm going to ring him right now. So rang Gus he answers, say what I said? Hi, PHILM. I just want to say I'm so sorry for it will never happen again. I'm so sorry. Ring I ring Jay back. I said, it's fixed, mate. He said, you tell him.
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Speaker 3: I said, yeah, how old are you there?
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Speaker 5: I'd have been probably twenty three?
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Speaker 3: And how old's Gus he would he'd be because he would have been quite.
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Speaker 5: Probably thirty thirty.
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Speaker 1: Yeahause when they won the Grand Final Cany it was twenty nine nine.
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Speaker 3: Yeah, so he was he was playing then, or he was coaching.
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Speaker 4: He was coaching.
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Speaker 1: He was coaching Penrith, so he was captain. He was captain of Penrith when he when he was twenty Is.
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Speaker 3: He the youngest captain ever?
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Speaker 2: Oh?
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Speaker 4: It'd be close times.
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Speaker 1: And then and then he went he sort of bumped around New Town. Then he went to South a successful stint they're not winning colts, but you know the way he played. And then Quinton went into coaching and was reserve go coach at Canterbury. When Wacock got flicked they put him in. He won a competition be Warren in the Grand Final.
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Speaker 5: He's one of my besties. Now you've got to start watching these games from the eighties.
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Speaker 3: That's they're all in bloody black and white chimes. Right year were year born ninety nine? I know, I know, I know what you think.
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Speaker 5: He didn't see the eighty nine Grand Final.
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Speaker 3: Well, no I haven't seen it. I've really now I've rewatched a lot of the Grand Finals. But the small details like that, like I didn't know he went he was captaining at twenty small details that only you well chimes.
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Speaker 1: He's a bit of he's a bit of something for you. We played South Sydney one day and it appeared just recently on they were doing.
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Speaker 4: A tribute to Joey. Of course they fucking were.
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Speaker 1: And and he came on with beat it too good again.
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Speaker 4: Yeah, now we got cove.
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Speaker 3: The other night they had a drink, first time they had a drink.
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Speaker 4: Had a cuddle.
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Speaker 1: It gotter and guss it didn't pick up anyway. It was going to beat our sixty nil. And during the game when we when we got the game out of control, we're when we're hit with hit fifty and whatnot, we're all sort of laying up and we're doing the baby thing because he was born the day before.
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Speaker 5: There you go, there's an I got a question for it. Did you play the Great Game with my business partner, Clinton Schefowsky at Newcastle that day where I think Joey it just invented the spiral bomb? Yes?
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Speaker 1: Do you know the background of that gimet You crushed him? He was the hell of a player, Clinton, He was a very very He got me one of them did well. I'll tell you what happened to chimes.
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Speaker 4: Do you remember.
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Speaker 1: I don't know if you remember this, but when at Newcastle there was no warm up ground and back in those days, you couldn't warm up on the playing ground before him because and I actually agree with that, the first time they wanted the fans to see the teams was when they ran on, you know, So we used to go across the highway and there was a warm up field there, so you had to actually had to you had to wait traffic get across the road in your sprigs and in our sprigs and anyway. The opposition players always say that when they were going across sometimes the traffic would speed up. This certain day, Brian Smith was coaching Paramatta and Smith he loved his mind game as he and Clinton went over early and he took our training, our warm up space. So we've walked over and gone fucking cheeky bastards. But what happened was he's going right, He's standing there with Clinton, he's Smithy the coach is putting bombs up to Clinton. Anyway, he drops one in front of us, all.
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Speaker 4: Funck, this is interesting.
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Speaker 1: So me and Andrew actually walk over at ten minutes way and fold our arms and just watch it. And the ball's going up and he's dropped, and anyway, Joey, Joey and Jack will beat this out. But Joey's standing there and he went all day.
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Speaker 5: It crushed him, and I remember the commentators talking and he comes again. He's dropped another way.
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Speaker 3: So Joey would nail on like, yeah, I've seen some bloody footage, and he gives the old technique. He's I don't know if you've watched his docco that he's still running. He's still got the DVD I was over at his other dighties, got the docco that he did the training montage one and he still teaches the kids his technique with.
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Speaker 1: What was unusual these days, he put a torpedo bomb up. Most of the fullbacks have seen a million times, so they know how to diffuse him. But those early days when I jammed them up, they didn't realize the ball is going to swing away and is a Maddie Burton bomb as good as I think, I think for I think, I think the most dangerous bomb that I've ever seen is when Nathan starts nailing those dead ball bombs flat ones. Talking to fullbacks, they say, there are just a complete nightmare when he nails.
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Speaker 3: Him Burton's one, Burton one goes. They just go, there's so much power behind it that if he nails it, it's it's nearly impossible for full backs to get to because it just it just shifts so far.
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Speaker 5: Can you give Cooper a history lesson on John bomb appeared for us?
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Speaker 1: Oh yeah, yeah, Johnny Peard he was the he was the originator of the bomb. That was his own days calling the bomber Johnny Peard who played He played it East and he went to parent Matter and one of the world's best blows.
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Speaker 3: So he actually invented the like nobody'd put up a bomb before him. So what was everyone doing before that? Just kicking it long?
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Speaker 2: Oh?
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Speaker 1: Maybe what they're doing Jack Coop's Cooper back in the old days of the contested scrum.
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Speaker 5: They favorite son, Yeah.
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Speaker 1: My favorite songs Jack Jack stage, and I wanted to call it Jack Stage, but Cooper wouldn't make me. But they just dribble the ball in touch. You just sort of nudge it over the sideline because it was a fifty to fifty bet that you get the ball back. And what used to happen, Coop was if the ball was in your half, your half bet got the feed and the hooker got the loose head. And so teams would oftentimes not go for the long kick. They'd just kick it over the sideline just before the halfway mark so they could have the feed.
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Speaker 3: That's boring. It's like rugby union a little bit.
00:19:51
Speaker 1: Made lots of real changes along the way. I remember when all the changes started to come in, and like I remember, like I grew up in three points for a try. And there was when they invented the sin bin for the first time. Nine only one and originally it was five minutes sin bin, and they said let's go five or ten. Then they went fucking too much controversy, go ten?
00:20:12
Speaker 5: What it used to be two points for a field goal?
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Speaker 4: Yeah?
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Speaker 3: Really from anywhere? If I kicked a field goal, I kicked one in the Queens and cut one. Take so chimes, let me take you the picture, right it was we were up by forty points and the high pressure and yeah, we actually were. It wasn't to win the game because when I was playing up with the Falcons, we had Ryan Pappenhauser and then Peraps could kick him from anywhere. So if the game was on the line, perhaps should kick it. And there was one game where I just snapped one just just to get an extra point next to the name, and I was just like, may as well have a crack, no pressure mailed it. I've been given the reins a couple of times in a very high pressure situation and literally, I shit, you're not. I kicked it. It actually spiraled and did a torpedo and just rolled out. I couldn't have hit it that good of all.
00:20:55
Speaker 4: I don't need to convince it sold on that.
00:20:58
Speaker 5: How many field goals to kick the field.
00:21:02
Speaker 1: Major semi final, twice in a mag twice in a major semi final times just a.
00:21:06
Speaker 3: Number scenario too many times.
00:21:10
Speaker 1: Me and Andrew had an agreement because Andrew was exposed to all the high pressure of having to take the conversions, you know. So my my job was to take the field goals, and it used to be funny, used to be a technique to it. Used to have to get their chimes and actually start to compartmentalize and think about other things, because if you focus on the field goal, you feel your heart like literally beating in your throat. And so you'd always just send it to a spot and mate kick one the week before to get us into the Grand Final against North and you wouldn't believe. So we beatn Norse that to sixteen on I kicked it against North's.
00:21:48
Speaker 4: Myself fantastic.
00:21:50
Speaker 3: It's repeated anyway.
00:21:51
Speaker 1: So the week so, the week leading up to the Grand Final, I get interviewed by Ray Martin for the News and Ray said, I'm going to give you a scenario to same score again sixteen or with five minutes to go?
00:22:02
Speaker 4: What do you do? I said, I'll call for the ball. Do you kick it? I said, yeah, bloody.
00:22:06
Speaker 1: Eth I do sixteen or five minutes to go, I call the ball, I kick it. Chimes, it's fucking going over like and all of a sudden, the gust of wind blows hits the upright and goes out. Of course it's lose to Andrew becoming that dummy and the hill fucking stole me.
00:22:24
Speaker 4: Fucking stole it. He stole it again?
00:22:26
Speaker 3: Can I can I ask you a quick question, man, because a lot of people in rugby league or no, generally, when that game's on the line, it goes to the best player, right And obviously yeah, and obviously Joey didn't take that reins like it's got taken by you. How did that? I know you said that conversation before. But did Joey ever get because players can get jealous oftentimes where other players will take the moment. Was there ever any arguments.
00:22:52
Speaker 1: When we go down the Parkers kids, he'd taken versions and I'd take field goals.
00:22:58
Speaker 3: Okay, So there was never ever like, Maddie, get out of the way, I want to take it. Because a lot of halves actually struggle with that now where the left side half wants to take it because he wants that moment, the right side half wants to take it.
00:23:10
Speaker 1: We never played left and right halves either. It was a completely different system.
00:23:13
Speaker 4: But no, that was the algorithment.
00:23:15
Speaker 1: Anyway, enough about million my success chimes. What were the circumstances that led you to management?
00:23:25
Speaker 5: Yeah, it was about ninety ninety three.
00:23:29
Speaker 4: Yeah.
00:23:31
Speaker 5: At the paper, you put in for an upgrade, so they have gradings, different grade urns. A grade was the top and you do your get etch it. Then you become a D grade journalist. And I'd put in for an upgrade and they knocked me back, and I was. It was a bit disappointed, you know, but I was a bit of a plot, a bit of a tribe, and I was never Journalism was different back then. I probably didn't drink at the pub for the bosses as much as I should have. I would have probably got more money. So when I said to the boss, I said, I said, I'd like to take mys had nine weeks holidays. He said, oh, we can't speak you mate, you can't take your holidays. I said, but you give me more money, you won't let me take my holidys. This is my first negotiation, this one. I said, I think i'll quit. He said, off you go. Really, I said, I'm serious.
00:24:20
Speaker 2: I leave.
00:24:20
Speaker 5: He said, yeah, see you later and I quit. I said I'm quitting and I quit and Buzz actually helped me get a job at Rugby League Week and I was employed within a week. Norm Taska there gave me a job. It was the best job I ever had.
00:24:34
Speaker 4: I loved it.
00:24:36
Speaker 5: Yeah, it was great, good people, a lot of fun. And I became a senior writer. I was allowed to do my own thing. And yeah, that was my first negotiation from one.
00:24:47
Speaker 3: And at what point did you go, I want to start playing management.
00:24:50
Speaker 5: Well I got a random call from Keith Blackett, who was from Bathurst, and there was one Monday morning the phone rang and he said, that's Gilson said, ye it is. He said, my name's Keith Blackett. I'm from Bathurst. Paramount want to sign me. I'm looking for a manager. This is out of the blue. And he said, I heard you're thinking about getting into management. He said, I want you to represent me. I said, Keith, I can't work for the magazine and be a conflict of interest. He said. He said, if you ever heard of Wally Lewis. I said, yeah, I have, I actually know Wally Lewis. He said, well, he said, I'm not sure I'm better than him, but I think I can be as good as him. And I think this is a j who is Anyway, I said, Keith, here's three numbers of three agents and someone will look after him. Give him a ring and good luck. So I gave him three. I went to the agents that we gave him three numbers. Anyway, next morning, phone rings Keithy Blakett again. He said, it's Keith Blakett. He said, those three agents. One didn't answer, and one said he wouldn't help me. One called me a Neville. He said, I've got a meeting that at midday. I need someone to help me. And I said, Keith, I can't do it. And Keithy Black, who became a real good mate, was a character, and he started screaming down the phone. My life's on the line, my career is on the line. No one wants to help me. You know, this is my big chance and no one. I said, all right, Keith, I'll come and help you. I went out of paramatter and met Dennis Fitzgerald there and I knew Dennis and he was kind enough to give me an audience and we spoke about doing a deal and Dennis said, how many players you got? Tolim was going to management? I said this blake. He rang me yesterday. Anyway, went back to the office, walked in the Edders office. I said, I'm resigning. I've been out of paramatter, but not on official business, been out there for myself. He said, what are you talking about. I wasn't going to manage footballers. He said, how many you guys? I said, oh, by cook Keith Blackett. He said, oh, I said Keith Blackett. I said, he's from Bathist. He said, what are you talking about? Is I'm going to manage footballers?
00:26:51
Speaker 2: Mate?
00:26:51
Speaker 5: I need to resign and he said, off you go.
00:26:57
Speaker 3: Twelve months old and then who's your first? Big fish?
00:27:01
Speaker 1: Like could say right there, because if someone had a manager, like in the early nineties, people were like fuck.
00:27:08
Speaker 5: There was only about four agentsy around, but no one ever thought about it. I think Wayne Beavis was one of the originals. There was a few around that time, and Richard Fiske was doing some and Brian Welsh was doing some helping et and those sort of blacks. But you only the real big fish.
00:27:27
Speaker 3: Had someone and have to keep back at How quickly did you start to would your portfolio.
00:27:31
Speaker 5: With me a week? Mate?
00:27:32
Speaker 4: Oh?
00:27:32
Speaker 3: Really?
00:27:33
Speaker 4: No?
00:27:33
Speaker 5: I signed Laurie Daily a week later. No way, and he was the best player, arguably the best player in the world at the time.
00:27:39
Speaker 3: How did that? How did that come about?
00:27:40
Speaker 5: So I knew I needed some players, So I went to North Sydney avel that camera playing Norse and went across the Percy's after the game. Might have even gone across at a half time, I can't remember. And I bumped into lights and Rafford had put a snippet in the paper that I was going into management and mentioned Keithy black and loss come up and he said, he said, how's Keithy Blackett guard? I said, oh, terrific, because people have been gigging me all week. What's this article went in? And he said, do you want to manage me? And I said, Laurie, I can't. I can't do this. I can't handle the pis date you know. He said, I haven't got anyone. He said, if you want to do it, and I knew reasonably well, because I used to go and cover Cambra games when they started. You know, he said, love you to do it, and I said, let's give buzz a ring, let's get it in the paper, and they reported and then the phone started.
00:28:31
Speaker 3: Ringing everyone since as soon as Laurie signed it was like it.
00:28:35
Speaker 5: Was a big leg up for me. Massive And then.
00:28:39
Speaker 3: Back then, percentage wise of contracts, what did managers get.
00:28:45
Speaker 5: Yeah, yeah, it would have.
00:28:46
Speaker 3: Been so similar to what they are now.
00:28:49
Speaker 5: And let's not forget it's tax deductible. Very important to remember that two words, tax deduction.
00:28:56
Speaker 3: What manager for his?
00:28:57
Speaker 5: Of course, haven't you been claiming yours?
00:28:59
Speaker 2: No?
00:29:00
Speaker 3: Really, Jesus, I should be doing that.
00:29:06
Speaker 1: There, so chimes and you talk about good timing, you get Lorry and you started a few other blokes, of course, which we'll push forward to this because I imagine the story is super league Like I tried to explain it to these two blokes and their mates about what it was like.
00:29:24
Speaker 4: It was fucking.
00:29:25
Speaker 5: Chaos, manness, absolute manners, and I got caught probably in the Eiger storm. I looked after Adam Ritzon, who at the time I think it was eighteen, playing first grade debut at sixteen in the front row.
00:29:38
Speaker 3: Who was Adam Ritson playing for them?
00:29:41
Speaker 5: So he was, well, what happened was the best of my recollection. I've been on the drink. It was a Friday night common theme for keeps cropping up. Cronella were playing in Perth and I'm pretty sure I was out or I turned in early that height and the phone was turned down and I got up for a weir at about one in the morning and my answering machine had lit up like Christmas tree. So I played it and first message was Adam Ritson saying, Chimes, I'm in Perth. They're trying to sign me. Give me a ring, and I thought he's a jou. And then the second was him again. He said, Chimes, just give me a check for twenty five hours and the boys are going on the casino. Can I cash it? And I'm thinking, oh, this is a jew And then Shane Richardson was the third message. He said, mate, we've just all signed with Super League, so this would have happened after the game. It's about ten ten secrecy, Yeah, he said, we're just all signed. He said, Rideau signed, but he's insisted that you tick off on it before we can rubber stamp the contract. So ride because he couldn't get me, insisted they write a clause in that if I wasn't happy with the deal, he could tear it up.
00:30:55
Speaker 4: Just clever, young fella.
00:30:56
Speaker 5: Unbelievable lordie for a young blake. Yeah. Well, I got out of Adam, I think the next morning, and they flew back and I got out of his parents. We met at the airport. They said to me, what what's going on? I said, I haven't got a clue. I don't know. I don't know what to do. But he's got this escape clause, so let's let me find out what's happening. And that that morning James Packer rang me and he said, oh made He said, you don't know me. He said, but my name's James Packer. And he said, the n the arl about to launch a fight back. And I understand Adam Ritson has this clause to get out. I might have run carry or something and told him and he said, I need to meet you. I need to meet you. So we end up going to see him the next day and the deal he got was probably three or four times what Super League had offered. But by putting that clause and he gave himself the freedom to look at both sides.
00:31:54
Speaker 3: And how did you handle that, like, did you push back, did you use that clause a little bit as leverage to getting more money, or did.
00:32:02
Speaker 5: Actually put a deadline on him. So they basically said that if if he doesn't accept that deal, he had to return the check to News Limited by I think it was five or six o'clock on the Sunday night. So I had to ring one of the News Limited chiefs and tell him that Adam was going to go to the r L. And I guess not so much the threat but the pressure of if he's not going to sign there was no and you talk to them, but come back. It was more or less you talk to them and don't want to sign with this. We want our money back. So I told him check. He said, well, he's gone to the RL and I think he's one of the first players to sign with the r L. And he said, oh, you better drop that check back and I said, no, the check's already there made it's sitting at reception waiting for me. I think that might have got a bit of a hate on me at the time, because I found myself in the middle of this war defending my clent. I ain't got him a lot more money. He was very happy and I think they weren't expecting pushback at the time.
00:33:07
Speaker 1: It's amazing when you think about that, Chimes. It would never fly now because I suppose you know footballers at the time, we're no. Youve to know as.
00:33:21
Speaker 4: Legal matters and whatnot.
00:33:22
Speaker 1: But it's incredible to think that to be taken to a room you can't speak to anybody, to speak to your agents, here's the contract. And I remember when when we signed for the Arl, the Super League would come to myself and Andrew and said, mate, you've signed under duress. You didn't have a manager there, et cetera, et cetera. But yeah, how so, Chimes, I'm not going to ask you which way you land but who did you have? Were you able to deal with both organizations?
00:33:51
Speaker 5: Probably the majority of my players at the time of probably playing for RL ALIGNE club was the Roosters or Souse or Manly Parent matter, those sort of clubs, So you sort of landed where you landed. I did a few with Super League, but not as many as there I was working with Wayne Beavis and CMA but at the time, and they had more players than I did, so I guess through relationships. John Ribo has gone on records saying we should have signed the agents that very smart. Yeah, at least get them, get them on, get them on the payroll. There was some sort of divide or.
00:34:41
Speaker 3: Can I ask your chimes of all the players that you managed, because your managed obviously you had Lori Daily and I imagine a lot of other big names. The deals that you got done. You have to say the amount, but we know how much money came into the game when this happened. A lot of players were getting overs huge contracts. Which one of your players got the biggest payday?
00:35:00
Speaker 5: I didn't have Steve Edman, He's on record as the best.
00:35:02
Speaker 4: That was amazing.
00:35:04
Speaker 3: Steve.
00:35:05
Speaker 1: He was all main player who at the back end, who become a journeyman of sorts, thing around a lot of clubs, but cowboys, and it was well known that it was just about to hang the boots upon yea.
00:35:16
Speaker 5: And didn't they mistake him for someone else?
00:35:18
Speaker 1: They went in there and and then signed a big deal with the Super League just cashed in.
00:35:26
Speaker 5: Well, I think they mistook him for for like all high profile yeah, younger, fitter, faster playing because it was just madness because there was lawyers signing people. They didn't have the troops to sign once. They thought once they had Canella on board and I think Camera Pith Bulldogs, they thought everyone had just filed. And then when the fight back was on, you know, they were sending lawyers out to talk to agents about stuff they didn't even know about. So I took Biggie Butney and to see News Limited. I remember the lawyer saying to me, and Mick was there sitting with me. He said, we're talking about stuffing and I said, oh, made a comment, you know, I'm not sure we can trust you, pointing at me and mix. Mick said, what do you mean? He said, oh, you know, I think he's with the other side. You know, we're trying to get you over to outside, not with any side. And mixed it up and he said, we're going mate. I said, what he said? If he doesn't trust you? He said, I don't trust him. We're going. We left.
00:36:34
Speaker 2: Wow.
00:36:34
Speaker 1: True story was what was the first the first meeting you sat in all the first well, you said, Adam Richmond, but the first one you sat there and the super League or the RL offered one of your clients something and you thought yourself fucking hell.
00:36:49
Speaker 5: Like, yeah, the Redeau one was was off the charts because I knew what offer A was and I knew how much sauce had been put on the like it was. Yeah, as I said, probably four times great.
00:37:04
Speaker 4: So chimes. What would happen then?
00:37:06
Speaker 1: Right to give the boys and people who didn't live through it an understanding. So what would happen is Penrith went went to the Super League, but Freddie signed for the RL. So Freddie Nurse to find another club. So with Adam Ritson Cornelly out of the Super League, so you're going to find him another club eventually it's PARAMOUNTA. But how would that next negotiation go?
00:37:26
Speaker 5: Yeah, the Paramount one worked well. The RL basically owned him and they didn't want to direct him to a club. Then we're going to say you have to play at this club. Paramounter one worked well because I think we had a meeting and I think about four or five high profile blokes went together. I think it was McCracken, Jason Smith, Riudeau Pay teen pay, I think Gary Freeman was Gary Freeman out there at the time.
00:37:49
Speaker 4: Whiz. Yeah.
00:37:50
Speaker 1: Whiz was at Penrith and then went across in Paramatta.
00:37:52
Speaker 5: Yes, so when they went as a block, it wasn't wasn't that difficult. So that sort of made a lot easy.
00:38:00
Speaker 3: And who can you super League, don't you? I do? I like I like hearing the stories from the players that you managed. There some who were the biggest names that you had at that time.
00:38:12
Speaker 5: When I went, I had place like Craig's Salvatory, Greek Florimo, I had Robbie Kerns and Ritz and a few of the Saints Blacks, I took the Air and Jiff Hardy guys like that. But yeah, they were all established first.
00:38:33
Speaker 1: Still, Lorrie still had so lot you So the Canberra Boys, is my understanding.
00:38:38
Speaker 5: They met, they signed in North Queensland.
00:38:43
Speaker 4: Yeah.
00:38:43
Speaker 1: So when he went back to you and told you the figures.
00:38:46
Speaker 5: Cheering for him, Yeah, and I was never some of the guys might have stuck the head out of the fence to see what they are. Lorry committed to Super League primarily because his club did and his teammates did. And I think any normal person that'd be the first thing. I want to stay with the boys, that's right. Yeah, plus power club to championship club five years. Yeah, yeah, that was the thing with Newcastle. Will decided which way we're going to go and undern we become the basically the tager War at the end. Maybe were a bunch of hillbillies. We had no idea that position. We got ourselves into it made I had the great Nathan Barnes the Knights at the time. He ended up at paramatter yep and look, I can't tell you what he was on, but he would have got three or four times more thanks to Super League. But I remember the night Gus, Wayne Beaves myself drove up, which was Gus addressed the players. That was unbelievable in the grand stand.
00:39:52
Speaker 1: It was it was the grounds. The grand stand had a club within it. It was pretty modest so to join. But boys, he got up, Gus and myself and Andrew are.
00:40:02
Speaker 5: Going to sign on the Super League Churchillian speech of all time, wasn't it?
00:40:07
Speaker 1: And he got up and knowing that we're all young footyheads, Gus got up and just went rudder. Firstly off the top, who he wants to sign for.
00:40:16
Speaker 5: The r L.
00:40:18
Speaker 4: Of course Gus was there.
00:40:19
Speaker 1: Almost every hend went up except Andrew and mine truth he signed with the ARL and then Gus did this speech and just was talking about the Super League and talking with the AARL traditions of the game, and he just stared hole and Andrew and I and I remember the one he just went.
00:40:40
Speaker 4: What he said that really hit us?
00:40:41
Speaker 1: He said, some of my favorite players of all time Bradley Clyde, Lorie Daily, and Ricky Stewart. He breaks my heart to know that those blakes will never play rugby league ever again.
00:40:56
Speaker 4: And we went fuck.
00:40:59
Speaker 1: You could almost hear our bowels exclaimed, you know, and then he goes all right out And then what happened boys, was he goes, well, what do you want to do? And we also we want to stay together? Bad timing. Our CEO stuck his head around the corner. Now they wanted to go to Super League, but they didn't have the guts to tell us. He stuck his head around the corner. Gus saw him and goes, hey, you who are you? He goes, I'm the CEO. Fantastic, come in here, What do you want to do?
00:41:27
Speaker 4: Where are you going to go?
00:41:28
Speaker 1: He goes, oh, in panic, went we'll go with other side. The players want to go, he goes there you go, boys, right, let's go and have a yarn?
00:41:36
Speaker 4: And it went like that.
00:41:38
Speaker 3: It was digitiable during that time chimes. Obviously a lot of managers would have made a lot of money given how big the contracts were. Did you ever try to like poke other plate like sign? Did you did? Managers were managers on a sign experiment. They were trying to sign a lot of players. Do the deals for.
00:41:56
Speaker 5: Really have time? You picked up a lot of clients because the ring and got a manager? Can you go in and represent me at either one? So picked up a fair few, but I didn't have time to get about Pat. Yeah.
00:42:08
Speaker 3: Did you ever try to Matthew and Andrew? Did you ever have a crack trying to get No?
00:42:13
Speaker 5: Never did. And I knew the boys a little bit, and we obviously greater mates now, but it wasn't It wasn't me. I was sort of still starting out and still a bit green, and I when I started, I didn't have a clue what I was doing. I don't have a clue, you know. I flung my way into it and got you know what I know today compared to back then, chalk and cheese. But I don't think I've got to manage Maddie John's mate. He was absolute lunatic.
00:42:47
Speaker 1: Oh I disagree, you know what that you said before There was only half a dozen managers at the time, but I tell what the explosion and player managers where super happened. Some of them basically started a business overnight. And when when Super League first broke, we're in a We're at the Paramouna Park Royal and none of us had signed. No one really knew what it was about, but made all managers ring in the hotel room or managers knocking on the door trying to kick the door down. My manager basically rang us and said, mate, I'm down in the Paramount North Paramatta McDonald's come and sign.
00:43:20
Speaker 4: It was just chaos.
00:43:21
Speaker 3: I can imagine like from a manager's and a young manager's point of view who's wanted to start out, that would have been that's almost a lot of like that's if you ever had time to go into management.
00:43:31
Speaker 1: Did you lose friends?
00:43:32
Speaker 5: No? I didn't lose it, lose a friend. Thank goodness. We could have done it so much better. The game would have would have thrived. There's a lot agreed, a lot of put yourself first with a going to merge two clubs, but this two CEO is only one's going to survive, so they're not They're not going to want to do it. It's two coaches, only one's going to survive.
00:43:57
Speaker 1: Some of the mergers are talking about at the time they were going well.
00:44:01
Speaker 4: There was a school of thought, will put Roosters.
00:44:03
Speaker 1: In South together as a club? What the game would have lost? There was talks to George and Cronulla combining. There was all sorts of conversation. May paramount of penrithmember that talking about one big super super western Sydney soon.
00:44:18
Speaker 3: Can I ask you because you also now he was I don't think he was involved in this back in the day, but Matthew's great co host, Brian Fletcher, you manage him now.
00:44:28
Speaker 5: I did. I did Brian super League, you know. I think he got about and don't create me. I think he had about fifteen k.
00:44:34
Speaker 1: He was only a fourteen thousand too much.
00:44:38
Speaker 5: So was he at Roosters then he was mate? He hadn't played first No, I think I don't think he'd played yet. Yeah, yeah, well you can check, but I don't think he'd played it. I think he was just under the surface.
00:44:49
Speaker 3: Because how do you handle that? Obviously, people see Fletch now and they got they love his personality. He's loose, fun, charismatic. But as a rugby league player, if you have a personality like that, you can often get times in trouble. I imagine Fletch would have got in trouble quite a bit.
00:45:02
Speaker 5: Well, I've told some of the album. I'm writing a book. I put a book together and the publisher said you need about thirty chapters, and I've got twenty eight on flick.
00:45:13
Speaker 1: How many times did he like and he talks to me all the time publicly? How many times was he sacked from the roosters?
00:45:19
Speaker 5: Lots? Yeah, lots and fined and revived and brought back and sacked.
00:45:25
Speaker 1: And Robby broke the mascot sleep.
00:45:27
Speaker 5: Yeah, yeah, he looked. Brian did a lot of naughty things. He's a champion fella and he's never changed and that's one of the things I like the most about him. And he sticks with his mates that he grew up with. You know, he's the same old Fletch, but he was very naughty.
00:45:45
Speaker 3: And do you think if you put Brian Fletcher back then in today's game, how long do you think it would have lasted before it was.
00:45:52
Speaker 5: Lucky to last? Back then, he wouldn't. He wouldn't last long in today's game social media, and that would have been in jail. Yeah, I don't know where he'd be.
00:45:59
Speaker 4: Because he tells me story.
00:46:00
Speaker 1: There was the one with There was one story I'm not going to talk about.
00:46:05
Speaker 4: There was the Rocky the rooster.
00:46:06
Speaker 1: He pushed him off stage and he did a compound fracture of his leag Then he said there was another one where there was some bloke. There was a bit of a malay and he might have jobbed a bloke. And his father was a high.
00:46:17
Speaker 4: Powered lawyer and said who is it?
00:46:19
Speaker 1: He said, no, no, no, we don't know. And they went up and got the rooster's post and.
00:46:23
Speaker 5: Hims cost a few Bob, I think I think what he was in Melbourne once for a game and the boys were sitting in the corridor the rooms up on the floor and they're sitting with their legs stretched out, and and this this staff member who's carrying a tray of drinks or something and flesh. He said it was too good to be true. He said I had to.
00:46:47
Speaker 4: Win.
00:46:47
Speaker 5: I said, y's just two good an opportunities.
00:46:52
Speaker 1: It was because he was I think the second time he was kicked it well the Rocky Restaurants where he went in and met with Politis and Arthur Arthur Boutson. But Arthur said, it's a funny scene I've ever heard, and Nick wasn't as happy.
00:47:05
Speaker 4: He sacked him.
00:47:06
Speaker 1: But he said he was in the wilderness for about twelve months until he run into Gus at like a nightclub.
00:47:12
Speaker 5: Yeah, Gus, I remember, but Fletch was playing. When I first met Fletch, I helped. I managed his I think they're a under seven ins team, under eighteens with a made of mine Dale the Snail. And I said to Brian, I said, you've got some talent. Do you want do you want me to get your start? He said, I want to play for the Roosters. He said, all I want to track sit, Just get me a track sit. I love those Roosters. This is Brian, so got in the tracks. But remember Gus saying to me when he's playing reserve growd. Joey Thomas was the coach. I said, how's he going, Gus? He said, seriously? He said. He played for Australia's Blake I said, you feared in because Fletch had no respect for controlling the ball. He wanted off every plane. Sometimes it was brilliant and sometimes create an error. And Gus said, if we can just get that little bit of shit out of him, I'm telling you you'll play for Australia.
00:48:05
Speaker 1: Are there many blokes Chimes that you've gone like that where people have reached out to your families and you've gone and sat down and went away and gone, no, I can't do it.
00:48:14
Speaker 5: It happens a bit, but I'll tell them that. You know, I don't think we're the right fit. You know, did you push your sons your boys? Were you one of those parents who.
00:48:27
Speaker 3: Yeah, he pushed us like we didn't even want to plays and yeah we want.
00:48:31
Speaker 1: You can tell I begged him not to made that. I said, make remember one saying to Jack, why don't you when do you go to American and get.
00:48:38
Speaker 4: A college education or something.
00:48:40
Speaker 3: Like that, because you seem like the kind of manager Chimes who's a kind of laid back like you don't seem like the kind of one that's going to if they need to kick up the ass, you'll you'll give them that. But you Ultimately, I've.
00:48:53
Speaker 5: Seen I've seen like everything, like absolutely everything. I've driven blokes to drug rehabs and booked them in and checked him in and picked them up, and you know, you drink drivers and your yeah, players go to jail, yeah out of prison. I've seen everything, and it's yeah, I don't know. There's no handbook for how you cope with it. I can try and give him a kick up the ass.
00:49:25
Speaker 3: Is that hard when you have to take like players, because imagine you get quite emotionally invested in the players, right, Is that heartbreaking when you see him go down the wrong path?
00:49:33
Speaker 5: Yeah, sometimes, especially when you're closer to obviously you get closer to some than others and their fans. Jared Mullen is a good example. Yeah, I used to stay at the Mullein's place when I'd go up to newcast for the game, so very close, and that was he's doing okay, Now he's doing well, But that was really tough time.
00:49:52
Speaker 1: Really very difficult time. I remember he used to carry the weight of expectations. It was like a like an anvil on his He was always weighed down by that.
00:50:03
Speaker 5: Yeah, there's lots of stories and there's lots we don't know about like you know what the pressure is like to play an RL or people have expectations of me in that. There's plenty of pressure.
00:50:15
Speaker 1: It's high pressure the industry, so you're in at the moment. It's funny you were talking before about the newspapers and journalism. Blake was saying to me recently, said I can't believe how feisty it is between like News and Sydney Morning Herald. I said, Now, I said, you should assume what it was like twenty five years ago.
00:50:38
Speaker 4: It was like fierce, wasn't it.
00:50:41
Speaker 5: You'd get a rocket if you missed the story.
00:50:43
Speaker 2: You know.
00:50:44
Speaker 5: When I started, there was the mirror and the sun, you know, and if you missed someone scooped you you get a kick up the pants.
00:50:52
Speaker 4: Vice versa.
00:50:53
Speaker 1: If things are sort of cool a little bit there, and it's a little bit more civilized on the other side, player management fucking hell at the month, it's like the wild West. Now.
00:51:04
Speaker 5: Oh, there's about one hundred and fifty agents now, you know, and the only way to get experiences to have players and learn learn your craft, I think, and it's probably there's probably a good thirty of one hundred and fifty wouldn't have an NRL player. Yeah, maybe as many as half. And I don't know whether they see it as a badge of honor to say I'm a player agent because you get a ticket to the foot each week you can get in.
00:51:34
Speaker 1: Do you think they're signing from school boy carnivals? Stop pil them and just hope for the best.
00:51:39
Speaker 5: But the funny thing is that parents parents will still sign sign with them.
00:51:44
Speaker 4: Yeah, I guess some of them.
00:51:46
Speaker 1: They'll turn up at school week carnivals with sunglasses and shoes's and all.
00:51:50
Speaker 5: That sort of stuff. If I had a son, not talking about you all right, if you wish who was an actor or an aspiring actor or singer, you'd want to do your homework before you sign with an agent. Who's going to you know, you want to know if this blake nails all the right people in the right lain ways to get you to the opportunities.
00:52:14
Speaker 4: You know.
00:52:15
Speaker 5: Rugby league's a little bit different, mate, they I guess because people are scrambling and the first person I think your son's really good at one to sign, Well, here we go. Yeah, we're about run our way to make a lot of money.
00:52:28
Speaker 1: Good working class, blue collar people probably vulnerable to people coming in and yeah, super League spoke about Super League Chimes, what about Super League two point zero? As far as competition, signings, money, Perth and P and G.
00:52:44
Speaker 5: Yeah, going to be a tough slog, yeah, but I think we'll get there. Per stage one, I don't think players are genuinely going to want to go because it's how their comfort zone. And there's players with kids and families, and Polynesians have big families, you know, that travel together and live live together. So you know, I think if you put said hands up, who wants to go to Perth and say I'm going to that might be the bloke who's thirty three or thirty four or thirty five or looking for big payday. You know, because players are comfortable with a twelve million dollar cap, to get a guy out of his club to go to Perth, they're going to have to offer him a quarter of a million dollars more.
00:53:32
Speaker 1: I was going to say that if you're managing me and my club offers me eight hundred thousand dollars, so how much will Perth have to stump up?
00:53:41
Speaker 4: Do you think too?
00:53:43
Speaker 5: I'd have to be another two hundred and fifty thousand, but that you know, pay and players more doesn't make them better. What they're going to have to do is they're going to have to recruit some up. They need some senior players, I need some leaders, and they need really talented kids. So like red clar did with Katawa, they're going to have to go and identify the best young kids that are just under the surface that in twelve months or eighteen months are going to charge through.
00:54:10
Speaker 1: Have you had any of your players bump you and say, charms, I'm interested here in Bears yet.
00:54:18
Speaker 5: A couple of senior, more experienced players may have. But the trick with Perth is they're going to get used in the marketplace by all the agents to leverage leverage. Yeah, so you know that they've basically got to get to a stage where we would like to talk to your player, but we'd like him to say he's genuine about coming. If we're going to fly him over, we'd like to know that we're a chance, and you've got to accept he may not want to go in the long run, because Redcliffe missed a lot of a lot of targets, like a lot, Yeah, there going to miss a lot.
00:54:54
Speaker 1: Yeah, without the travel the next one, the really big.
00:54:59
Speaker 5: One, the long one over there. You wouldn't want to walk it.
00:55:01
Speaker 3: No, no, no, Little Matt Brockman did he run it over and again every week. Mate.
00:55:08
Speaker 1: So chime's okay, P and G. Which is not just going to be a regular challenge. It's going to be it's going to be as far as the country is concerned, cleaning up the country, health safety, all those things. But tax free dollars, what do you anticipate?
00:55:22
Speaker 5: Just back to Perth. Quickly, they'll get there. It'll be a tough slog, but they'll get there. I think, you know, fast forward ten years Perth will be doing okay, tax free money. I like the sound of that.
00:55:32
Speaker 3: Yeah, how do you get a head coaching? Old time?
00:55:36
Speaker 5: Mate? I would want a letter from the Prime Minister in Australia. But you remember, if the rules change and he's not along the Prime minister and you've got that letter, that you might be to wipe your bum with that. Yeah, that letter.
00:55:50
Speaker 3: So there, so there is a possibility that that money that and they are saying that now it's going to be tax free, that in three or four years it might not be tax free. Coming back to some of the players.
00:56:00
Speaker 5: What absolute guarantee if you've got you'd want, you'd want to be more than comfortable that your money is tax free. It's easy. It's tax free. That's the easy bit. But you need accountants, lawyers. Yeah, a stamp from the ATL stamp from the Prime Minister saying you won't pay any tings.
00:56:19
Speaker 3: But also, like from a recruitment point of view, it's very enticing to get a player who's at the top, top of his powers. They might be able to pay him, you know, one point five million dollars tax free. Players might go over there for two years. Can you ever see well in the next ten years players going over and you know, like a like a Harry Grant staying like at a club for eight years where you need that consistency to build attract other players, but to also get like combinations and things like that. Because it seems like it's going to be tough. Yeah, it seems like boys are just going to get over for.
00:56:53
Speaker 5: I don't want to knock it because I think it's exciting and we can pull it off for be fantastic, But it's going to be a tough loot.
00:57:00
Speaker 1: It's got the propensity to be our West Indies, regul League West Indies, you know, and bring all that excitement and with it. But there's what's interesting about the chimes, as you said about on the government level, is that we saw Peter Landy's at the White House with sleeping Joe Biden, without Anthony Alvi Benizi and I've got no doubt at all that was involved with as far as P and G and greater footprint in the Pacific. Well, the change of government now in the US and it seems like this the new regime is not as tight to Australia as we've normally had in the previous hundred, one hundred and fifty years. I mean that is going to be you know. And again on top of that, if something happens and we have a change of government here, who knows.
00:57:43
Speaker 5: Look, I'm I'm a PV fan fan and like everything he touches turns to go and there's no doubt we wouldn't be anywhere near where we are without him. So we'll get there. But it's it's going to be, it's going to be a challenge.
00:58:01
Speaker 1: In my lifetime in rugby league, I've never seen the game better than it is right now. It has little problems here and there, But as far as the way I think the game's been marketed televised, of course, play that play the standard of football. The way it's been administrated, I mean PVL has been I thought I would never ever see better administrators for the game than Arthurs and Quail, But this bloke might just be another level.
00:58:28
Speaker 5: He thinks outside the box and always coming up with ideas and look at participation numbers and crowd numbers and viewers and that sort of stuff, and the products, the outstanding the players are unbelievable. The game's indestructible times.
00:58:44
Speaker 3: Do you see, like given back to P and G and Perth, you know a lot of the juniors better than we would how much talent's actually out there? Do you think it's possible that there's enough juniors to actually fill those sides? Because when the state of Origin comes around, people say, oh the callity of the game, but the best players out have really dropped.
00:59:04
Speaker 5: It's an argument you can make because the comps diluted when Origin is on, but the undercarriage is it's as competitive as I've ever seen it. Some really good kids, obviously National school boys this year in a cross Harbor and the opens it's an outstanding talent. There's some superstar kids didn't even make the sign. Well, so there's there is, and then there's the Polynesian component, which just keeps getting stronger and stronger and stronger. New Zealand's developing players and they've got they've got an association I think with IPS, which now and so the game is building, and then you've got taken.
00:59:41
Speaker 3: And you've got ties of Rubby Union, right, can I ask you, because we've seen Mark and Wogan need to come over. He's been playing great, You've seen Joseph to elite, you go to that code and been killing it. Is there a player over in that Rubber Union code that you look at for a Perth or a P and G and go this plot you could sign.
00:59:59
Speaker 5: I think Max Jorgenson is as good as young players I've ever represented. I think he's exceptionally good. Hasn't scratched the surface yet, played league as a junior, and yeah, one day he's ticking the boxes in rugby and enjoying the journey and very passionate about it. One day I'd be surprised if he if he didn't.
01:00:24
Speaker 1: Yeah, really, Yeah, particularly the way Marks. You know, he's been a revelation. I never thought Mark.
01:00:30
Speaker 5: Would go as surprised me.
01:00:33
Speaker 1: I saw him in the Paris Olympics when I was over there playing in the sevens and I don't know whether they were spiding him a little bit, the fact that he just signed with the Roosters but he didn't get a lot of game time.
01:00:41
Speaker 4: But I thought it's going to be a challenge. It's been great, it's funny.
01:00:44
Speaker 1: Just quick you back on Pap New Guinea really quickly, you know, we would hope you don't know. I mean the amount of talent we're soon a Paven New Guinea. How quickly is progressing? Watching last year the junior Kangaroos played like the junior Kowall's up in the drawer, very strong Australian side. There's every chance in twenty years time or thirty years time that P and G could be the new Penis.
01:01:08
Speaker 5: As far as producing, we shouldn't underestimate that they're undercarriage and that they play the game. They're so passionate about the game, so they'll get there. It's just going to be a tough slot. It's going to be hard work.
01:01:19
Speaker 1: Hell, am I going to do this for chimes.
01:01:21
Speaker 3: This podcast or no, we're talking about life.
01:01:28
Speaker 5: Look, I'm enjoying it. So yeah, I'll keep going until until I run out of gas. No plans to.
01:01:36
Speaker 3: Because you've got a lot of players on the books. Now, who's some of your Adam Reynolds, Benny Hart.
01:01:42
Speaker 5: Yeah, so we look after I work with Clinch Sposky, so we co manage our players, but we look after Cam Murray, Ryan Papenhews and Zach Klamak, Josh but finally dang gay guy, Sammy Walker. You know, we've got plenty of high profile good players, and I don't mean to not name them all, but we're really happy. They're all good people, they all work hard, they're all doing really well, and we're very lucky and grateful to do.
01:02:15
Speaker 4: What we do.
01:02:16
Speaker 3: Who's your favorite? If you had to? Okay, let me rephrase that. Counder your head. You can only manage one of everyone on your roster.
01:02:27
Speaker 4: Who is it?
01:02:29
Speaker 5: I can't answer it. I can't answer it really because someone will ring me up this that I was your number one. Benny Handle, like your kids, you love them all the same.
01:02:42
Speaker 1: Sure, Good on you, mate, appreciate you. Good on you, mate, and yours well, thanks mate, Thanks congratulations on the podcast, well mats fantastic, thanks many good on