The NRL could be on the verge of an American Dream, a season opener with the potential to make rugby league relevant in the United States. The competition has reportedly revived discussions about staging a historic premiership game between Manly and South Sydney in Los Angeles to open the 2023 campaign. Clubs will be banking on the Hollywood pull power of Rabbitohs owner Russell Crowe and Sea Eagles supporter Hugh Jackman three years after plans in 2019 fell through.
But it is not the first time Australian sports have tried to gain exposure and relevance in the lucrative US market.
First overseas State of Origin
Well, sort of. It was an exhibition match following the already-completed 1987 series, in Long Beach, California. Three weeks after Queensland retained the shield, New South Wales beat them 30-18 at Veterans Memorial Stadium. While the result did not count towards the series, it is included in the player appearance and records calculations. In terms of publicity, though, it barely made a squeak, with the crowd figure contested but reported to be around 12,000. To date it is the only Origin game taken to the US.
Viva Las Vegas?
The NRL’s Magic Round, which features all eight games at the same venue, started in 2019 and has been played in Brisbane every year since. However it is seen by the game’s administrators as a concept easily transferred abroad, with a view to replicating the festival-like atmosphere of the UK Super League’s Magic Round, with Los Angeles and even Las Vegas floated as prospective venues.
In 2019 the NRL’s then chief executive Todd Greenberg signposted bold plans, calling Magic Round “a product that lends itself to emerging markets”. “We’d absolutely look at taking it overseas,” he told the Sydney Morning Herald.
VFL’s first foray
Australian rules has long attempted to promote the game outside of its heartlands, as far back as the first and second world wars , during which Australian troops organised exhibition and scratch matches in Europe and Asia. Some years later, in 1960, Melbourne and Geelong tried to crack the American market by playing the first exhibition matches in major US cities in Honolulu and San Francisco respectively. The games events drew little attention and were attended by only 1,500 and 3,500 spectators.
The hard Hogan sell
In 1987, Perth magnate Errol Marron hatched an audacious plan to base a VFL expansion club in Los Angeles – named the Los Angeles Crocodiles to piggyback on the huge international popularity of Crocodile Dundee and Paul Hogan.
The radical proposal – an attempt to save the floundering competition – involved the teams playing four blocks of three games in Australia with eight teams making the trip to LA every season, and included the Los Angeles Memorial Coliseum. Despite sponsors and airlines having pledged support and ESPN approached as a broadcaster, VFL chairman Ross Oakley announced the league had rejected the bid.
Still, the VFL scheduled more exhibition games in 1988 (Collingwood v Geelong, Miami), 1989 (Essendon v Hawthorn, Miami) and 1990 (Melbourne v West Coast, Portland). The latter, directly after the VFL was rebranded as the AFL, generated the most interest.
Essendon’s California dreamin’
Early in 2020 reports emerged that the Bombers and Greater Western Sydney Giants were planning to play a game for premiership points on the west coast of America. But talks had not progressed past the preliminary stage when the pandemic struck and they were put on ice. Both clubs were reportedly still eager to make it happen though it is unclear when.
If a match does come to fruition it will make the US the third nation beyond Australia to host a game, following Sydney Swans and St Kilda in New Zealand in 2013 and Port Adelaide Power v Gold Coast Suns in China in 2017.
