Surreal feeling as Warriors staff go on leave
The Warriors have closed up shop with staff all taking leave as the NRL club hunkers down for the four-week shutdown caused by the coronavirus pandemic.
But as this takes place, Warriors chief executive Cameron George has to ensure the club is still afloat when this is all over.
‘‘The players are home, they’re in isolation following all protocols that have been provided to them,’’ George said.
‘‘They have been reunited with their families and we’ve just shut the office, so it’s quite a surreal feeling.’’
No one knows when the NRL will return to action or if the lockdown in New Zealand lasts more than four weeks, which makes things hard for George, as well as the club’s chairman Rob Croot and owner Mark Robinson.
‘‘I’m working through a number of different scenarios,’’
George said. ‘‘It’s very sad and hard for everyone at the moment and I’m doing my absolute best to protect people and their families as best I can.’’
If the Warriors were still jointly owned by the Carlaw Heritage Trust through Auckland Rugby League, or if the trust had bought the club outright last year, the chances of getting through this would have been greatly reduced, as it would have put huge financial pressure on the Trust and the Auckland clubs.
But with Croot and Robinson from Autex Industries involved decision making during these tough times is more straight forward.
‘‘They have been unbelievably supportive of everyone,’’ George said of Croot and Robinson.
‘‘They’ve always been available and haven’t wavered with their support.
All 16 NRL clubs will find it tough to get through the competition being suspended and Australian media have suggested that the three clubs in the greatest danger of going bust are the Warriors, Titans and Sea Eagles.
The Warriors will look for government support, along with other New Zealand sporting organisations, and George says it’s not surprising that people on the other side of the Tasman are talking up the Warriors’ danger of going bust.
‘‘That’s always a convenient statement,’’ he said. ‘‘Whenever there is pressure on, they go straight for the Titans and Warriors.
‘‘It doesn’t worry me and know what we’re doing.’’
Instead of the Warriors and Titans being at the greatest risk, it’s clubs like the Bulldogs, Eels,
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Panthers, Sharks and Wests Tigers who are under the biggest danger, because they’re supported by their leagues clubs, rather than private backers.
They have never had to deal with any financial burden, because they’ve been able to rely on the leagues clubs to bail them out and willing to throw more money at their NRL team to make them successful. But clubs like the Warriors, Titans, Storm and others live and die on spectators coming to games, merchandise sales and other incomes.
But now the leagues clubs are shut, the revenue streams for those clubs will run dry.
For those leagues clubs, they also need to worry about how they deal with all of their other staff as well as the NRL team during this time.
So when adversity strikes the Titans and Warriors are in a better position to get through this than the likes of the Panthers or Bulldogs.