By Roy Masters
Deep distrust between the NSW and Queensland rugby leagues could escalate to open warfare in 2017, with the battle between the boardrooms rivalling the intensity of State of Origin matches.
The backflip by QRL president Peter Betros, who declared ARLC chair John Grant's position untenable, only to recant two days later and oppose the demand the NRL clubs and the NSWRL for a 130 per cent of the salary cap funding package, was provocative.
Maroon man: Harry Sunderland has a kick during an Australian training session in 1933.Credit: Fairfax Media
But to then make a statement fearing for the future of bush football in NSW was seen as an overt attempt to drive a wedge between the NSWRL and the CRL.
The QRL then boycotted the December 20 meeting where a decision on Grant's future was adjourned to March 1.
Arthur Hennessy.
Yet, like most acrimonies in rugby league, it's happened before and its root causes are money, meddling in each other's domains and officials who don't trust each other.
In the early- to mid-1920s, Queensland, like today, was dominant on the field. After losing 19 consecutive games, Queensland beat NSW 25-9 at the old Sydney Sports Ground (now Allianz Stadium) on September 22, 1922 and subsequently won every series through to 1927.
It was the Maroons first "golden era". Crowds to the interstate games boomed averaging around 25,000 a match.
The venom between the states became entrenched by the 1930s. It disrupted Kangaroo tours, caused so much dysfunction on the Board of Control (the forerunner of the ARL and now the ARLC) that it nearly fell apart. It ruined friendships when NSW purged itself of officials believed to have Queensland sympathies. Horrie Miller (Easts and NSW) and Queensland's Harry Sunderland were the main protagonists.
In terms of modern parallels, it would be unfair to isolate Easts (Roosters) current boss, Nick Politis, as the NSWRL's main man but he is on its board and he's equal to the politicking of the QRL's "The Fox" – Terry Mackenroth – a former Queensland Labor Treasurer whose own colleague, Premier Peter Beattie, once described as a "tough son-of-a bitch".
The hostility between the NSW and Queensland leagues began in 1922 with a civil war erupted between the QRL, where Sunderland was secretary, and the Brisbane Rugby League, now a lower tier competition.
The NSWRL sided with the BRL, akin to Betros' overt attempt to drive a wedge between the NSWRL and the CRL.
Bob Savage, the Balmain delegate of the NSWRFL, flew to Brisbane to settle the dispute but it ended with Savage and Sunderland, the QRL secretary, having "a very frank" and "extremely conflicted" discussion, according to media reports.
The Australian Board of Control (BOC) was created on December 10, 1924 with NSW dominating the board and appointing the chairman - Fred Flowers (NSW and Souths).
NSW's power to elect the chairman has been a source of friction ever since, even though Queensland was given 50 per cent equity in the re-constituted ARL, despite NSW then having the premier rugby league competition in Australia.
When the QRL's John MacDonald succeeded Ken Arthurson as ARL chair in the bitter aftermath of the Super League war, it took court action by the NSWRL to remind Queensland of NSW's constitutional right to appoint the chair. Sydney solicitor Colin Love replaced MacDonald but when Love was poised to become the inaugural chair of the new ARLC, Mackenroth manipulated Brisbane based Grant into the top position.
Queensland's dominance over NSW on the field in the 1920s didn't mean those lucrative gate takings made their way south to pay the BOC's bills and the QRL was told its continuance on the board would have conditions.
The dispute echoes through to today, with one of the critical issues in the game ahead of the March 1 meeting a NSWRL request for equality with the QRL in funding rights from Origin games.
The QRL has been allowed to run all Origin games in Brisbane for a fee, while dispatching whatever profit it deems, after expenses, to the NRL. Compare this with the 2016 dead rubber, played in Sydney, which fell $750,000 short of the NRL's expectations and the NRL deducted it from the NSWRL's budget.
Because the NRL is based in Sydney, all NSWRL's home games are run by NRL staff and profits poured into consolidated revenue. The NRL charges the NSWRL servicing fees for sponsorships the state body has secured.
The NSWRL also seeks a return of its IP rights and, to be fair, expects the same for Queensland.
By the late 1920s, the Sydney media had taken a strongly parochial line with respect to the game on the field, similar to Brisbane's loyal media today.
The Sydney media referred to the Queensland players as "the Basher Gang", while Sunderland mocked NSW players as "squealers" and provoked them further by arguing that Queensland "realise that rugby league is a red-blooded man's game, not made for anaemic to play".
If Australia's coach, Mal Meninga, is the only player to tour four times with the Kangaroos, his fellow Queenslander, Sunderland, set a record as a touring manager, leading three teams overseas.
But the 1929 Kangaroo tour had Arthur Hennessey (NSW and Souths) as coach and the inter-state conflict was so bitter Hennessey kept a secret diary about Sunderland. After the tour, Hennessey shared the diary with BOC secretary, Horrie Miller.
Four years later, NSW campaigned to have Hennessey re-appointed Kangaroo coach but Sunderland opposed him, claiming that Hennessey's "methods and temperament are not conducive to the success and harmony required." NSW retaliated, calling Sunderland a "Little Napoleon".
Although Hitler had only been in power a couple of years, Sydney newspapers used the German dictator to mock Sunderland with stories like "Hitler Sunderland runs the show" and the "Little Dictator must be the big noise". They called Sunderland the "Sensation-Maker-In-Chief".
As the Kangaroos sailed towards England for the 1937 Kangaroo tour - Sunderland's third - Miller cabled co-manager Bob Savage heavily criticising Sunderland. Miller also cabled the English Rugby League asking them not to confide in Sunderland and Savage. When Savage was later shown that cable by the English, he joined with Sunderland, with whom he had a long history of acrimony, against Miller. In a case of "you show me your cable and I'll show you mine', Savage revealed Miller's other cables to his new friend.
At a farewell dinner in England for the Kangaroos, Sunderland read out the Miller cables to all present. He told the media that he might sue for imputations that he and Savage are "tow-headed school-kids, thoroughly irresponsible, reckless of constituted authority, predetermined to have a glorious spree at the Australian League's expense, and lacking even in elementary principles."
He then proceeded to have a spree at the BOC expense, sending a cable to chair Jersey Flegg, saying "Instruct Miller cease cabling. We are managers of Kangaroos, not i dotters and t crossers. Not spending further money on unnecessary cables."
But Sunderland defiantly spent £2,000, diverted from tour funds, to book an extra week in France for the players to sight-see.
Not surprisingly, the players and Savage sided with Sunderland, with Kangaroo captain Wally Prigg confiding that before the tour a leading NSW official told him to "stick with Savage against Sunderland".
Newspapers report that the Kangaroos were "quaffing champagne in Paris in undreamt of quantities." (Papers also noted that there were only four teetotallers in the squad.)
A furious Miller retaliated by diverting £3,000 to the NSWRFL from the tour funds.
(Sixty years later, during the Super League war, the NSWRL exhausted all its $25m reserves fighting Rupert Murdoch, while the QRL spent almost nothing. The QRL's then secretary, Ross Livermore – a man whom one NSW official said, "With Ross, you knew he'd stab you in the front" – probably justified this on the basis the NSWRL had earlier knocked off the 3,000 quid.)
When the 1937 Kangaroos returned, the NSWRL cancelled the "welcome home" greeting in Sydney and a 14-hour BOC meeting subsequently condemned both Miller and Sunderland, together with his new mate, Savage, who was voted off the Management Committee.
Queenslanders also turned on Sunderland, saying he was paid too much as QRL secretary and he left the post in August 1938.
He responded saying, "The chief man is a cheap man at any price" and challenged accusations he was arrogant, declaring, "It was a bad day for fools when modesty was first proclaimed a virtue".
Miller stayed on as NSW and BOC secretary until 1946 when an irregularity of £80 saw him leave in controversial circumstances. His former brother-in-law, Flegg, removed all Miller's photographs from league walls. Miller unsuccessfully tried to start a rebel rugby league competition two years later.
Given the unity today on both the boards of the NSW and Queensland rugby leagues, it's unlikely any top official will switch sides, or be abandoned by his own.
But unlike today's warring officials, Sunderland did have vision for the game above state interests.
In the early 1950s, despite being earlier spurned and taking a post with Wigan, he submitted a plan to the BOC to promote rugby league in the USA. He also moved to Victoria, where he unsuccessfully sought to advance the code.
He is the only man to give his name to an award to players from two countries: the Harry Sunderland medal is bestowed on the best Australian player in an Ashes series and the Harry Sunderland trophy is given to the man of the match in England's Super League grand final.