Punt Road woes compound sufferingCAROLINE WILSON
May 9, 2010THE Richmond Football Club, having again sunk to the bottom of the AFL ladder and looking entrenched there, is facing another crisis.
The Tigers are running out of time in their decade-long campaign to relocate the Richmond Cricket Club from Punt Road and almost certainly face another summer, possibly two, away from their home ground and unable to configure the oval to AFL size without the intrusion of practice wickets and the massive pitch in the centre of the ground.
While Essendon CEO Ian Robson made headlines this week by threatening to relocate the club away from Windy Hill, the Bombers are close to a deal with their cricket club. Their new ground will be the same size as the MCG. Richmond is aiming for Etihad Stadium proportions.
And it seems inconceivable that the picturesque adjoining lawn bowls establishment at Essendon will withstand the pressure of one of the country's most powerful clubs.
But the Tigers, long criticised for dwelling in the VFL while the rest of the competition went national, are mired in a thicket of bureaucracy dating back decades. Having agreed to a shortsighted deal with the Victorian government in the 1980s, which allowed the widening of Punt Road and reduction of the oval in return for government sponsorship via the Quit and TAC campaigns, the club desperately needs to expand the ground to make it fit for training.
Two years ago, AFL chief Andrew Demetriou described the ground's surface as ''crap'', but club CEO Brendon Gale admitted several days ago that even if cricket was to be relocated and the wickets dug up, the ground would not be ready to train on until the start of next season.
And that now looks a near impossibility. Shortly before Gale took over, Richmond believed it had reached a deal with Yarra Council to relocate the cricket club to Collingwood's old home, Victoria Park. Everyone seemed happy with the arrangement until the vote took place and the councillors voted against the move.
Soon afterwards, the Magpies, with impeccable timing, announced the Collingwood reserves would be returning to Abbotsford to play their home games at Vic Park.
Incredibly, given the magnitude of AFL football and Richmond's estimated $30 million turnover in comparison with district cricket, the Richmond Cricket Club is the leaseholder at Punt Road under the management of the Melbourne Cricket Club.
The only good news for the Tigers is that while the co-tenants have been at loggerheads for a good part of the last decade, the relationship has improved. But while Jim Higgs and his RCC colleagues appear at least willing to co-operate to find a new home, the search, which has been overseen by Gale's No. 2, Michael Stahl, has been fruitless.
Richmond is now one of three AFL clubs being strangled by its own history. Essendon's story has been well documented and its cricket team seemingly ready to co-operate, while at North Melbourne, the cricket club's lease is due to expire and the pitch relegated to history.
The Melbourne Football Club, having missed its chance in the Olympic Park precinct the first time around, will soon relocate and train in the area without suffering the indignity of training without goal posts, as it was forced to do at the Junction Oval over the early rounds of the 2010 season.
So once again, the Tigers have been left behind and, despite their multimillion-dollar redevelopment due for completion by the start of summer and a smart new second home at Craigieburn, seem unlikely to be training unencumbered at their geographically appealing headquarters for several years to come. And unlike the Bombers, they cannot even threaten to walk away from Tigerland. There is far too much at stake now for that.
Like every other AFL club in Victoria, Richmond has been the beneficiary of millions of state and federal government dollars, and now, finally, the Tigers appear to understand the gravity of their football circumstances and how long ahead lies the road to success. The AFL appears to be backing the club and their membership is healthy.
How on earth such a stalemate exists between two sports and clubs of such varying magnitude, when even Cricket Australia has indicated it would move the Sheffield Shield final to make way for an early start to the AFL season, seems incomprehensible. In a city built on village greens, surely there is a another ground somewhere.
http://www.theage.com.au/afl/afl-news/punt-road-woes-compound-suffering-20100508-ukyj.html
