Tigers review MCG deal after training ban

[mightytiges]

By Peter Ker
realfooty.theage.com.au
May 26, 2004

Richmond will review its tenant agreement with the Melbourne Cricket Club after it, and the three other MCG tenant clubs, were recently barred from training on the ground.

MCC chief executive Stephen Gough confirmed yesterday that Collingwood, Hawthorn, Melbourne and Richmond had been denied access to the ground indefinitely as stadium officials attempt to protect the playing surface coming into winter.

Richmond football manager Greg Hutchison said the club took issue with its lack of access to the MCG. "We want to train on the MCG as often as we can," he said. "We need to sit down and have a look at our arrangement with the MCC."

Hutchison said the Tigers had trained on the MCG - their official home - just twice so far this season, meaning the club had used alternative venues. Their traditional Punt Road is considered too small to prepare for playing on larger grounds.

"We are in a very similar situation to the Melbourne Football Club - you hear them complaining that they are all over the place; well, we are the same," he said.

"We train at Marcellin College, we train at Scotch College, we've trained at Sandringham, we've trained at Punt Road - we train at four different venues and we have to pay whenever we leave this venue (Punt Road) to go and train and it costs the club money."

The MCG has recently carried a heavy load of curtain-raisers and football clinics on top of its regular schedule of matches. Last weekend a fun run was held at the venue.

Asked if the MCC needed to limit its commitment to events other than football, Hutchison said: "Certainly there are some things that we can talk to them about to see if we can get ourselves on the ground," he said.

The tenant agreement allows home sides to train on the MCG once during the week they are scheduled to play home games there - providing MCG curator Tony Ware is happy with the weather and surface conditions.

Gough said the tenant clubs were well aware that their training sessions could be cancelled at the curator's request.

"You are not going to grow any more grass from now on, so the ground can only hold its own as best it can coming into winter," he said.

"Clearly the less turf replacement we have to do, the better in terms of cost and the look of the ground."

http://realfooty.theage.com.au/realfooty/articles/2004/05/25/1085461757921.html

[mightytiges]

Ever since the AFL introduced ground rationalization and other Clubs apart from Melbourne and Richmond started using the 'G, the MCC and the AFL has treated us with contempt when it comes our home ground. Most Tiger members and supporters want our home games at the 'G but the MCC is doing us no favours in regards to making it financially more lucritive to play there. The fact that Collingwood will have their new social club in the new Northern stand says alot about where we now stand in the pecking order. The problem is while we wallow in mediocrity on-field we don't have the ability off-field to press the issue via bums on seats, allocation of more friday night exposure games and off course the corporate dollar that follows.

[Puntroadroar]

tell the MCG they can P#$% off too

sign a million dollar deal at the dome

[Tiger Spirit]

Richmond will review its tenant agreement with the Melbourne Cricket Club after it, and the three other MCG tenant clubs, were recently barred from training on the ground.

With everything that has been going on at the Club, I’m more than a little suspicious about this stance.  I don’t know how valid the reasons for us wanting to review the agreement are.  It’s not like we’re the only Club in this position or that we are being treated differently to any other Club.  And the reasons for us not being able to train there seem valid enough.

Maybe the Club's just trying to play hard ball, but it’s not like the people at the Dome make it easy for Clubs to train over there anyway, so how could that alleviate the situation?  Doesn’t really make sense.

The cynic in me says that this is a way of getting us supporters ready for a move to the Dome, because it will mean more money?  And I suspect that this could well be another of those ‘easy money’ decisions.

As far as I’m concerned, the MCG is our home.  Telstra Dome is an elitist ground.  The MCG is the People’s Ground.

[froars]

Telstra Dome as our home ground - now that would really be testing our loyalty.

I hate the joint.

[Tiger Spirit]

Telstra Dome as our home ground - now that would really be testing our loyalty.

I hate the joint.

I don't hate it froars.  It's just that it's a bit of a brain strain to work out whether it's harder to get into the place or out of it.

[mightytiges]

I like Docklands to watch footy at. It definitely grows on you the more times you go. However I love the G. It has the history and it's our home ground. From the point of view of getting to and from the ground the G is much better for me. 20 minutes and I'm there whether from home or work while Docklands is a pain to get out of. Who was the nitwit who designed that bottleneck with the Bourke Street overpass.

From a Tiger supporters viewpoint I would say our crowd numbers would sink even further if we moved lock, stock and barrel to Docklands. I know others who like froars hate the place. Plus you need bigger crowds than the G to break even. We only agreed to playing 4 "home" games there as the draw forced us to play 3 there in any case and this way our revenue is guaranteed for those 4 games.