South Queensland Crushers
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| Club Information | |
|---|---|
| Full name | South Queensland Crushers Rugby League Football Club |
| Nickname(s) | The Crushers |
| Founded | 1992 (first season: 1995) |
| Departed | 1997 |
| Former Details | |
| Ground(s) | Lang Park (30,000) |
| Competition | Australian Rugby League |
| 1997 | 12th of 12 |
The South Queensland Crushers were an Australian rugby league football club based in Brisbane, Queensland. It was decided that the team would be admitted into the New South Wales Rugby League competition in 1992, along with three other teams, as part of their expansion plans for first-grade rugby league in Australia. The competition was renamed to the Australia Rugby League competition in 1995, which was the Crushers' first season in first grade rugby league.
The Crushers were an unsuccessful club, rivalled against the other Brisbane-based club Brisbane Broncos who were much more successful. The Crushers only competed in three seasons of the Australian Rugby League competition, and winning the wooden spoons twice for being last in the season. Despite the wealth of star players for the Crushers, they were financially unsustainable and competitively unsuccessful which led to their demise at the end of 1997.
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[edit] History
[edit] Formation
The New South Wales Rugby League competition (NSWRL) had begun in 1908 as a rugby league competition in the Sydney region of Australia. For the next eighty years, the league would only venture for clubs in the New South Wales region. But in 1988, the NSWRL admitted two Queensland based teams, one from Brisbane and the other from Gold Coast. The Brisbane team was the first NSWRL club to be privately owned and by 1992 had won a premiership with a dominate team. The NSWRL, planned to introduce a second Brisbane based team, hoping to hold back or reproduce the success of the Brisbane Broncos.[1]
On the 30 November 1992, the NSWRL formally admitted a Brisbane-based team into the competition, along with three others, from Townsville, Perth and New Zealand. The NSWRL hastily established a Brisbane based team, which was to be known as the South Queensland Crushers, which would enter the 1995 NSWRL competition, which had been renamed the Australian Rugby League competition (ARL).[1]
In September 1993, the Crushers chose Bill Gardner as the coach for the team, but after a poor off-season, he was replaced by former Australian international Bob Lindner. Darryl Van der Velde, an experienced rugby league coach from England, was the clubs inaugural chief executive. The club had chosen Lang Park as their home ground which had been abandoned by the Brisbane Broncos in 1992.[1]
The Crushers were able to sign Queensland representative players Trevor Gillmeister, Mark Hohn and Dale Shearer as well as three rugby union players including Garrick Morgan who had represented Australia in the union code. The Crushers had attempted to lure former Australian international captain Mal Meninga from retirement for one season, but failed. By the beginning of the 1995 season, the Crushers had also signed North Sydney forward Mario Fenech, who the club named as captain.[1]
[edit] 1995 and 1996 seasons
The Crushers lost their first match along with next three before winning their first match 16-12 against North Sydney in Round five. An injury to Dale Shearer and the failure of Garrick Morgan to adapt to rugby league saw the Crushers lose much of it’s attacking proses. Captain Fenech was dropped to the interchange bench and loss of the captaincy which was passed on to Gillmeister. The season’s end was dampened after coach Lindner and Fenech feuding which resulted in Fenech being released from the final year of his contract.[1]
In the 1995 season, the club had only won six and drew another in the twenty-two games played. In 1995, News Limited, a mass media company, began deliberating a rival rugby league competition, the Super League, and it was expected that the Crushers would be one of the Super League franchises, but the Crushers remained loyal to the ARL competition. The Crushers believed that they would survive and be able to compete on its own. The ARL supported this despite their disappointing first season because of the high home ground supporters averaging over 21,000 a season.[1]
The club had bought five players from the Sydney Roosters to help them improve from their inaugural season, and Queensland representative Tony Hearn also joined the club for the 1996 season. The opening round of the 1996 season the club gathered two points because of Canberra’s forfeit but the club only recorded three more wins in the entire season gathering six points on the competition ladder and took the wooden spoon for being last on the ladder. The Crushers won the second round clash against Parramatta before losing ten in a row. The Crushers then won two in a row before plummeting to lose their last eight matches.[1]
Despite a record crowd that watched the Crushers take on the Brisbane Broncos of 34,263, the Crushers home ground support only averaged over 13,000 each game. The diminishing crowd numbers and player payments meant the club was on the brink of bankruptcy. The ARL and a mystery supporter bailed the club out with over half a million dollars in financial relief. With first-grade rugby league divided between two competitions, it would be hard for the Crushers to recoup lost money in establishing the club as it ploughed further into debt.[1]
[edit] The final season
The 1997 season was not much better for the Crushers, again taking the wooden spoon for the second year running. The club only won four games of the twenty-two match season. The 1997 season for the Crushers saw their home game attendances dwindle to an average of 7,000 peoples and even with free days, which allowed supporters to come to the games free of charge, the club didn’t gather support as it had in its inaugural season. The Crushers did however win their final match of the season convincingly 39-18 over the Western Suburbs Magpies. The NSWRL/ARL’s plan to rival the Brisbane Broncos success had failed.[1]
With the unification of the Super League and ARL competitions following the 1997 season, the new National Rugby League (NRL) competition was formed. This meant that three teams of the twenty-two teams participating in 1997 would be axed as part of the rationalisation process aimed at reducing teams to an optimal number. With the introduction of the Melbourne Storm and the fact that the agreement between Super League and the ARL was to have a fourteen-team competition in 2000, the future for the Crushers was inevitably demise.[1]
In late 1997, the club’s only option of survival was to merge, with the most likely contender the Gold Coast Chargers, who like the Crushers, were struggling to be able compete in the competition. However, the NRL approved the Gold Coast team for the 1998 season, and they went alone into the re-unified competition. The club was wound up in December 1997 with debts totalling over $AU 3 million dollars.[1]
[edit] Season Summaries
| Competition Playing In |
Games Played |
Games Won |
Games Drawn |
Games Lost |
Ladder Position |
P | R | M | F | W | Coach | Captain |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1995 ARL Season | 22 | 6 | 1 | 15 | 16 / 20 | Bob Lindner | Mario Fenech | |||||
| 1996 ARL Season | 21 | 3 | 0 | 18 | 20 / 20 |
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Trevor Gillmeister | |||||
| 1997 ARL Season | 22 | 4 | 0 | 18 | 12 / 12 |
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Steve Bleakley | Craig Teevan |
[edit] Noted former players
[edit] Sponsors
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[edit] Crushers players to be successful with other clubs
- Clinton Schifcofske (Parramatta & Canberra Raiders (NRL), Queensland Reds (Super 14))
- Mark Tookey (Parramatta & New Zealand Warriors (NRL), Harlequins RL (English Super League))
- Scott Sattler (Penrith Panthers, Wests Tigers. Currently involved with Gold Coast Titans)
- Travis Norton (Bulldogs, Nth Qld Cowboys, Retired)
- Chris McKenna (Cronulla Sharks)
- Steele Retchless (London Broncos (English Super League))
- Danny Nutley (Cronulla Sharks, Sydney Roosters)
