For more than half an hour, Andrew Abdo has been talking about Las Vegas.

We are sitting in his office in Moore Park, where the National Rugby League chief executive is articulating plans of scale and ambition beyond anything ever attempted in Australian sport. In just over a fortnight, a double-header will be staged at Allegiant Stadium, the venue that recently hosted the Super Bowl, featuring matches between the Rabbitohs and Sea Eagles, as well as the Roosters and Broncos.

It will mark the first time that competition games, save for those played in New Zealand, have ever been staged outside of Australia. It is the most concerted effort for rugby league to expand beyond the eastern seaboard, where it is predominantly played and followed, into a potentially lucrative new market.

It is then that Abdo provides a glimpse into just how profitable the Vegas venture could be.

“The size of the market and the size of the economy is just so big,” Abdo says. “To put that in perspective, Australia – by GDP and by population – would be the equivalent of one of the big states in America. And there’s 50 of them.

“So it’s 50 times the opportunity.”

NRL chief executive Andrew Abdo poses with an American-themed football ahead of the historic season-opening games in Las Vegas. Credit: Gregg Porteous, NRL Photos

As ever, the greater the risk, the greater the reward. The NRL has thrown all of its chips in with its Vegas gamble, committing to playing games in Sin City for five years, until at least the end of 2028. Allowing for start-up costs, the governing body is budgeting for a small loss in the opening year, in the hope of significant returns in subsequent seasons.

Only a few years ago, the NRL was spending as much as $1.2 million on season launches. Little more than that will be required to fund the overall cost of heading to Vegas on March 3 [US time] for the first time.

QOSHE - ‘It’s 50 times the opportunity’: Why the NRL believes its Vegas gamble makes business sense - Adrian Proszenko
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‘It’s 50 times the opportunity’: Why the NRL believes its Vegas gamble makes business sense

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17.02.2024

For more than half an hour, Andrew Abdo has been talking about Las Vegas.

We are sitting in his office in Moore Park, where the National Rugby League chief executive is articulating plans of scale and ambition beyond anything ever attempted in Australian sport. In just over a fortnight, a double-header will be staged at Allegiant Stadium, the venue that recently hosted the Super Bowl, featuring matches between the Rabbitohs and Sea Eagles, as well as the Roosters........

© The Sydney Morning Herald


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