Consistent with taking a hard line against brawling on the field and a tough stance in regard to player behaviour off the field, each NRL club, player and official has been warned in regard to their behaviour on Monday. As we approach the final round of the regular season, the silly season will be beginning for many clubs this week and will continue throughout September as we enjoy finals Football.
The clubs which will be celebrating the end of another successful season (or in the case of Parramatta the end of another season) will be the St George Illawarra Dragons, Parramatta Eels, Canberra Raiders, Penrith Panthers and the Wests Tigers.
The NRL should certainly be on notice following last year when the Bulldogs were in the papers for all the wrong reasons, despite their tremendous performance on field in 2012.
The Bulldogs contributed $30,000 to a charity nominated by the NRL in regard to sexist remarks which were allegedly made to Nine Network reporter Jayne Azzopardi. The comments included 's*** me off, you dumb dog' and 'I want to go and punch you in the face.' This is not the only incident which has come out of Mad Monday. Previous years saw the 'Joel Monaghan' incident occur and Robert Lui assaulting his then pregnant girlfriend.
In response to this incident, the NRL today has sent an email to each club chief executive reminding them of the game's code of conduct and issuing a warning in regard to social media.
The NRL will undoubtedly be taking Mad Monday celebrations very seriously, particularly following an incident which occurred this week at a St Kilda Saints Mad Monday celebration, where a dwarf performer was set alight.
Last year, the then interim NRL chief executie Shane Mattiske said it was time to scrap the term "Mad Monday" as it gave players the excuse to take celebrations one step too far.
I, to an extent, agree. I am completely for and supportive of the players celebrating the end of the season. Throughout the year they train hard, put their bodies under tremendous pressure, deal with the media and essentially work as hard as they can to achieve a result. The achievements of players, the achievements of the team and the achievement of the club should certainly be celebrated.
However, such a celebration needs to occur within an established framework with care being taken to ensure that it does not go over the top.
One suggestion is removing the media from such celebrations and allowing the players to enjoy themselves in private. This is problematic for a number of reasons. First of all, many player celebrations take place in public places where the opportunity to be spotted or photographed is not only there for the media, but also for civilians. In such a situaiton, there can be no guarantee's that players will not be photographed.
Further, the players also use social media. The Joel Monaghan incident saw his teammates taking the photograph which was then circulated and resulted in Monaghan's public humiliation.
Clubs need to take responsibility and ensure all their players are aware of the limits of Mad Monday celebrations. Once someone is set on fire, the fun stops.
Love,
@LadiesWhoLeague
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