Week two of the NRL Finals series will see the 7th and 6th placed teams during the regular season host home finals games against the 3rd and 2nd ranked sides.
There Wests Tigers have called for this set up to be changed. They feel that, a reward for finishing higher up the ladder during the regular season should be that you always have home field advantage over lower ranked opponents.
To be honest, I see their points. Its pretty logical that we play 6 months of regular season Rugby League to gain some sort of advantage during the finals. That advantage shouldn’t be wiped away in 80 minutes of finals football, right?
Wrong!
The 2nd placed Penrith Panthers and 3rd placed Wests Tigers cash in their “advantage” cards by staying alive to fight another week after losing their first week of the finals.
On top of this, if you are a lower ranked side and you played well enough to beat a higher ranked team, you have a decent amount of momentum. Momentum your supporter base will feel. That builds excitement and that surely has to be a good thing.
The Raiders have already announced that they will have a sellout crowd when they host the West Tigers. It is without doubt the most anticipated game of the weekend.
Meanwhile the Sydney Roosters, if they had fans, could have also expected a huge crowd when they host the Penrith Panthers. Problem is, they have no fans at all, and with the travel from Penrith to the Sydney Football Stadium a nightmare no matter if you use private or public transport, I think this will be the smallest crowd of the finals series by a very long way.
Still, that should not take away from the fact that this system seems to have worked for the NRL for a number of years now. I’m sure anyone that has a ticket to the Canberra game on the weekend will tell you, this system is good for the game.
