SeaEagleRock8 said:
Nuttybott can be added to the list of Sea Eagles messiahs.
No, not a messiah or anything else. Just a deeply unhappy supporter who wanted his team back. Remember, in late 1999 and early 2000, the Manly Sea Eagles were GONE. And as far as anyone could tell at the time, they were never coming back. The press certainly took that line, and I remember getting very upset when Beaver made a comment in the local paper to the effect of "everyone has to understand that the Northern Eagles are here to stay". On the night of the first NE match (against Newcastle in February 2000) I was driving home to Point Clare (the next suburb to Gosford) from somewhere I had been that night, and as I drove to the top of the hill I could see the lights of NorthPower Stadium (as it then was) in the distance. I switched on the car radio and listened to a little of the broadcast of the pre-match preliminaries, including a speech welcoming the new club by then Prime Minister John Howard. I have never felt so miserable and lonely in my life.
I couldn't bring myself to listen to the actual game, and indeed I never watched or listened to a single one of the NE's games, ever. It simply wasn't my team, and I had decided from the start to have nothing to do with it whatsoever.
As the 2000 season progressed
sans Manly, I did become aware through the media that all was not going well for the joint venture. So at one point I decided to step up my personal boycott, by doing the one thing I COULD do about it...ie write. I wrote lengthy detailed letters to officials of the Manly club, expressing my opposition and disgust at the whole Northern Eagles venture, and asking them to consider whether on reflection it had been a good idea, in view of both the poor onfield results that season and the well-publicised boardroom turmoil between the Manly and Norths factions of the club. I actually received a reply from Peter Peters (then media manager of the NE), who attmpted to refute (not very convincingly) my indictments of the joint venture club. The thing was, though, he seemed to believe that my main objection to the Northern Eagles was simply that they were not
winning at the time, and he closed by asking me to "be patient, and we will give you a team worth supporting". I replied that, with all due respect, he had missed my point. It made no difference to me whether the NEs won or lost...I wouldn't support them even if they won ten Grand Finals in a row, because they were
not my team, and I told Zorba that. I wanted the Manly Sea Eagles back, nothing more nothing less. I repeated the same message in every letter or email I wrote to the club. But boy, I really felt like a lone voice crying in the wilderness at that time.
A few months later, I read some comments made by Ken Arthurson to the press, stating that the NEs were in one hell of a mess, both on and off the field. The club was on the verge of financial ruin, and the boardroom squabbling had escalated to the point where the joint venture was in danger of imploding at any time. Arko went on to suggest that Manly should break free of the JV and "go it alone" once more. Well, this was exactly what I had been wanting to hear...a powerful figure within the Manly club felt the same way I did, and what's more he might be in a position to actually DO something about it!
So that was when I made contact with Arko, and after that Sunday morning phone call (when we shared our mutual dislike and rejection of the NE project, and I did as much as I could to encourage his mind in the direction I think it was going anyway), I spoke to him several more times during the 2001 season. By the end of that time , he was determined that the NEs had to go, and as president of the Manly Leagues Club he began bringing pressure to bear on the Football Club, stating that the Leagues Club would give no more money to the NEs to bail them out, but was willing to fund a stand-alone return of the Manly Sea Eagles if the JV split up.
And the rest, as they say, is history.
I like to think that in my own small way - my own VERY small way - I helped the cause of getting our beloved Manly Sea Eagles back, by at least letting those within the club who didn't support the joint venture know that there were others who felt the same way, and by encouraging them to do something about it...
