Behind the Scenes of 2016 with Scott Maxworthy

[00:00:00] It's over! It's over! 50 years at Cronulla has their first title SharkCast And all you people back in the Shire Tell your poor slideshow because we're coming out with a trophy Hey there, welcome to SharkCast Podcast Dedicated to the greatest sporting club in the history of the entire universe

[00:00:47] This show is brought to you by Dyson Logistics, the Royal Motio Club in Port Hacking And our good friend Jason Hawes at Crips & Crips Real Estate This is a very special, dare I say, annual episode Regular listeners know what the date is today

[00:01:02] It's the greatest date in the history of the world It's better than your child being born It's better than the day you met the love of your life It's better than when electricity was born

[00:01:15] It is the date that the Sharks won their first and so far only grand final And we're here to talk about that amongst other things as well And usually we'll do it with someone behind the scenes Sometimes it's people in front of the scenes

[00:01:29] Today it's someone, I'm gonna say he's behind the scenes though Sharks fans will know him He is a good mate of mine He is a large part of why I am involved with the club In the capacity that I sometimes am Which we'll get to down the track

[00:01:46] And he is the owner of the most keys on a key ring I have ever, ever met And his name is Scott Maxworthy Scott, welcome to the show Thank you Samuel So today is October 2 or spoiler We're recording this a few days before

[00:02:03] But it's gonna be October 2 when you hear this And what we do Scott, as you may or may not know Is we just talk about that day And how we talk about that day is we get to that day And in your case we wanna hear all about

[00:02:16] How you got to that day And what it meant to you and the things you went through Before we get there I need to know some things about you When did you work at the club? I joined the Sharks as an employee In November 2013

[00:02:33] And what was your role, the title, your role? Yeah my initial role going in there Was brand and communications manager Okay, what does that mean to us normal people? Well obviously the Sharks brand And everything to do with that And every sort of creative

[00:02:54] Use of the logo, use of the IP Use of the assets that we had And we didn't have but anything that really Was Sharks brand orientated And then from a comms point of view Every customer touch point and whether that was

[00:03:13] Above the line media right through to social Which was just emerging then Right through to the marketing around community Engagement and things like that So comms is making sure you've got the assets there And the strategy in there of how to go and engage

[00:03:35] With in our case quite a spectrum Of fans, of media, of sponsors Government quite a wide gamut and spectrum Now people who know you know that your role Was more varied than that You did a variety of things Like most people in rugby league land

[00:03:57] Particularly Cruella Sharks land They have many different hats on top of their role And we'll get to that a little bit later on But going back in time Scott Tell us about how you became a Sharks fan And let me put this date in your mind

[00:04:16] October 1, 1966 was my birthday Was the day I was born And so born and bred Komo boy Mum and Dad had the milk bar opposite The syllabae down Komo Keri's butchers a little bit further down Ted Keri and further Komo pub there

[00:04:40] So I grew up playing footy for the Komo Angels Back then they weren't crocodiles, they were angels And... How do you go from an angel to a crocodile? That's the story of everyone's life I think So I started playing footy when I was Seven years of age, yep

[00:04:58] So I played the... We were Komo Genelli Angels under 7 Bs Undefeated Premiers in 1973 So as Sharks fans know what happened in 1973 We had our first grand final And manly cheated and... Settle down Scotty Though you're right So that was 1973 But played footy for Komo

[00:05:28] And it's very important in understanding How important that those early ages are In forming what is a life long relationship With your club And so my hero is back then The Steve Rogers of this world But I remember the first footy boots

[00:05:50] I had to get from Steve Rogers shop So those, again those players And those influences And as a family we'd go to Shark Park And we'd not necessarily watch the game The best game of footy was the kids playing On the field behind

[00:06:04] That was tough and rumble footy So you were born in 66 The Sharks came into birth the next year Yep Your family was all in straight away? Absolutely Dad was a guy near boy Mum was a crawler Girl So born and bred Shire

[00:06:21] And again the shop down in Komo Progress And wasn't a bad footy player I think our next grand final When I was at Komo was 1978 See where this is going We were under 11 Bs Undefeated premiers And then Brett and I

[00:06:40] As we did Mum and Dad would get grand final tickets That's Brett Maxworthy You're very well-known brother Yes, so that's my older brother I have an older brother Brett Well known local Muzo From 7s to 13 There's Brett and I Sitting there watching the grand final

[00:06:58] And us going home Are you with there? Well there Yes, I've been to every Sharks grand final Well that's okay Yes Alright let's Okay keep going and we'll get back to that Brett also great footballer He played with the ETs And the doggos and all that

[00:07:16] What position was Brett? Brett was a halfback Really? He was a bit lighter than you I used to be a halfback Okay Everyone from half to 5, 8% I'm not shaming you here No, no I've only known you guys for 10 years That's alright, I appreciate that Samuel I played Flig

[00:07:33] Brett played Yeah I played Well yeah Not bad for you player Komo didn't have a side Went and played for Sado Loftus And then Guimey And then Guimey Got into Flig I played a couple of years Flig It's been great And guys that were your Competition

[00:07:52] Ended up being your best mates The Jamie Primers The Rides Kenny Brown Who just passed away A month or so ago And so those relationships That was all about the Shire During those days And so even as 15, 16, 17 And up to your 20s and 21s

[00:08:12] It was all about that Shire lifestyle And beach, footy, music So that's your early years Becoming a Sharks nut Which I can see how that is very You had no choice Which is awesome Let's go back to 73 to GF So you were 7 What are your memories of that?

[00:08:32] My memories were sitting there with my brother And my mum Me screaming my head off And abusing the referee As a 7-year-old Now was that Hartley or not? I think you were 78 They still treated though And I called Dickhead in front of Hartley

[00:08:50] That's the only swear word we can use on this show You've gone off early Jesus, alright I've only got one in so far As a young kid abusing Hartley And I remember mum and daddy who was sitting in front of me Turning around and mum saying

[00:09:06] And then the whole crowd going No, he's right! He is a... And so on But again, that was your weekend Saturday afternoons and footy Was part of growing up And 78 Did you go to both? Holy heck Yeah, we were diehards So tell me about the draw

[00:09:29] Honestly as a kid it's hard All you can really remember in terms of moments Is the level of disappointment And then Again, the 30 something other years Of being... having carried that Never having succeeded So I know we'll talk about it a bit later

[00:09:49] But you know when you get to In your late 40s and approaching your 50th And you've been the brand of every Dragon jibe Based upon You know a referee's decision back there And not split And that's in chess, you know That is football

[00:10:11] But the we hate mainly thing You just carry with it, it was ingrained I hope it still is It is Tell me about the loss then The midweek loss Yeah, I just remember Just being in shock at how We just didn't have it

[00:10:27] As a lover of the club And as you get older and you read back And you understand how You know we were We were lucky to get on the field We were that battered When you leave school What do you do? What's your occupation? Where do you start?

[00:10:46] Or do you study or what do you do? Yeah, I wasn't much of a student You know I was a... Too chatty Yeah, I served I played footy And I was pretty social I played footy And I wasn't very disciplined I was pretty smart

[00:11:07] So it's just straight A's and B's But it just wasn't my groove And then so I did a few little things But I ended up working I got into computers very, very young I think I had my first PC when I was 13 Years of age

[00:11:22] Because my dad who was a New user as well Couldn't feed four kids So he became an accountant And then he became a very good accountant And so he was an early doctor So I used to backtrack what Scott means As a musician he couldn't feed four kids

[00:11:39] Oh sorry, as a musician yes So I was a musician with four kids under six He had to get a real job And as you'd appreciate A damn chester So that's a bit of the background piece But my dad was Kerry Packers' treasurer What about that?

[00:11:59] And I had quite a very mathematical And technology thing And so I was able to get in there And help design their share trading systems And all using PCs that moved it away From mainframes So and again that became My entry into both finance

[00:12:18] And investments and things like that Developed quite a good skill set In being able to understand what their Needs were and being able to use Computers to improve their business process Again, so that's how that was That entry into the business side of tech

[00:12:36] And then went on to moving into A bit broader role of okay How do I explore technology? How does it benefit consumers, you and I And businesses and that was The start of my trajectory for the rest of my career That's kind of your shtick right?

[00:12:52] That's my shtick Yeah We are jumping around a little bit here Which is on me, this is kind of what I do But how in God's name did you end up Across the bridge at that filthy, filthy club? You mean when I was working for the dragons? Yes

[00:13:07] Because before you came to the sharks More or less You spent time there I did How did you sleep it? No, I haven't slept it questions Oh thanks for that This is a very transparent podcast I have to go back a little bit please

[00:13:24] Yeah, so I ended up in the UK Working over there Mum and Dad came over Dad was on a business trip We went to a pub called South of the Border And it was a rockin' pub And it was an English pub Combined with a sort of a

[00:13:42] Rocky live music thing Us being a little bit intoxicated Said we should do this at home That idea stuck And so I was over there for probably another year And then came back to Australia To find a pub that we could turn into That English community type pub

[00:14:05] With a strong music type of feel You succeeded there Because I remember when we met And then we, you know, we'll get to And we hung out and whatever gets into each other And then you told me That your family ran the legendary Maxi's Is it Inner Section?

[00:14:27] The Inner Section Tavern So it's the one up here So you asked how did I cross the bridge So I would always drive past there So we turned that into What was the bouncy dance floor And that's what I was known for

[00:14:42] I think our first Friday night in there There were ten people And we went, what the hell have we got ourselves into And I said let's just understand What we aim to deliver And because we're a family of musicians We're able to put on entertainment

[00:14:57] And we knew how to party And so we go, we're just going to take that And put that in there And create that vibe that we had In that English pub In nine months we lost money And we got to the point of mum and dad's

[00:15:09] Mum and dad's houses were on the line To our properties we were on the line We were at, we were just saying That was a dumb idea But we persevered And then what just all happened Just the focus on understanding Who people are and focusing on people

[00:15:25] And not bouncy dance floors But knowing someone came in the door You know that's Steve Awe He drinks VB and And focused on that customer experience And I say, I focus on that Because that to me is what everything And that theme carries on So anyway it J-Curved

[00:15:46] Right, bottom, bottom, bottom All of a sudden it started to turn And then it doubled And then it doubled And it doubled And so within three years we'd have Oh, I kind of 500 people in there on a Friday And Saturday night And we then

[00:16:05] Poke machines came into pubs We were then allowed to uplift our Band quality so we could put on Matt Eastlick was a regular Mossy had a couple of gigs We just uplifted the whole musical We were on a performance contract And so the owners saw their

[00:16:29] Run-down pubs suddenly worth A lot more and at that stage I'd had enough of working that many hours And it was 60, 70 hours easily a week So anyway that was the pub And the pub was Back to your question of why Across the bridge

[00:16:48] My beautiful girl walked in the Backdoor of the pub one day And I said I'm going to marry her And then that turned into What is now a 25 or 26 year relationship So Kimmy's the local? Yes, okay Yeah Kim's born and bred Sansuzzi

[00:17:08] That's nothing to brag about but yeah I always say that Sansuzzi's Now the suburb of the Shire I'm at the frontier You are, it's a nice spot I'll give you that It's a nice thing Kimmy's an angel There's no shade on her So you see a job going

[00:17:25] At St George What happened after the pub We made some good money I started a dot com business there That was seven years That was a real start up type of thing One of the people who joined me in that business Was Donnie Rogers

[00:17:46] Well known to our podcast Now country music sensation Absolutely So we were one of the first businesses In our business incubator up at Sutherland Called The Shed I had a hold of salespeople out there That was called bang it up dot com It was a building exchange

[00:18:06] I wanted local guys to get out there And talk to builders and tradies So Donnie came on board John Wood photographer He came on board I had a bit of a bias If you're a sharks fan you got the gig Sounds like it

[00:18:22] But I'd known Donnie for years He was a bit of a wild child back then Still is from what I hear Yeah good Saw potential And that's what I always try and do Find people with potential Give us some framework

[00:18:34] And allow them to try and help them rise So Donnie worked for me He was my number one sales guy When I had a bit of a family tragedy He stepped up And we know the story there And he showed his metal It's a friendship we've had now

[00:18:52] For a very, very long time And as you know It's a bond And we've done a whole lot of other things On top of that His dad was only at that filthy club One year or something We then launched

[00:19:07] One of the things that came out of the building industry Was that they don't read They love video And so we started to play with internet video As a communication medium And so in that incarnation We started working With a number of clubs

[00:19:24] And social media was just evolving at that stage So we started building social We started producing social media videos Give me a year 2008 Gotcha And so we ended up We did with Donnie And Brendan You went to school then The great Brendan Walker Yes

[00:19:47] I like where this is going Well we created the Kani Army Oh yeah Right, and that was a social channel for Sharks fans Yes And so within that We started producing these videos About taking on the opposition And you know Tearing up dragons' jerseys Things like that

[00:20:06] And so that actually caught the attention of the dragons For obvious reasons And a mate of mine Who was quite high up at dragons Said Would you be interested in coming Helping the dragons develop their social media strategy The digital strategy and things like that

[00:20:28] Did you have to think about it or As a serious question No, gotcha No, the dragons at that stage Were chalk and cheese in terms of The professionalism In what they were doing And even having that appetite For risk and change and innovation They were the only club

[00:20:52] So we did a whole lot of things with Wendell was their brand ambassador So we did a whole lot of internet video with Wendell On the dragon site But I was freelance so it didn't work full time Ah, okay Right, and so we were able to do that

[00:21:06] We did that with Damien Irvine and Ricky If you went to the Sharks site Up would pop Damo And say, good day Damien here If you want to be a Sharks member Yada yada And if you I don't know if you remember that It's going way back to

[00:21:21] So you were freelance working for the dragons Yeah Okay It was 2010 so I got to See how Wayne Bennett worked Yeah, right And I was very fortunate And to see the How he got the best out of people Was amazing Did you work with him at all?

[00:21:43] No, no I was more like, again I was working with the media guys And Jay Banning She was a media on comms But I sat on They formed a digital group Within dragons and so I consulted them They're giving them a digital strategy

[00:22:00] Were there any other clubs chasing you? Like aside, did you work with the dragons? Yeah, we did stuff for the NRL For Manly, for Sharks For New South Wales Versus the state of origin So we did all those We did a re-enactment of Gire and Wally

[00:22:20] On the face off Yeah Did a whole lot of stuff And it was all around these digital avatars On a website If you want to buy membership please click on me It was early days of Video advertising and things like that Internet video advertising

[00:22:38] So was that your first kind of Paid gig in Leagueland? Yeah Yeah We were from a production point of year We were primarily focused At the very high end of Pharmaceutical Because they would pay like 10 times what a football club would pay

[00:23:04] The value of the audience that were attracting And the return on so they were targeting Doctors versus and so a doctor was worth A lot more reliable attention Pharmaceutical was huge IT was huge Sport was a passion project What came out of that

[00:23:22] Was a seed towards the Sharks Because what we saw with those sport videos Was the engagement level Was about 10 times that of everything else And it seems logical But the power of sport Is that it cuts through There's a relevance that comes to that

[00:23:44] And there's a known-ship and there's a connection That occurs and so that was like This is from a marketer's point of view That's really interesting Right I need to Did you think about that ever before? No It was just sort of subconscious maybe

[00:24:00] It was an insight that came out of the data When we looked at the results We were getting out of Because we could track everything And it's a bit of an intro into the Sharks We could track every video how many times it was played

[00:24:12] How many times it was clicked And we could see attention span during those clips What was the conversion rate through to a destination Funny how slow I'm not picking on the sport that we love But it's funny how slow or in my opinion

[00:24:28] Behind the times we were with everything Because I'm in the stats world as most people know And before I'm going to say even 2003 or 2004 It was like scrums, penalties, whatever Like there were no real stats kept And that's years and years and years after

[00:24:50] TV broadcasts had a huge interest in this product And so if I watch a game from 1994 I'm just astounded going What were you guys doing? And now you look at it And I understand we've come a long way in that world

[00:25:09] But yeah, again I'm equating that to what you're talking about Like the innovation of video The fans response to those videos To me it's a no brainer now Yeah, well I think what you touched on there is that As technology has This is not a technology show

[00:25:26] But as technology has become more universal The skill set on how to utilise that technology And the data has become more and more And so in 1994 You would have had 3% of people knowing how to use the PC Yeah, that's true Right, and so it is over time

[00:25:46] The skill sets have evolved and evolved What do you do between 2011 and 2013? So we're doing more and more of these videos We're doing those in corporatey And getting out there and doing that The iPhone was released in that period

[00:26:02] And that had a major shift in the way that marketing dollars Were spent, particularly digital marketing dollars So less emphasis on web Interaction communication And more on how do we make apps Apps is where attention goes So the framework around all this Is where your eyeballs are

[00:26:23] That's the economic driver Again going into the shark's piece A piece around customer experience Earning and owning attention And eyeballs And capturing hearts Let's take a quick break here Scotty And we're going to jump into all things sharks And your experience and your story there

[00:26:44] So we'll be back after this very, very short break You are with Scott Maxworthy One-time shark employee Full-time lifetime shark guy Back after this break Dyson Logistics have been on board with SharkCast For day one And because of that and their excellent service

[00:27:03] We are proud to be associated with them Dyson Logistics provides tailored logistical solutions To meet your individual client needs And is set apart by its personalised service Dyson is a strong worldwide agent network Enabling highly competitive rates And I should also point out their head honcho

[00:27:20] Is a lifelong season ticket holder Of the mighty Cronella's level on sharks Find them online www.dysonlogistics.com Call them on 0283391844 Dyson Logistics service delivered Alright back on this very special October 2 edition Of SharkCast pod We are with Scott Maxworthy

[00:28:07] Who is in a large part of saying this An OG, I call myself an OG I am one of two OGs You are hovering around man You are close so we will get to that So 2013 rolls around

[00:28:21] It is a pretty good year for the sharks on the field There is hope, there is finals games Controversial finals games There are other controversies going on of course How do you end up interviewing for the sharks? Donnie was working with me again This was Clive Video

[00:28:39] Which was a customer live interactive video experience Donnie was working for me He said Maxie I am going down to see sharks You want to come? I said mate I am just happy To sit in the stands with my brother Just down from where you are

[00:28:54] Up in the ET Drink beer, swear at the ref So Donnie was going down to try and talk shop He was talking shop He had a meeting booked with Steve McGee And Noisy it might have been He went down and did our pitch

[00:29:12] And he had all the other clubs What we were doing stuff with And he was the right man to go and talk to sharks And so he came back He said Maxie is super, super keen You know It was on the back of the work we did

[00:29:25] With the Carney army and all that So they knew what we were doing And we used that as a test project And they were aware of it And we did a great interview with Gal I don't know if you ever saw the interview That Donnie did with Gal

[00:29:38] Yeah, it was on the shark side It was on the TCA side Which was just great It was open and it was just Wards and all And we talked to them again about the legacy And things like that And you know as a shark

[00:29:54] One of the questions we would always ask Is what are you going to do when You know And so That would always come in conversations Anyway Donnie was down there to sharks He was doing a pitch on us And he comes back and said Maxie

[00:30:09] They're super keen to go and do something And I said how much money What do they want to pay How much do they have They never got money That's right I love Job Unleagos so far He said You're keen to have a meeting

[00:30:26] I said yeah I'll come down and we'll do that So I sat down I had a meeting with Noisy Who was the then CEO And Damien The CEO and the new board just sort of come in I think that was It was earlier on

[00:30:42] There was a new board And Noisy was in there So timeline wise Is our friend Irvine hanging on there No he's out He's out Keo's in We came down and presented Said look this is what we do I said you're so sharks You're social media shit

[00:31:02] I'll pass that one No more The way they were using social Was not best practice The quality of their video production Was not best practice And that's not being Just trying to think who we're offending I'm kidding go on But in the same breath

[00:31:22] They didn't have the skill set And they weren't giving the resources And so You had people trying things without really having Guidance on So That was my as blunt as I could be I go you're So far away from Doing it right So anyway

[00:31:43] Said look this is our fees and this is what we charge Noisy then Reigned me up and said Do you want a job Wow And then I said I was like I'm going to have to talk again What was the offer And I said oh

[00:31:57] No sound effect needed No sound effect needed Now this was just for you Not for Donnie No this is for me And Donnie was Again he was freelancing for me And doing other things I came home and I said to Kim

[00:32:15] I said sharks have offered me a job And I think one of her comments Was do you get holiday pay Because And things like that And And the internet She goes well that means you'll stop Winging about them Good point It's your time

[00:32:37] I think the first day of November I walked into My office And up on the wall Is the photo of Steve Rogers And Got the tingles rang up Donnie And said mate I just got to tell you And That began the journey So was there any hesitation

[00:32:59] On your behalf Not about finances or anything like that And I'm saying this in hindsight now For both of us getting too close to the dream And what that could mean You know things aren't always What they seem It's a great question

[00:33:15] But it is a great question because It's a mental approach to things If you approach things from a point Of fear And you'll never know Absolutely I'm just asking was the thought there though Or not was it too early in the No because there were very quick wins

[00:33:33] The quick wins were Very quickly getting there And fix that social I knew what the problems were You had no Strategy And no rules And So it was a lack of understanding Of what digital strategy is And how to do it and how to engage

[00:33:55] In those social channels So very very quickly Took control of that Stopped people posting whatever They wanted to post Put a whole lot of roadblocks For the spammy Commercial messages that were flooding The channel That were, you know, we promised them XYZ social

[00:34:17] Media posts with every corporate box And you go, you're spamming people You're switching people off And so that created a bit of conflict But And the other thing was I had to go and unblock Everybody who'd been blocked For being critical Including myself

[00:34:37] So someone was there blocking anything negative Like anything negative? It was just So again it might have been Twitter And I pulled up the block list At some point There was my Twitter handle Because at some point I must have offended somebody Who thought

[00:34:55] We're going to have zero Policy on anything About anything and again On the back of the starter I understand But we had to change the way That channel worked And I remember Very very quickly And I bought in Brendan And helped me put in place

[00:35:15] Some guidelines around that And very very quickly We established that Everyone has a right to their opinion But this is a shark supported channel And it's the official shark supportive channel So if you wanted to be negative Then go

[00:35:31] There are a whole lot of other channels you can go Define negative, if you can Negative was Anything that wasn't constructive To The greater conversation Or Someone so as a useless player That doesn't Create any value at all What if so and so should have scored that try?

[00:35:53] Should have Could have, yeah, that's not too bad But when there was Again this is a starter On the back of a starter The negativity in there Was horrendous It was toxic Again we just reinforced The process of this is Have a right of Conversation but please understand

[00:36:17] This is a we're here to support the team To understand The players read this The wives read this, yeah The kids read this, yeah And so if you don't have something good to say Excuse the French but go and talk elsewhere We're here to support the team

[00:36:33] And so some people didn't like that But others Said finally and the first time We saw a huge positive response Because Before it was just blocked Or was left Unmoderated and so it was a bit of A this is a line of sand Again I'll stop the spam

[00:36:53] Reduce the spam Coming through from a commercial point of view And start to put some strategy And there's a strategy around how You start telling Positive stories You start to interact And then you start to go and share What historically was Just football, football, football, football news Right

[00:37:15] And I said ok club is more than that You know the club touches every part of our lives From Give me the community stories And so I'd reached out to every department Said give me the stories I want those stories, let's bring them in

[00:37:29] Increase the video production quality That we're doing A lot of the kit was my kit My previous production business So Put that in there Started putting in Proper briefs, proper production Proper audio Trying to craft better stories And that became our modus So you start working

[00:37:53] In the season that is I'm going to say our worst ever For whole A lot of reasons and I People could argue with me but I didn't argue with no it was the worst How does that year go for you professionally It certainly going into It was

[00:38:11] It certainly wasn't going in with Naivety Having said run a business And if you want hard That's hard That's real hard work When your parents are going to lose their house On one of your ideas That's hard It was quite interesting Even though it was tough

[00:38:33] One of the things that was identified Very very early Was Putting in a Strategy Of We Are Sharks And the campaign I launched them Was We Are Sharks and I'm a shark And that was reinforced It was an arts verse It built a siege mentality

[00:38:55] Around the sharks brand And so we are one We are sharks And that was just a constant push through Of Trying not to swear But we're stronger than We're not going to be pushed off the Perth Where we will get through this When there are a few

[00:39:15] Quite major hiccups Along there The toddy one Was hard That hurt And because I had a Social And I had brain and monitoring as well And so I got those comments channels Coming in and I looked at all the different And I'd keep an eye on the polls

[00:39:37] I had a trigger on Twitter We got more than half a dozen so tweets Within a certain period Editing my phone And this is like 3 o'clock on the modelling On the set And my phone was ping-pinging And it sounded like a pimple machine

[00:39:53] So I opened up my phone and I saw the photo And I was like, that's fake And didn't think much of it So I sent a message to Robbie Willis And said, Rob And I think we just got home We played a game

[00:40:07] I can't remember what the timing was But I know it was Like 3 hours after we Done finished the game or something I can't remember Did they play it in Brisbane or something? I'm trying to remember Yeah we won in Brisbane I know I love Todd Can't hear out

[00:40:27] But then what about things like Then meeting the roosters the next week When we're behind by 20 That's got to help the business What a dirty game Noisy was very, very good As a CEO At Building A family type We had the lowest turnover of staff you've ever seen

[00:40:49] It was very much And that started to fill It was very much all of us together And it was very good at building That within our Behind the scenes sort of team And so we were under siege from the media They were camped out It was horrible

[00:41:07] Everyone may not remember But there were media bands Out the front of the club Every day and you go Okay, what's happening today? I always said Robbie Willis He's the most Hardworking media Person in sport So Toddie, yeah I love Todd because If you've ever

[00:41:31] I'd hear stories of Todd driving past A group of kids kicking a footy in a park And him getting out and playing footy with them That wins hearts and minds The interesting thing about The Bubba So Toddie gets sacked Toddie gets sacked I'm talking with

[00:41:49] Robbie Willis's son Ryan And He goes, why'd you sack him? I said, I didn't sack him The club sacked him He just did the bubbler He runs to the bubbler But that insight for that generation It was no big deal For My generation and older generations

[00:42:11] Why the hell would you go and do that And someone take a photo of it For an 18 year old No big deal You guys have lost the plot, you're out of touch Fascinating It is fascinating I'm not here to Judge on Toddie He's been judged his whole life

[00:42:33] From what I hear now he's doing pretty good things I think it was the silly thing to do But that's just my opinion All this time the Asada stuff is still going on As far as stories and people camping out

[00:42:43] How do you deal with it as an employee But also as a fan That this club means everything to you Like how does that affect you? The intrinsic Piece around the brand and the club Never got in the way of The job that had to be done

[00:42:59] All it did was Being a Sharks fan the entire life Gave a great contextual And I'm done to get technical in the marketing piece But Ability to understand The legacy To understand Steve Rogers, the Mick Malanze Rick Burks The Graham Bowens All part of the shy

[00:43:23] Part of that journey The history Deep fan perspective On the inside from people Who were either in sport for sport That's the nature So there were only a core Real core group of people there That were die hard Sharks Die Thompson Bonsie, die hard Sharks Ches Goddard

[00:43:47] And then other people who were The Kylie Lucas were less But there were the core Born and bred Sharks And so there was always that Lend we brought to the discussion Around that Because for me as a fan And I was working at Fox Sports

[00:44:05] So I was dealing with Like Journos and that kind of thing From a different side of things But it was all about Asada That used to grate me unbearably I had to do, I had to work on This is different to what you're doing

[00:44:21] But I had to work on something That would ultimately Perhaps bring my club down You know, this is my job to sort of Give someone a photo or whatever The only reason we started this podcast Was because of the negativity That's the only reason we started this podcast

[00:44:37] You're telling me it didn't really get to you? Oh, I wouldn't say it wouldn't get to me I think there was a net I've got a personal experience on how Much that negativity Can affect you both Physically So I did, but the answer is That if you

[00:44:55] How do you get around that Or how do you address that And the only way you do that Is to focus on the good You tell the good stories And You build that You understand that To a lot of degree Every club will have ups and downs

[00:45:15] You just gotta be able to ride through that process Because as down as you get It will get better So you never lost sight? You never... Not so much gave up But there was never a moment where you were like a Well my original promise to Kim

[00:45:29] Was two years For two years And after two years I fixed socials We took it from 30,000 to 120,000 And the Strategy around that and the engagement was right But it wasn't... The job wasn't done So that then sort of leads into The change of management In there

[00:45:53] And I was at that point, do I stay or do I go? It was great, it was a love job Do I go back And earn some real money But So I spoke with I spoke with Damien And I spoke with them Lyle came in Lyle's first Media

[00:46:13] We were the first one to break The first Lyle interview Put the camera on Bang he delivered to camera First take and I've gone Oh, this is a bit different Did you know about his rap and everything? I knew the Wanderer's piece because

[00:46:29] There was a whole lot of conversations Who was coming in Speculation around that I've just got flashback to the yellow jersey Then I'm not going to come back I feature in that Me on the ground On my knees saying please no No, I've got a good story here

[00:46:47] We'll get to it This is the beauty of not having a rundown You just think of stuff and we'll get to it I spoke with Lyle You're 14? Or early 15 When Lyle came in And basically said Put together your thoughts On a strategy to take sharks

[00:47:07] To where they need to go I think I shot off to Bali Did a bit of work up there And just got it down on paper And put together a strategic digital plan For the sharks for the next five years And then presented that

[00:47:23] And the board accepted that And we made some Quite significant investments In technology That was beyond what Any other club was doing This is the same time the NRL Spent $150 million building out a Technology platform And I'll talk to that Because the key thing The NRL had $150 million

[00:47:47] They wanted to own you and I As the fan and our data I said no We have the relationship No one gets an NRL tattoo I used to hate it when I say that It's so true It's so true And I'd say it all the time

[00:48:05] And I said we're going to build our own data stack We know more about the customer We've got 32 different customer touch points In that business From hospitality to turn style To digital So we're able to Get together to understand you and I And to improve The personalization

[00:48:25] Of that experience The other investment was our live streaming We were the first club to do live streaming Of a trial game 50,000 viewers For that first Trial game Were you commenting? No we hadn't chatted them Let's get to that So you and I meet I'm guessing it's like

[00:48:49] April May that year It's early in the season And Adam and myself Had done starting the podcast We were about A month into it Fakily speaking And we connected because I sent you or someone A song that I wanted to have As a run on song

[00:49:11] Some guy gets back to me He doesn't mention the song So I'm asking around Who's this guy? No one gave me an answer So we went down to meet you And your idea was To have a Web version Of our podcast Different content Same deal

[00:49:35] Half an hour format And we were intrigued Which was great Part of the deal was to have a club person Which of course Adam and I Weren't happy about that What are you talking about But thankfully You guys insisted

[00:49:53] And of course our great friendship with Rob Willis started And the three of us had Sharkcast TV Which was so much fun And we were You leaving the charge Innovators in club land Absolutely And this isn't a toot your horn thing When it's having a conversation

[00:50:11] No, no, no, this was Being innovative Taking a risk Putting coin up to do it Unproven There's a caveat to that In the During 2014 You would have noticed the game day Strategy move towards being a family event So we did the castles on the hill

[00:50:35] And all those sort of things It was to change the conversation From being all about football losses Into The relationship What it was to go to the football with your dad With your mum, with your brother, with your friends That was game day experience

[00:50:51] And so you changed the conversation And within That process Was understanding That the drivers for people going were different People on beer hill Are there to catch up And have a few beers and party That's their driver and great when you win Much better when you win

[00:51:11] Much better when dragons or Manly supporters walk in front of you As you pass beer hill For mums It was a different thing again It was a day out, the family actually came together And there was no wi-fi So kids were playing kicking balls

[00:51:27] And it wasn't all about being Tech and connected For you and I as a fan up in the hill Up in the stand Or wherever we were It was being part of That support During that Very hard period So it was understanding different messages

[00:51:47] For different people and the strategy there And that was a good catalyst into Understanding Not treating everyone the same And changing the nature Of the way we communicated From a big blanket piece To let's tell those stories So the live streaming Piece, that piece of

[00:52:07] That puzzle, that digital strategy Was all about going Engaging all the Different social media groups And bringing them in To the club And putting them around the table with Lyle And saying guys this is An opening the door It was very much opening up the door

[00:52:27] That wasn't without some people Being quite defensive That's right As they may should have been Maybe they should have been But it was again opening that Digital is very much a two way communication And it's about building that level of trust And integrity In what you do

[00:52:47] And being open And so you had again the fan forums The That came first right Opening it up and having a discussion Tell us what your problems are It is one oh one type of marketing stuff The follow on from that Is to reach out and say okay

[00:53:05] I've listened to SharkCast I think it's got potential I've got a studio here we're working on I'm going to combine those Combine those two elements And we'll see if it works You know And was good So we went from pre-record Afternoons Whenever we could Go way into live

[00:53:29] Like live TV which was pretty scary And The response was great from the start And it just kind of went up The more we did it You know you'd get us Amazing guests We had Flano on with the cup A few days after we won it

[00:53:47] Which is probably the highlight But everyone in between came along Because it was such a great year at 15, 16 17 And a bit more but just that Those two years in particular It was mind blowing all tonight Luke Lewis is coming on I had

[00:54:05] Time of my life and we all did A great memory for me Is just watching you Do eight different things at once And curse and swear And you know like We're live, we're not live Why aren't we live There was always the battle with are we live

[00:54:23] But from a club point of view We saw the feedback In written form and we saw it When we walked around the ground People coming up love the show Da da da da To the point where Well we might get to it later on

[00:54:39] To the point where you had us with the real press Talking grand final week That was unbelievable Like Wadler is looking at me going who's this guy I'll tell you what was the big shift there Is when we I can't remember what Jersey Was Barnti released

[00:54:55] But we announced it first on Sharkast And sales went boom Look at that That's nice That's the thing, it was a great sales pitch The entire club What it also did Was Reduce the influence of the mainstream media On Our fans So the trust

[00:55:21] It's called a source of truth And trust If people want to hear something first Or get the truth They'd come to the shark's side You built that level of integrity And trust And you guys being independent And could ask anything And Robbie's job was to be sometimes

[00:55:41] But he knew how to respond In a way That said we can or we can't Or we don't know if we didn't know But you got a point of truth And it doesn't matter what And I'm not allowed to swear So journals was trying to pump

[00:55:57] Up out in the media People just started to ignore them And I think to an extent Where we are now in 2023 That's tenfold A lot of people will not even listen To mainstream media I'm not saying they shouldn't Be kind of pleasing looking back going

[00:56:17] If you do it right Because obviously a lot of people do it wrong But if you do it right You can connect with the audience That leads me to asking about other things Like the pre and sometimes post Live game stuff we would do From the studio

[00:56:33] You would have a bunch of different people Come in and do pre game It was like in my mind It was like couple hours of communication You would let out things like Get this pass or whatever Latest news The fans had their interaction And that was groundbreaking

[00:56:51] And I remember many times You and I running from the UT stand To the studio At the top of the Lease Club To do a post game show And getting that reaction It was really a great time As a club Like you're at the top of people

[00:57:09] Who should be congratulated In the ones begrudgingly It was really good time for the club I was just a very small piece In making stuff happen Right? I facilitate it, it was all I've ever done So Yeah, I'm in those rushes back After a game

[00:57:29] Not wanting to leave your seat And no you There was one couple of games I was like I'm not leaving And he was like we gotta go We're watching over our shoulder We couldn't broadcast the game But we could do everything that happened on the field

[00:57:47] And so what we were able to do there Was do Mermaid's Dancing Gain, Wheeler Doing activations all that And pump that out to the fan base So if you were One of the campaigns I launched earlier Was Where the Shark Are You

[00:58:05] And it was a way of connecting with shark fans Around the world And one taking the stadium Out to them But them also feeding that back in So I had another technology Called Stackler If you tagged We Are Shark Or I'm A Shark

[00:58:23] We'd bring that in and be able to put that out On the big screens you saw all the social Posts and there were people in The Y bar In Bali with Mark Who would regularly post Sharks and other fans would meet

[00:58:37] In these different bars all around the world I know for a fact People loved that time Because they could tune in From America or wherever And feel part of it And a lot of these people are expats Some aren't But a lot of them could connect back home

[00:58:55] And there were a few times where I was working or sick Or whatever and I'd tune in And this is so good And I'd do it overseas Primarily well actually overseas EPL, NFL They all do it that way It's something lacking in both Sharks

[00:59:13] And NRL at the moment As far as like the technology And that kind of thing goes and it wasn't perfect We all admit that But it was leaps And bounds ahead of where it had been And I remember our friend

[00:59:27] From Newcastle came down to watch us do a show And he was the media guy there And he was just learning from us Then within a few months they had their own podcast So it was innovative in that sense And again this is me Blowing smoke up you

[00:59:41] I'm not blowing smoke but really good times I'm skipping ahead here a little bit We're going to get into the grand final year But we did live stream Games, commentary Which was unbelievable The rights for round the The non NRL games We got permission

[00:59:59] To be able to stream those But I'm also thinking I don't know if I'm allowed to legally say this The ones we did for the Corporates In the stadium we could It wasn't public broadcast So having a Shark and as you know The Brief to you guys

[01:00:21] Was completely one-eyed Bias For people who are not aware Of former colleague Adam We got to basically Convince on these games We got to cool games With someone else Yes Yes, young Adam Yeah Benson Adam knows who he is Richard Richard We had Aaron Raper

[01:00:55] So it was a real shark fest And you were kind enough To put us in these moments And we would like cool games Very amateurly of course But to the point where I think it was either 2017 Or 2018, I'm going to say 2017 You know what it was? It was 2016

[01:01:13] It was the grand final year Because Maloney threw an intercept With his first touch We called the trial game for you On the internet We had to do the trials That was fascinating So basically your perspective Was we got these two lunatic fans

[01:01:31] And I think Rob Willis, the shark cast guys The call of game for you That fan content I can't say it enough It was so vital in A lot of ways for a lot of people Like still get people telling me Like what a great time it was

[01:01:47] Bring it back, which is lovely So it's definitely got a legacy But as a club I can't Stress enough how innovative You were Bringing all this I know you say you're just the guy Putting in the whatever, but you were the guy I know you had help but

[01:02:05] Yeah, I just knew I know how to do the tech stuff And make that stuff And again it's a customer experience For me it's the fan journey And so one of the things That I was very happy with what we did Was the way We tapped into

[01:02:27] The fan passion To give the opportunities to the Adams To the little sage My reporter Who's now, she's burgeoning The young actress And so we gave media opportunities To people who To a certain great tapper Who's now doing seven years Got camera time Did build the skill set

[01:02:51] I understand there's more than just Being in front of the camera You gotta think about your story And how you tell the story I'd done music video clips Where I sit there in mime But I'd never done anything Like what you put me through And for some reason

[01:03:09] Because I guess I was like A little bit on the side Whereas Newman was sort of hosting The Gibra way, he had a lot more responsibility So I felt very little Nerves or stress and I had a great time But there was a time

[01:03:23] A few years later where you put me in that role And it was a little bit more nerve-wracking But because I'd had that experience Which is like, oh well this is what we're doing Let's go for it And I think again you should be commended for that

[01:03:35] Because you do give people these opportunities And a lot of Well I think every other club Wasn't really doing it We saw it happen, you know The Broncos had their own channel And everyone sort of Productions was pretty ordinary Anyway it was a great time

[01:03:54] Those times didn't last forever But I think enough Was done To create memories for people I think people who were sitting in the corpus Remember our pretty boy-ass calls They would have had a few crownies by that one So I'd had my headphones on loosely And I'd be

[01:04:14] Watching the game But I'd have headphones on And I'd be sitting there laughing In the stand by myself This guy shut up without Valentine's homes Come on, let's have a quick break Scotty and we'll come back And we're going to talk about the year that was 2016

[01:04:32] The greatest year of our lives Back after this short break we are with Scott Maxworthy In the presence of the great John Docking The former Sharks fullback So a shout out to you Shark Cast is supported by the best

[01:05:20] And most honest real estate agent in the Southland Shire Jason Hawes from Crips & Crips Real Estate He's an expert in the Caring Bar region And has his eye all across the Shire Lifelong Sharks fan and supporter Of this podcast

[01:05:32] If you're looking to buy or sell in the region The person you need to be talking to Is Jason Hawes from Crips & Crips Real Estate Call him on 0410 417 450 That's 0410 417 450 Jason Hawes Crips & Crips Real Estate Welcome back to Shark Cast pod We are with Scott Maxworthy

[01:05:56] And he is telling his story of his life as a shark And That life started out young He was a Jersey Flake player He's been to all the Sharks Grand Finals And he worked for the Sharks Including the year we won

[01:06:12] The Grand Final which is fascinating for me Scottie 2015 was a really good year On and off the field for the Sharks They Were bounced out pretty badly in the second week Against the Cowboys But that's okay it made them tougher And 2016 We've got Chad Townsend coming home

[01:06:30] We've got James Maloney big changes On already really good team Did you have the vibe that a lot of us had That this could be the one? I was probably more conservative Than most Probably from 73 and 78 And old scars Could you see the difference though

[01:06:48] Like from being around training And from whatever else early in the trials And For much of it I was quite Reserved And Was this Dare to dream Understatedness And Week by week And it was Just an incredible I had a look through Chuckie's book

[01:07:16] And went through that again today And I had tingles And just remembering That's the photo book they really seen again It was a week by week Groove and we saw it on the show We did And if you look back at that Our Anxiousness and Holding Our breath

[01:07:44] It was great How did your job change in that year With the success, with the 16 game for all that The data again I had my technology in place And that technology Enabled us to Create a better Experience We were able to Understand behavior What you saw

[01:08:08] Was we were able to put in place The focus was on fan experience And customer experience What's the first thing that happens when you go to a game People go to get a beer And they go to get something to eat The BQs Were 20 minutes

[01:08:24] So we looked at There was a list of about 300, 400 items That had to be improved We went and pulled it apart On what had to be improved in terms of game day Before 2016 And that was everything from a repaint To Trying to fix those toilets To etc etc

[01:08:46] But the money came We got the money and we fixed lights And all of a sudden the lights were fixed And things were painted Fresh coat of paint And From a bar point of view So 80% of people come 20 minutes before kickoff That's so annoying

[01:09:06] And so what happens is That creates congestion at all the points At your beer and so The most important part Of rugby league Is the first few tackles You want to be in the seat With your beer Ready for those big hits And if you're going to queue

[01:09:26] You're getting increasingly annoyed That you're going to miss that first hit So we said How do we go and fix that So Marcelo Great man, he was in charge of the lease club So we said Right, we're going to put in rapid pours

[01:09:42] And we're going to put pop up bars everywhere So I think we went from 8 bars to something like 80 pop up bars And in the ET there was one either side As there should be And so you quickly go and get a beer

[01:09:56] And there were costs associated with that But it was an investment In improving that customer experience We reduced bar lines By about 12 minutes So customer satisfaction Fan satisfaction went up The net result is Our NRL Promoters school We went to number one In terms of game day experience

[01:10:22] We were number one in terms of digital experience With the shows you guys were doing We were educating people Two hours before To come early And toast to cheese sandwiches are $4 If you get to, if you're there So mums Were able to go and feed the kids for $4

[01:10:40] Or whatever it is Change that behaviour And we had a lot of channels Mainstream media Couldn't care less And so we had that comms channel We were able to change behaviour We reduced bar lines Increased customer satisfaction And we started winning

[01:11:00] I was going to say the fact we had a ridiculous team Didn't hurt us going to number one In the NRL rankings But it was a compounding effect And it's funny how contagious That becomes And the fans out of the woodwork But our numbers were

[01:11:16] Ridiculous in terms of Yeah a lot of sellouts And the buzz was just That run was And then again Activation and sports bar Putting the big screens up there There was just The Lease Club got a lot more involved And through Marcelo's relationship with

[01:11:38] The football side of things It really improved things to the point Which was the greatest night ever But I was going to ask you About, we did skip over The yellow jumper business I know people desperately want to hear about that So just pretend this is 2015 again

[01:11:54] It's the last round We're at home, we're playing manly We need to win to get in the top four We've got a pretty good team Like 2015 is a good team And if in top four Who knows what's going to happen We're going to have news I think

[01:12:10] On the Monday Or so Around time we're recording the show And You would have found out before that But you know it was like a A comedy script, it was like What did you just say? We're going to have a fluorescent yellow jersey

[01:12:28] For the players that promote safety In the workforce And we're all like We love safety in the workforce We love these guys run out in bright yellow jerseys And You know, Lyle and all those guys They didn't understand and they're about

[01:12:44] Other things as well as the team winning And I get that. Sponsorship money As well as providing A good message From the team, we're still trying to turn around Things but as fans We have our hands In our head And I remember being at some sort of

[01:13:02] Media thing or we were recording or something And there she was Hello yellow jersey And it was the brightest thing I ever saw And I remember Newman having fun in it I remember Heiner having fun in it And then words started getting out We're playing in this

[01:13:20] We'll get to that. You don't mess with Things in the last Why was it the last round, you talk? Obviously commercial drivers behind that Was it As disruptive as I thought It would be, it was a lot more As a somewhat grown man

[01:13:36] I'm not going to say we lost because of the jersey Like you don't miss a tackle because of the jersey But just the whole Connection Had a real problem with it Even if we won now I'm going to care That's true The great thing about

[01:13:52] It is it's a talking point Now history, it's something we'll never forget Because we had the 2016 one which was Something we did with a movie or We did The orange spilks Yeah and we won in that I'm sure So just so bright yellow Scott Look

[01:14:14] We're doing the photo shoot I'm going to try to Pull down the shutter speed Because it was so bright I'm going to hate this That'll get it But we didn't even sell them If you're going to do it, do it properly and sell them It was commercial

[01:14:32] And the key thing for me With that was the negative Negative negative negative negative negative I'm going okay Alright and then Gow Put up a post on Insta Instead of it saves one life And sentiment just flipped Bloody Gow The goat

[01:14:52] And Gow we need to turn this around Because people are getting just Lucky and he did this post And then this message Gow's message of it saves one life Yeah It's good work And that was the claim we just pumped

[01:15:08] I think I might have been putting the script for you guys To read and you know I'm not reading We threw that out I guess our response was Why did you do it in round 15 Probably because it wasn't commercial We didn't have the commercial opportunity wasn't there

[01:15:22] It was the last round to win Everything's against us You might as well just put the L up now It's manly, we don't beat them Anyway let's go back to 2016 It was a lot more fun We went on the run Leeds club is doing great

[01:15:38] The vibe is great At what point do you And your staff and staff Around you start talking about The what if, the big what if Or the what if discussion Probably started In hypothetical Two to three months When we Could start to smell

[01:16:00] Smell it in the air and getting the good vibes But there was also Not getting ahead of ourselves And so but Discussions when you start to talk about Bands in terms of merch And you've got to start putting those planning and actions in place And

[01:16:16] Okay what does this look like And let's make those Very Discussions with police Discussions with council That The what if started to happen Because you could see with the crowds getting bigger every week And the Leeds club pumping And the merch going out the window

[01:16:36] Like it was all building So yeah this interests me greatly Yeah so yeah Behind the scenes there are A lot of informal type of discussions Yeah And always and certainly At a board level Those discussions have to occur As we Get closer and closer

[01:16:58] And there's an NRL planning Document you get For winning the grand finals And so Fast forwarding I don't know if I'm going to break the storyline But we We come out of the stadium after Cowboys And we're there And we're going to be there And on our tables

[01:17:20] Is the grand final And Marcelo Is that when you get the document? The funny thing is In the week leading up to Marcelo Who's a rooster supporter He's going do you want me to ring roosters And get their plan And then I get all the other comments

[01:17:38] Like what are we going to do with the The trophy cabinet and just all these One liners There's all this subtle humor that's occurring And then there's this Underlying grounds swell Of Hope And the what if And the dream

[01:17:58] I've got a little video I'm going to show you When we get to the right time Hopefully it'll make you cry That's not too much But yeah certainly That just that As I said that 8 o'clock meeting the next morning And that became Quite

[01:18:16] And the experience of a Lyle And a Keo In that type of environment To be and Flano Of Guys this is going to be the most wild week You're going to be under a lot of The people management of that Was incredible Yeah you've got

[01:18:36] Around your studio you've got A nice what is it's got To Collage thing happening on your computer It's just all the moments from that year Mainly to do is staff members Also some fans as well But that's got me going a bit Just quietly But

[01:18:56] Let's backtrack slightly so What's the vibe after the Canberra win in week one Where everything was against the odds and they did it And they got the week off it's like oh we're getting a bit closer Is it chaos then or not There's never any chaos

[01:19:10] There's not chaos Everything is people The expectation of people That there'll be times when you're completely exhausted You've got to have a cry Everyone's there to go and support So it was building that Quite a supportive Environment And again credit to To Lyle who'd been through that

[01:19:32] A number of times but also For people to capture the moment To once in a Potentially once in a lifetime So from my point of view Because I did a lot of the video And a lot of the photography Was to capture that moment That

[01:19:50] Both from a staff point of view But behind the scenes And there were thousands This is just on Grand Final Day As you saw from the Sharks website during that season We do photo galleries of fans All the way through The season To capture those moments Throughout

[01:20:12] But yes this was The Grand Final Day And capturing for example merch And staff and behind the scenes So refresh my memory and we have had Barnes-Yon in his own episode But when did For example The merch shop open Was that after the camera game Approximately

[01:20:34] So there was discussions On what we were going to do And trying to work out Work for the lease club on what we were going to do And things like that Underneath there was a whole Technology being put in place For me from a marketing

[01:20:50] Point of view was around data acquisition And capturing fan Details to improve That customer experience The thing with the merch We had to have the mechanism To be able to go and switch Into Premiere mode Minutes Seconds after It happened At that same time

[01:21:14] Every fan was on our database Got emails On communicating What the shop open was What was happening in the stadium So our comms plan was And so the partners we had Atelian Marketo Came in And developed a whole technology for us To be able to go and facilitate

[01:21:36] That We sold so much Merch leading up to the game Obviously which is normal for a grand Final team but something we'd Never seen before in that capacity It's the point where you had to open up A new store, Barnes-Yon was pretty much

[01:21:52] Living at the joint. That seems like Organized chaos to me I remember I was around it. It was unbelievable We would film Sometimes like two episodes a week And we'd be there at 7.30 at night And the merch thought it was just a line I was like whoa

[01:22:10] I don't know if Barnes-Yon gave the numbers or not I think he did but you're free to Yeah, well I think we were at 1.1 million leading up We did that and more In two or three weeks Amazing We were taking photos of

[01:22:26] Choose of, I remember Barnes-Yon walking up With flags or something or other And people pulling it out of the box Before he got into the shop And then lining up half an hour To go on pay Yeah, it was We had the beauty of which we don't have

[01:22:44] In theory and hear me out people But having a Leeds club right there Amongst the heart of it all We love Carilla but it's a little bit away From what we've been doing for the time being And that's awesome that it's there but

[01:22:56] The old Leeds club was just perfect For its For its purpose And the vibe there man Like and we'll get to the night of course But the vibe leading out to it when we would film Just so good Like there was a proper

[01:23:12] You know smell in the air I remember They had a number of open fan Training kind of sessions But I remember and I'm sure you do too Is when we filmed on the Field That's right, yeah. An episode of some sort

[01:23:28] Which I think cost you a lot of grief And we would have the players come over And coach and that kind of thing And I know for Adam and I that was like What we thought was peak life Peak life would come the next week

[01:23:40] But that was amazing And that interaction with fans And fans having their own Sharks show That week to be able to capture all that There was just another tick in the box For the Sharks like they just I think for a club under finance

[01:23:56] Just handled it so well And that's me in hindsight saying that You've got all the back stories but As a guy who was hanging around as a fan A lot of what they did They did really well Yeah, yeah. I mean there's

[01:24:10] Nothing more powerful than people with a common purpose Hmm, yeah And it doesn't matter if it's footy Or it's, you know, we Everyone knew What they needed to do Yeah No one was afraid to go and do something That had to be done

[01:24:28] Which is a bit of a Sharks thing to be fair Throughout the years But that year it was pretty strong So Cowboys game Amazing Where were you Were you working that night? Were you doing it? Well, it was that Come game I said the proviso is

[01:24:50] I'm sitting next to my brother Watching the game So I've got to do everything I need to do before And I'll do stuff after But that time Is We would see you in the ET stand Like rock up in your well dressed outfit

[01:25:06] And you'd have a beer in your hand And my brother would be like What's he doing? I'm like I had My radio on And I knew what was going on I remember it was a very Because you always really rushed it Was like, just have to kick off

[01:25:24] Not really before But look at it, he comes max worthy We give you a little shout out And I know when the big screener Killed That was great knowing you Because we would review up at that point And we'd go, shit it

[01:25:42] And some of the time we'd go Shit it You had to get gnarly because you're turning up In the first minute of the game Big shot sharks guy So where were you sitting for the Cat Boys game? We were amongst all the sharks Fans

[01:25:58] Did I meet you at the pub? I think we might have We went a couple of pubs before So yeah, my thing I was on the bus with fans And we were taking shots and everything? No, that night you had off Yeah, that was me being

[01:26:14] In the moment Then rocking off it and getting on it For an 8 o'clock meeting Yeah, and then Everyone's all Hyping A little bit dusty Tell us about the meeting, 8 o'clock The plan Comes out And Managing that vibe And it's Leagues Club and it's football And it's operations

[01:26:44] And so Lyle's brief to me He said to shoot So my camera is there And I'm behind the scenes capturing As much, and that was my brief for the week Apart from doing our shows And getting some other bits in tech But it was really to try and

[01:27:02] So the briefings with the police There's shots around that Which you won't see there There were so many meetings going on There were micro-meetings going on There were people having Having to take breaks And sleep under their desks Because they were absolutely exhausted

[01:27:20] You got Marcello, you got muddle You got Everyone just Moving together to try and make things You had our media day Which was insane You had the Leagues Club making it Sharkified And that was I think on the Tuesday You'd walk in Monday and go, oh this seems

[01:27:42] In the grand final They're not really prepared and then he came In Tuesday and he went Oh yeah On the media day we did Which we talked about a little bit before To paint a picture for people So that was in the bottom of the Leagues Club

[01:27:58] Is it the summertime bar or not Yeah it was the inside part of the summertime bar Yeah that's for our older listeners And basically The entire squad was there There was a large representation Of media from little People doing podcasts to To Whitelan and whoever else

[01:28:16] But there was a lot of people And cameras and the whole thing It was a big production And Rob Willis basically said To me like good luck But I think you had organised a few other boys To sit with us which was great And we

[01:28:32] Adam and I went separately to get More documented It was Such a great vibe The energy was so high but I remember The boys in the team Were so relaxed And that's when I was like People talk about when Paramatta Were at the breakfast and Newcastle

[01:28:52] Walking they go we knew we were going to Beat them. For me I remember talking to that media session Speaking to three or four other guys And then talking to a few of the other ones Off camera I remember talking to Val And Birdie

[01:29:08] And okay they're the youngest guys, the larricans You wouldn't know They didn't know what they were entering into And Ricky Lattelli was just chilling Like all these guys Were so ready for it Whether they knew it or not At that point I was like I was like

[01:29:26] I better tone that down Because these guys are already a rock Do you remember noticing that? Absolutely. And as I said before There was never any chaos There was busy There was never chaos In that regard A lot of that came back to

[01:29:44] Shane, I can't think of his surname Who was the SAS guy Who helped There was a whole lot of mindset stuff And building that resilience And mindset It's all very common now In our discussions And everything we do But they're very much there about Creating an environment of

[01:30:06] Focus And everyone knew what had to be done And yes there were things you could control And there were things you can't And don't lose sleep over the things you can't And things like that or if you need help Put your hand up

[01:30:20] And you can't just embrace the moment So football was very much about His media time And then we Put a cocoon around them And so there's a lot of effort In making sure that Everything is smooth and cool And then the great

[01:30:38] And they had those great interactions with the fans And I know I've heard Mickannis talk about it But the whole like Not hiding from the fact that we're in a GF Like let's be proud And as players it's more about We've got a job to do

[01:30:52] But it's also I think Matt Johns was talking about this week The sort of Brian Smith mentality Where you hide them away It's just another game But we sort of don't want to really acknowledge it And we like many clubs flipped it And we're like Wednesday or Thursday

[01:31:10] 4pm come down And then there's like 15,000 people And you had those select moments You could get Close or close-ish or in the same environment As your heroes In the biggest week of their life and our lives And that to me

[01:31:26] Again is something that as a club we really Managed well, like we didn't hide from The Leagues Club they might have taken a day Too later but they got there and it looked amazing And that place That's a whole other story That's a whole other podcast episode

[01:31:40] But that place ran like clock work Around the clock That sort of things but a great time What was going to be your role for the big day? Donnie At that time lived two doors down from Me just here and so we

[01:31:54] Go for a swim in the morning I think Matt had come down so he was Outplaying and missed the swim So I've gone down there and Jumped in the water and I've done A little video piece of just capturing A little selfie video Piece of capturing The

[01:32:12] That was that and it was a Ramble I remember that And it was a mixture of tears And excitement and as I said My kids said just go down Have a swim come back Have a cup of coffee and I came back

[01:32:28] Donnie and I went and had a cup of coffee And how you're feeling mate And also feeding Off that energy And then Back to work there was a bit of Prep just to make sure All the tech Particularly in the event of winning That for Banzi stuff

[01:32:48] That had switched over that the Email systems were in place All the tech was in place we also Put in that tech I told you That captured everyone's Anyone that used I'm a shark or we are sharks All that content Fed in and fed back

[01:33:04] Into every screen in the club So if you do a post And up on all the screens which is awesome All the tech was there After that was done I was back to fan It was game day so My brother turned up and Rayleen And Kim and We

[01:33:24] Went back into fan mode And jumped into the sharks fan And took off to home So yeah give me your game day what time did you Drive out there? I got So what time did we get The sharks bus? We got there

[01:33:40] I wanted to go and capture a whole lot of photos And Banzi had stuff to do And everyone else had bits of work to do Because the NRL pretty much Everyone had bits and pieces to do But to a certain degree We were fortunate to be quite flexible

[01:33:54] In what we could do that day Chest chitchatting all that On field, there's mermaids And all those sort of things So I got there And a few of the pubs got some incredible photos Of sharks fans In the moment And then I think we got into

[01:34:12] I caught up with friends Who were die hard sharks fans Who have been through that whole journey A mate that I played footy with Since under 7 B's in Kano And so We had a beer and Did the dead of dream and then walked over

[01:34:28] Sat in our seat and What do you remember about walking in? Sea of blue Unbelievable huh? That's something you can't forget We should have known it We probably did know it but when you see it Alright Scotty so you're going to show us this video

[01:34:44] That you have been sprucing around the world Post grand final A part of a presentation I gave around our whole digital strategy And that From wooden spoon And to premiers And technology So this is the intro video That starts And we can see the players coming out 83,625 Gals

[01:35:16] Gals Crowd is rustling Oh that's nice Oh it's the only team you can see That's a rockiness We'll depart for sea Listen to this roar now Haven't watched this part for a while Wow that roar man Unbelievable So good You got shots of all the crowd

[01:35:56] From all the different angles A premiership starvation Gal looks happy After 50 years There's 90 seconds to go Flano looks nervous I know this because I watched this last night Total TV audience 3.9 million So I was able to For this presentation So all those fan videos Yes

[01:36:22] So you got a split screen Of the game and fan videos It's quite good to watch A man and a woman on their edge of their seats Chads kicked out We're going to have about 50 seconds left from the clock I think Flano is barking one last instruction

[01:36:41] Lady pulls her hair out Oh the lady pulled some hair out Wow That's nerves of course Craig Bellamy can't watch No one can watch The lady is talking to the TV Or maybe the Lord above Mickey and his pulls into the second row Here we go

[01:37:11] They going right everyone 45 seconds The lady is freaking out Bit of a hit up here And this is where it gets a bit messy Scotty This is where we get messy It's 30 seconds on the clock And here we go This is brain waves

[01:37:32] So we've got the lady's brain waves Oh no that's the last tackle there 17 seconds left The dogs in the shot now They going right How this is not a penalty I don't know They going left everyone Not a great pass The lady is up The dogs going crazy

[01:38:00] The siren sounds They going right Ricky Lettelli is about to make the tackle Oh it's beautiful Oh my god She's wet herself Well I got the tears Scotty Well done I got the tears What's the deal with the guy He's not a fan

[01:38:32] Is the guy not a fan in the video Easy No wonder Good on that lady I don't think I've ever seen that video I don't think I've ever seen that video I wanted to capture that fan experience And for the presentation So I had to present

[01:38:50] So many corporate Marketing tech Conferences This one was in Japan Talking to Tokyo Olympics World Rugby Sharks was on the world map For what we were doing So this captured that A motion of 50 years But I looked through pretty much Every fan video that was recorded And again

[01:39:16] I've probably watched this a thousand times I am teary look at that What a moment I still do it to this day Every now and then I'll just look it up You might come across one you haven't seen I like that image there

[01:39:30] The ladies in tears and gals on the ground Where were you sitting In the eastern side was it Were they run out? No the other side Were about to be like What line were you on We're on Pretty much the 20 half way

[01:39:48] Between the half way and the 20 yard line There Towards where Ricky made the tackle That seems to be a common theme Every single person I talk to Including myself, either that or behind Tell me about What happened For the game What you were feeling I had

[01:40:10] My beautiful partner Kim Since the pub days when she walked in And 20 something years And The deal was When people go how come they're not married yet When the show starts, when the grand final We'll get married I'll put her around it I'll go for Lyle

[01:40:32] He lined up Ponyfax He just seemed Lined up Ponyfax for you It's all sorted, just go up and see Ray So Kim's next to me The grand final in the back of her mind And the deal was every year It was going to be another carrot

[01:40:52] I'm sitting there going Sharks didn't pay that much The So I'm there with my brother Brett and then Kim on the other side We are Screaming Like everyone Completely It's hard to express, there was just raw emotion And so it's Kim

[01:41:14] She's got a smile on her face like this That's a special day for her And this was an on-go joke Did you talk about that day? About the ring? It was the first thing you saw me Ray's over there Ray's gone Tuesday Because of the public holiday

[01:41:40] So I think the next week Down to Ponyfax He's finished Ponyfax Jewels And got the ring So you didn't propose At full time or whatever No, no, no So big day for everyone I'd forgotten all about that And tell us about you and Brett Must have been pretty

[01:42:04] We all have those stories You and Brett must have been pretty good Yeah, it was just In tears And then I walked around And got into the field And just started shooting I wanted to try and capture as much as I could Saw Baz Saw X

[01:42:24] And just staff And raw I wanted to capture the staff piece Because everyone worked So freaking hard And there was like 40 other people capturing the team Absolutely And so I was always looking For those sort of core moments And you're seeing those It's a great shot of lyre

[01:42:46] Inside the mind of Lyre Gorman Or I was looking for players In moments where The feckys, for example Who weren't necessarily the I wanted to The really interesting you talked about The opportunity we gave people to get better From media Because we put those players

[01:43:06] In that environment which was safe Let's not forget society of feckys First ever interview And then you look at the interview we did At grand final He was a pro I don't know who it was He was being pushed towards Neiman And I pushed

[01:43:24] Like on a barrel, like here he comes He comes fecking We love you man, it's all going to be okay Yeah, and I think that is That came through Like Kamen have a lyre, right? It can smell big as If you're fake it'll pick it up straight away

[01:43:40] And so the nature Of you guys The passion for the sharks Came through And that warmth towards the players Came through The players warmth towards you guys Came through And so for fans I think that was unique It wasn't your typical Media Response You're on the field

[01:44:08] I mean Was there a moment of just We all had it, but like you're on the field You're working in theory You must have just been All over the place mentally As a photographer again Get the shot Grant's photo That one of him and Gow

[01:44:28] He's in front of me I'm going get out of my shot So it could have been you We both Saw it and I'm going I've got a photo there of me with the back of Grant's head Gown, because he's got this Beautiful camera

[01:44:44] Was that just luck that he was there? Yeah Yeah, because it's come out with Baz and Kylie Kylie Lucas at the time Came, those sort of Group there and again Everyone's hugging kissing Crying and I loved all these kids everywhere It's just And there was

[01:45:08] I don't know if I've seen That in any other grand final Of just this huge sort of Spectrum You know, it was just Everybody there Tears of joy Post game I know where you ended up But what happened in between When I saw you

[01:45:28] At the club at like midnight Did you hang out with the team? With the players? With the club stuff? Yeah, so we got the bus back We got back before the players So some of the media guys stayed Their brief was to get

[01:45:42] Bits and pieces of that. We had to get back to the club To make sure I think For me it was right for barns Everyone was right, so we got back early I remember walking In the doors of the club And just Energy levels were Insane The adrenaline

[01:46:02] I just wanted to have a beer And calm down So we were up in Chairman's Stairs That again was a huge buzz The prep then was all When the players were we right, we geared for that Crowd coming in Because we opened up the stadium We tried to

[01:46:22] We were Very very close to having The biggest video screen In the Southern Hemisphere In the stadium for that Night But police thought That crowds were dispersed To avoid 20,000 people Being in the stadium Like the old Oz Rock days And so the strategy

[01:46:48] Was then we were allowed to open up The stadium later that night So it was just that I do remember having so much Wheat and sitting down The corner on the floor And just Reflecting and just going Wow we got there Yeah I've told the story many times

[01:47:10] On the show Through a bunch of you guys We got into the Yeah Talking to Dane Torranceon Who I'd never met before To talk to him on that night Plus all the other things we did that night Which was great fun

[01:47:28] That literally was one of the best moments Of my life to be in that environment That privileged experience Which I'm Forever grateful for Kurt Capewell jumping over the bar And serving everyone There's some crazy stuff That was the Wednesday night No he did that night too Absolutely

[01:47:50] Kurt liked to serve a drink Yeah there's thousands of stories But my experience I didn't experience the stuff on the field So that's a different experience Everyone had a great night The club did the best it could possibly do I know there was a lot of

[01:48:06] Stress about the leagues club How many you could hold When you had to get there It was that age old question We always asked ourselves how do we get to the club If you're at the ground and it's like Can't do both

[01:48:20] So yeah we had people arriving at 9 o'clock in the morning To get their spot Which is beautiful Such a unique time man I know in my heart of hearts we'll get there again I just don't know when it will be A lot of things obviously have to happen

[01:48:34] To make that happen When did you sleep next after the win After the players had come back And we had a few I caught up with a few other players afterwards It was their moment I was spent So just jumped in an Uber

[01:48:50] Didn't do a party or not Absolutely got it And I had to be back in the next morning Still would have been like 3 o'clock in the morning Yeah so I think I was back at work At 9 o'clock next morning And getting prepped For what that was going to

[01:49:06] What that was going to look like My brief there was Make sure we create the best experience We came out of that So many stories Guys like Muddle Slept under his desk and had like 2 hours or 3 hours sleep In Muddle he was the operations manager

[01:49:24] Lyle did photo shoots With fans and the trophy 5 or 6 hours straight Again I just kept that flow Going, making sure the Experience was good helping out That sport, Summertime Bar Was just rocky That was unreal We were in the club taking photos

[01:49:46] The whole family experience sucking all that up Get a phone call I'm with Lyle And all these Bring the trophy down All these Guys we can get the trophy And we're going to go down all these Let's get organised What was his name from the leagues club

[01:50:06] Organised a shark bus This is military precision Trophy out into Nor these, gal meets us out the front Into Through and all the crowds going absolutely It's crazy And so there's an area Caught off for the players Jimmy Malone he's just on fire Yeah

[01:50:28] And so they start crowd surfing So I've got my camera of course And I'm shooting at his butt And he's gal crowd surfing And he's Lyle crowd surfing And Jimmy's just going Raaahhh And these were just There's a few other shots here I think it's in this set

[01:50:48] Wow that was And that was the night of just capturing That was the behind the scenes Stuff of the plays Because after the game everyone was Well gal had Shingles So he couldn't He was basically back to hospital And things like that

[01:51:08] So this is his first night out there to play And yeah so Nor these was wild And I think I think I had maybe one or two My car was in Sharks car park Like for three months I was on first name basis With every Uber driver

[01:51:24] And again that went on And I think it was The Wednesday night We had the presentation That was good fun As much as there were some old boys In the house on the night Of the win Because it was basically like a midnight kickoff Not every old boy

[01:51:44] So to speak probably could be there Whatever so on the Wednesday night With the awards it was full of Old players and I met Guys from the 70's who I knew by name And seen videos with old legends in my mind And I think it was the night

[01:51:58] I might have met Roland Beckett I was messaging my brother going Man I'm talking about Roland Beckett Yeah you're right like that night And the players were in such good form Like fun but just really Accommodating photos And whoever like the works Yeah that was really special night

[01:52:16] Yeah and then we went downstairs And no one was prepared to go So Domo said Open the bar and then it just And then we had to There was no DJ Or music system downstairs So I'm racing out we end up with someone's

[01:52:32] iPod plugged into the PA system I don't remember to get music And we turned it into a A wild party downstairs Was it the night you made me carry stuff? I would have If you were able I would have made you do something

[01:52:46] I was just able I think I think that was the night you were like Oh come with me we're going to bring down like a stat I'm like what? Like 11 beers But that's what we do for the club Fantastic time Scotty When did the party end?

[01:53:02] Me about three months Yeah about three months after we It's probably We still had There were Christmas parties there were star parties There were all those the vibes But the nature of footy Is new season And so there's a whole challenge again

[01:53:20] Where do we take that fan journey Yeah and how much Do we emphasize The past And that's part of the challenge Is you can't But we're in our 50th I think that was the 50th year celebration so we were able to kick

[01:53:36] And it was a lovely storytelling piece Around I was vocal at the time But definitely since I've been vocal about I feel like as well as the club did everything With the celebrations and the acknowledgement And everything was beautiful I think when that season

[01:53:52] Kicked off to me as a fan It was almost like We didn't acknowledge it I know we're not America or whatever I didn't see a banner go up I didn't Like it was like round one Brisbane let's go And I'm like Hang on a sec and in hindsight

[01:54:08] The more I thought about it the more I was like I personally Haven't had the experiences you've had I would have done something I think I know there will be a 10 year anniversary soon I'm not suggesting that haven't The club hasn't done the right things along the way

[01:54:24] But I thought they could have definitely Milked it more While acknowledging here's the new season Like let's have a dynasty For a two-peat like something Some angle And I think that's part of professional sport In that you've got Players leaving you've got a new squad

[01:54:42] It's a new season Focus You're right could there have been But in the same thing of I think it was just a massive Release and relief That we're Good done Tick I gotcha I think for me maybe it was also a part of

[01:55:06] Like I didn't want to end obviously I was like round one what the hell do I care About round one let's go back and talk about the grand final Like we're doing now it's like you don't get sick of it So I understand the professionalism

[01:55:16] Of having to move forward And have new players And new members and that sort of stuff But I just thought in hindsight Especially And again I don't want to become America or anything There must have been a way

[01:55:30] Even just for that night to get everyone a little bit more Amped Scotty we're going to wrap up But anything else you want to cover Talk about stories Having created those moments For all Sharks fans I think all in all We did all do a pretty good job

[01:55:48] It's everybody it's our behaviour You know No arrests And things like that Negativity Maybe a couple little negativities I don't remember that year thinking the same thing It's like I'm in a stadium of 35,000 people watching us Going to a pre-limb Everyone's cool I'm in a stadium full of

[01:56:12] 85,000 people We might lose this Everyone's still kind of cool Now would they have stayed that way I've got no idea But win the game I've got a million drinks People are still cool There's a photo of Marcelo there Trying to work out keg deliveries For the club

[01:56:34] And we're up on top of Looking down On the bay there where the kegs come in He goes I've got another truck And you see these trucks And I've got some photos of the keg room And it's keg upon keg We working around dry No

[01:56:54] That's a good thing And it's not all about getting on the grog Of course So what are you doing with time now You're not at the club anymore With the change Of board And I'll be pretty blunt Lack of appreciation For digital strategy

[01:57:14] We had a proper media team More than double the staff That gives you the capability to go and do things You've also got to have an appetite for risk So it's a cultural thing And so with the change Of board there were power vacuums And things like that

[01:57:30] As power vacuums are filled It's a different dynamic The thing about Damien Very deep understanding of digital Damien Keo The nature of Hoyts and the business they do Has a strong Digital element And a strong understanding of data And how it was heavily supported

[01:57:50] And to be able to go and do the things That we could do To improve that experience That didn't last forever Mentally I'd also Having ticked that box In terms of the promise to Kim Could sat there and say Okay, we've done the job

[01:58:08] Ideally you try and put things in place That can carry on After you go But that requires people That's the skill and it requires Ownership So with half the staff Or more than half of the staff Let go in 2008

[01:58:26] There was a bit of a mass coal there wasn't there We've got to mention was Dougie I love Dougie So that was our creative designer Yes But as a 3D artist Incredible I'll throw it in there now The animation we had Going over Shark Park

[01:58:46] Right and the complaints I got From the dragons about that For making little kids cry Dougie Great guy, great human Great human, we lost So much of that IP And capability It was a change Of direction Scotty thanks for coming on

[01:59:08] Really appreciate it, it's been a long time coming Yeah I was writing down Who I thought would be good for October 2 And there was obviously a long list of Candidates but I Just kept coming back to this Scott Maxworthy guy You know and I'm glad we did this

[01:59:22] People will know your work And they wouldn't have known who it was associated To so now they listen to this and they'll be like I remember that, I remember that That was this guy so Appreciate you man, you're one of my good buddies

[01:59:34] I'll see you down the road I guess Yes it's been a very humbling experience Happy to have helped You definitely got us on the road That's for sure, got me on the road Been there through some tough times as well of course Through, I say tough times

[01:59:48] Difficult times we'll say But we got through that, you're a top fellow So people see you out at the ground You're quite recognizable, you're usually swaying around And again not because of alcohol You're going to sway, hey everyone knows Scotty So if you see Scotty next year

[02:00:02] Tell him you listened to this episode And you thought it was pretty good Possibly a bit long but still pretty good I knew what I was in for Scotty I'm glad you did I'm partly responsible, I say partly Yeah

[02:00:16] I appreciate you Scotty, we'll talk to you again another time All the best with your future endeavors This is Sharkast Pod, we'll be back with another episode Sooner rather than later Thanks for sticking with us all these years Enjoy October 2 Up up, up up

[02:00:42] Heartbreak in grand finals of the 70s They went broke in the 80s They went broke in the 90s They had a Posada scandal two years ago Has any club in any country In any sport Had a more arduous journey To its first title for the Cranulla Sharks