A removed section from the original Chapter 7: The 16 Year Struggle to Streamline Rugby League.
Cowan says that at the time of his campaign for one board, the NSW Rugby League was run by a clique. This was a widely held view within rugby league circles at the time. The General Committee consisted of delegates and vice-presidents from every club – more than 40 delegates attended the monthly meetings. It was extremely unwieldy and inefficient. It is difficult enough for a 15-person board to get to good decisions in reasonable time, says Cowan. He recalls his time on the NSWRL executive in the early seventies.
What’s really funny is that for a while I thought that I was in the clique. We used to meet before every general committee meeting and decide what we were going to support that night. There were about eight of us, and we all thought we were involved in the important decisions.
But I found out later that I was never really “in”. The “in” team was quite small. It was a bit like an archery target – you have the inner and outer circle of the bullseye. So, even though I was on the executive, I was on the outer circle. It took me till 1974 to work it out, and one night I publicly resigned from the executive over a decision they made, but I stayed on the committee as a delegate.
The week after his resignation Cowan crossed paths with Jack Gibson, the coach of Eastern Suburbs, who congratulated Cowan on making a stand. He said a lot of people were sick of the fact that a small group were running the league to suit themselves. The clique still existed in some measure until Super League came on the scene in 1995.
Tom Wilson also remembers the workings of the clique. At the time of the Mulgoa Road purchase, he was a delegate to the NSWRL. The league was concerned about the bad state of many of the playing fields and was pushing clubs to make improvements.
Back then, the Penrith ground was leased to us by the Department of Lands. For us to commit to spending any large sums of money on doing anything, we would need them to guarantee us something like a forty-year lease. Anyway, there was some talk of having our own playing field on the new land. When I tried to explain all this at a league meeting, the chairman, Kevin Humphreys, accused me – in his inimitable fashion – of hedging. Basically, he said I was bullshitting. I objected and asked for an apology, which I got.
But of course, that was not the end of it. When we all went downstairs for the usual drink after the meeting, I was completely ostracised. The only person who came near me was Peter Moore [former Canterbury CEO]. It was a strong lesson.
Charlie Gibson was widely regarded as part of that inner circle. He was a good friend of Humphreys, and the man that Mackie and the Super Six recommended for the job of rugby league secretary for Penrith.
Despite the promise shown in 1974, the underlying problems did not go away. Ashurst and Stephenson had settled in — the team had shown promise by reaching the finals of the Amco Cup and the budgeting and financial controls were in place. Cowan recommended that it was time for him to hand over to ex-player, Ron Workman.1
The committee agreed and Cowan stepped aside to concentrate on the management of the licensed club.
The potential shown in 1974 was never realised. The first-grade team finished in the bottom four of the competition for most of the seventies.
Cowan’s growing frustration with a system that he considered wasteful, inefficient and noted only for a succession of failures fuelled his determination to convince both clubs of the advantages of a united effort.
If I analyse that history, I can see that the real cause of a lot of the internal problems through the seventies and early eighties was my unequivocal belief that Penrith would never achieve success as a rugby league competitor while it had separate administrations. I harped and nagged boards for ten years before I finally won the argument, and even then, the win was only because of the involvement of the NSWRL [New South Wales Rugby League] executive.
Later critics would portray Roger Cowan as a CEO surrounded by yes-men. The events of the 1970s suggest otherwise. They must have been either unaware of or had forgotten those years. It was an ongoing battle to achieve his ‘one board, one CEO’ ambition. He often thought he would never win. Neither side was willing to make the concessions necessary to bring the two together. Cowan laughs at the ‘yes-men’ tag.
For more than ten years, I did my very, very best – put my absolute best efforts into getting one board, one management. I kept going back, and going back, and it didn’t happen. So, no – they definitely weren’t yes-men.
One time in the late seventies, I was getting so frustrated, I thought I’m really going to make the effort here. I prepared a 19-page booklet for the next board meeting. It had graphs, and charts – every piece of information I could pull together to try and convince them. I was determined to make them see that “this is the only way this club is going to succeed”. I gave it to them a couple of weeks before the meeting to give them time to read it.
On the night of the board meeting, I made sure it was on the agenda. The item came up, and the deputy chairman, Murray Clarke, said: “I move that this document be received”. Somebody else said, “I second that”.
And that was it, there was no discussion, nothing – they just moved on to the next item! I blew my top, lost my temper completely.
It was really stupid putting a 19-page document before a board anyway – boards need concise documents. But I’d tried those for years and they hadn’t worked either.
It took me another couple of years, and a lot more frustrations to win that argument. And we haven’t looked back since. Many other clubs now operate the same way.
Cowan’s commitment to the cause was also used by his opponents to brand him as anti-rugby-league. This is one of the major Cowan myths, and it would be used against him many times by many people. It was also another factor that contributed to his appearance before Ian Temby in 2004. That one small trickle that began as a frustration with failure in rugby league in 1971 combined with some other small trickles along the way, became a raging torrent 33 years later.
Editor’s Note: Roger’s long campaign for “One Board, One CEO” was about far more than administrative structure. It reflected a deeply held belief about accountability, organisational unity and the future direction of Panthers. Readers seeking additional background may wish to read Why One Board, One CEO?
Barry Hubbard says that at one time, Cowan and the board executive even travelled down to the NSW rugby league office in Sydney to talk to Kevin Humphreys [then NSWRL president] to see if there was some way for the licensed club to take over the rugby league club. Hubbard was dead against the idea but still felt it should be explored. Humphreys told them in no uncertain terms that it was impossible. It was unconstitutional, and if they tried, they could be expelled from the game.
Local butcher and prominent cricketing identity, the late Trevor Wholohan OAM2 interpreted Cowan’s trip to rugby league headquarters very differently. His opinion, expressed with his characteristic passion and vehemence, was aligned with those branding Cowan as anti-rugby-league. He declared with his characteristic passion and vehemence, that Cowan’s meeting with Humphreys was “to get rid of rugby league”.
Cowan’s reaction to this was disbelief. He wonders how any rational person could come to such a conclusion.
Imagine meeting with Kevin Humphreys to talk to him about getting rid of rugby league. Any sane, logical person would know that you wouldn’t do that. Humphries would chew you up and spit you out.
Hubbard said Cowan had returned from the meeting with Humphreys undaunted.
Roger was never one to take no for an answer. He had tunnel vision. He went back to the club and resolved to have a meeting with the football committee to decide on holding a joint election for a board that would have responsibility for both clubs.
In discussion, the football committee had agreed, in principle, to hold the electionBut when the actual motion was put to a vote, a division was called, and people were asked to vote by moving to opposite sides of the room. It was narrowly defeated. A couple of the committeemen who had agreed to an election now crossed the floor and voted against it.
The internal squabbling at Penrith – and the poor performance of the team – was becoming an embarrassment to rugby league administrators. The executive of the NSWRL offered to help, bringing in Alec Mackie, a highly respected rugby league administrator, who was chairman of St George and a vice president of the NSWRL. A committee – dubbed the Super Six3 – was set up to find a way forward, with three representatives from each board. Roger Cowan was also a part of the committee. Mackie chaired the meetings, which eventually concluded that there should only be one board at Penrith. The two committees, for the second time, came to an agreement.
When the joint election was held in 1980, the new board comprised all the directors of the licensed club. No-one from the football committee had been successful. It became the first board in rugby league history to handle the affairs of both a licensed club and a football club. However, it was only halfway towards the model that Cowan had been recommending.
I believed that a structure comprising one board employing two chief executives would be just as difficult as having two boards dealing with two chief executives.
In many ways it could even be worse. It missed the whole point of the recommendation.
When the boards came together, that is what they did. Rugby league was controlled through a newly appointed chief executive, Charlie Gibson, while I retained responsibility for the licensed club.
A promising coaching strategy for the 1974 season was derailed by a committee modifying it for the wrong reasons. It was years before its time and it might have been successful had it been given a chance. Here we were in 1980 and I had a feeling it was happening again. The system I had been advocating was being half introduced and again the modifications were for all the wrong reasons. You can’t half bake a cake.
And that was exactly the position the Club found itself in.
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Ron Workman is Panthers player number 13, a member of the 1967 foundation team, he retired as a player in 1973 after playing 93 1st Grade matches. In 1975 he was appointed as the Secretary of the Football Club, a role he held until 1978. ↩︎
Trevor Wholohan was a long-standing critic of Roger Cowan, with tensions between the two dating back to 1974 when Wholohan’s butchery supplied the Club. A dispute over an account led Wholohan to claim that Cowan had impugned his honesty. He later attended most sittings of the 2004 Temby Inquiry as an observer. ↩︎
The committee was in fact: Kevin Humphreys (NSWRL), Alec Mackie (NSWRL), John Jennings (Penrith Distric Club), Tom Ellis (Penrith District Club), John Hewett (Penrith Leagues Club) Rocky Davis (Penrith Leagues Club) — that’s the “Super Six” — and Roger Cowan. Keith Rhind (Penrith Legues Club) was on the bench for this team. ↩︎
In the winter of 1973, Penrith found itself searching for answers.
The club had entered the first-grade competition only six years earlier and was struggling badly. Results were poor, confidence was low and the future looked uncertain. The low point came when Manly-Warringah inflicted a humiliating 70–7 defeat on the Panthers. The result became part of club folklore and reinforced the belief that dramatic action was needed.
Penrith’s response was bold. Rather than look only within Australia, the club turned its attention to England.
Club president Wally Ward and director Bruce Welladsen travelled to England with a clear objective: find experienced players who could strengthen the team and help establish a culture of professionalism. Their first target was Bill Ashurst, one of Britain’s leading second-row forwards. Negotiations were successful and Penrith secured his signature for what was reported at the time as a record rugby league transfer fee. Contemporary reports noted that Penrith had committed more than $27,000 to secure Ashurst’s services.
But Penrith wanted more than a forward. They also wanted leadership.
While in England, Ward and Welladsen turned their attention to Mike Stephenson, captain of the English champions, Dewsbury. Stephenson later recalled receiving an unexpected approach while working on a building site in Yorkshire. A workmate shouted up a ladder asking whether he was Mike Stephenson. When he answered yes, he was told that visitors from Australia wanted to speak with him.
The meeting that followed would change the course of Stephenson’s career.
Ward and Welladsen outlined their vision for Penrith and offered Stephenson a long-term contract. At first he was uncertain. Penrith sat at the bottom of the premiership table and had just suffered one of the heaviest defeats in its history. Yet the honesty of the approach impressed him. Rather than paint an unrealistic picture, the Penrith representatives openly explained the club’s position and their plans for the future.
Stephenson later said that this honesty was one of the decisive factors in his decision. The club was struggling, but it had ambition. Just as importantly, it had a strong junior base and a growing district. He believed there was an opportunity to help build something meaningful rather than simply join an established powerhouse.
Penrith eventually secured Stephenson’s release after complex negotiations with Dewsbury. The reported transfer fee of almost $40,000 established a new benchmark and attracted national attention. The press described the signing as a record-breaking deal and evidence of Penrith’s determination to improve its fortunes.
The arrival of Ashurst and Stephenson generated enormous excitement. Two of Britain’s finest players were heading to Penrith. Expectations rose accordingly.
The results, however, were mixed. Despite the quality and commitment of both men, rugby league success remained elusive. Penrith finished with the wooden spoon in 1973 and continued to struggle for consistency. Yet the significance of the signings went beyond wins and losses. They demonstrated that Penrith was prepared to think differently, act boldly and invest in its future.
Those qualities would become recurring themes throughout the Roger Cowan years.
Cowan continues with further thoughts on the bad decision to place Clare as head coach:
It was a ridiculous decision. Jack had some strange ideas about the strategies of the game and started clashing with the captain, Mick Stephenson. Mick was a passionate competitor and was quick to argue with Jack if he thought the coach was talking nonsense. Jack said he would take him out the back of the grandstand and sort him out.
My response was something like: “Jack, if you think the answer is to fight our captain, I want you to know that you will be doing it over my dead body”.
It was one of the many signs that we had made a bad decision.
This episode reinforced Cowan’s belief that Rugby League decision-making should be seated in one body, looking after the interests of the entire club.
Tom Wilson gives an example of the way the football committee worked at the time.
Les Boyd was a brilliant newcomer at the time, only a very young kid. The coaching committee had invited him and his father to come to the club to talk to us. His father was a little short stocky bloke. Les wasn’t much bigger, but he was a very strong looking, solid boy. And he had already started to make a name for himself.
We’re all standing around talking, and Pat Russell — who was on the football committee — is down at the end of the bar, holding court. He says to me, ‘Look Tom, look at the kid’s old man, the size of him. This kid will never grow up to be any decent sort of a footballer.
That’s what we were up against. Les Boyd did grow up, and he became an outstanding footballer — a mongrel, but a great footballer. It was only one man’s opinion, but that’s all it needed back then. It was like that all the time — how would the bloody schoolteachers know?
Appointing Jack Clare as head coach, the football committee cited Masters’ lack of first grade experience, saying he only had coached school football. In fact, his credentials were very similar to Jack Clare’s, but Masters had a far better CV.
So, the 1974 season began with Clare in the driving seat. Masters was to look after tactics, Harris coached the forwards, and Wilson the backs.
It soon became apparent that there was a problem, says Masters. The team lost its first four games and conceded a total of 107 points.
So on a wet Sunday at Warragamba, after a club family day up there, Roger gathered all four coaches in his car, and gave us an ultimatum. He said, “It’s obvious that this is not working, and I’m going to appoint Roy as head coach. You can accept it, or we go back to the board – who will no doubt go to the media, and wherever else it goes from there.
Cowan made it clear it was up to them — handle it quietly and confidentially or suffer the glare of media coverage and the uncertainty of how the committee would handle making a new decision.
For the remainder of the season, Harris became second grade coach, Wilson coached third grade and as far as the world knew, Clare was the head coach. None of us ever revealed to the press what the situation really was. We maintained that situation only to preserve Jack Clare’s dignity, but the reality was that I was first grade coach for that season.
The entire Penrith experience is one that Masters would prefer to forget. He felt very let down at the time.
My significant problem was that Roger … didn’t give me any support … I had to make my own arrangements … I just had to cop it sweet.
I thought that I had made a significant investment in a life change and ended up being dumped pretty much high and dry
In a recent exercise to select Penrith’s best team and coach of the past 40 years, Masters is named as the first-grade coach for 1974, but it’s taken 40 years to acknowledge it. Cowan told a meeting held in 2006 to discuss that 40-year team, that Panthers has treated Roy Masters abominably.
Masters speaks highly of Cowan,
I have a very great affection for Roger. But my admiration for him is based on what he’s done for the club since I left, not any problem that I had at the time with him.
See, you’ve got to be measured in this world – you just don’t define your personal history in terms of a couple of years you spent somewhere, and that forever influences your view of a person. You also make observations as you go down the track. And I can’t deny the fact that he, selflessly, with massive amounts of hard work, has built a vast empire.
Roger’s model introduced a revolutionary coaching plan It was a good model, but it was too far ahead of its time in terms of the politics that existed at the club in those times.
It didn’t matter what you tried to do with those people. If you came up with something new — like trying to develop match plans or produce videos — or had any kind of scientific training, you were completely alien. You belonged to a culture they didn’t like, and couldn’t accept. Yet look at the game now, it’s all scientific, all research and video analysis.
The politics during those days of two boards was treacherous … and it was very destructive and soul destroying. Merv Cartwright wasn’t on the committee at the time, but he was still a powerful force behind the scenes.
My experience at Penrith steeled me for the future.
In 1974, the year that Roy Masters came to Penrith, Mike Stephenson and Bill Ashurst also came — from England, to play with the team. Under the direction of Roy Masters, the team made the final of the new mid-week competition, the Amco Cup. They finished in ninth position in the first-grade competition, and had come close to making the semi-finals.
Although the team had its best yet success under Masters, he opted to remove himself from the politics and coach the Under 23 side the following year.
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From early in the 70s, Roger Cowan maintained an absolute commitment to the belief that rugby league would never succeed at Penrith while it was a separate entity. Cowan passionately believed that the secret of success was to integrate rugby league, uniting all the expertise within the management structure.
It took more than ten years to achieve that goal. Yet the struggle came with an unforeseen downside — the move to integrate had a negative impact on some relationships and reputations.
Cowan says there had been consistent failure under the two-committee system, and serious conflict.
I sometimes wonder what would have happened if I had taken the easy path and simply kept out of rugby league. I am not sure that it would have been possible to do that and also protect the interests of the licensed club. In so many ways, the two are interdependent. But if I had found a way to do it, there is no chance whatsoever that the police would have walked through that door in 1985.
I know some very successful CEOs of large clubs who have kept right out of Rugby League. I think they were smarter than me. If Rugby League had been managed openly, honestly and effectively in the first few years there would have been no need for me to ever get involved. But I was never about to lead a team working for the success of the Registered Club and have it all blown away by irresponsible management of football.
As the club moved into the seventies, the licensed club continued its growth. But on the football side of things, the club was struggling
The results told the story.
The team’s best performance throughout the seventies was equal seventh in the 12-team competition, in 1971. It was second-last twice and had collected its first wooden spoon in 1973.
Something had to be done to improve performance and Cowan formed a small strategic sub-committee to focus on new strategies. The group included Cowan, Tom Wilson – who would become the club’s director of coaching the following year, Dave Podmore, a local businessman and Frank Ley, a schoolteacher who was also heavily involved in school rugby league. Podmore, Wilson and Ley were on the football committee.
The group devised a whole new concept of coaching.
The plan was to appoint a panel of coaches. The head coach would lead a team of specialist coaches – one for backs, one for forwards, and one skilled in tactics and strategy. The panel would oversee all three grades of football, and each would train the players in their specialty.
This was a new concept for Australian sport and structurally very different. There were similar systems used at the time in American football. Balmain coach Jack Gibson1 had also spoken in support of such a coaching system, although he never actually used it. It is now in common use in all football codes.
The system was introduced in time for the 1974 season.
Roy Masters, who would become a prominent Sydney sports journalist2, was part of that 1974 coaching panel. Barry Harris – a former state representative – was to be the forwards coach, and Wilson, already established as a coach, would oversee the backs. The fourth member of the team was Jack Clare. Clare was popular in the world of rugby league and seen as a ‘nice bloke’. He had been chairman of selectors with the Balmain club but had no experience coaching at grade level. He had coached high school teams and had only ever played five first grade matches.
Cowan and the strategy team wanted Masters as head coach. He had coached a number of successful school teams, notably the Australian schoolboys’ team that returned unbeaten from a tour of England in 1973.
Tom Wilson remembers that some of the group travelled to Tamworth to meet with Masters, who was teaching high school there at the time.
We spoke to Roy for 40 minutes on the sideline of a training session. We watched the session, and Masters didn’t say a thing to the team the whole time. They went through 43 moves – and dropped the ball once. What an efficient team!
Roy had developed a completely different way of doing things. It was a real management concept. We convinced him to leave Tamworth and come to Penrith to head up the new coaching panel.
But it would not prove that easy! Wilson continues,
When they got back and started to work on the new strategy, the old brigade came out fighting, “What would some schoolteachers and a couple of businessmen know about football?” The committee was prepared to go along with the new coaching concept but personality clashes within the committee caused a poor decision that derailed the strategy. The decision was later corrected by Cowan in quite extraordinary circumstances, but the strategy did not recover.
Masters says there were problems from the start.
The pervading culture on the football committee at that time was anti-intellectual. If you were a schoolteacher, you were gone from the start. There was one particular person on the board who really had it in for me. He was very vocal and wielded a lot of power.
There was something like 16 men on that committee, and most of them were the same.
It was never going to work. Frank Ley – who was a teacher – signed me. Roger, the club secretary, had also been a teacher, and here was I, another one. They just would not accept me. And it was all down to the prejudices of this unbelievably insidious committee.
It was even worse than that, says Cowan.
Frank Ley was unpopular with the committee, and he was seen by the committee as the driving force behind the appointment of Roy Masters, so the vote to appoint Jack Clare as the head coach was really a vote against Frank Ley. Personal prejudices easily won the battle over logical argument.
Headline SMH Herald 11 October 1973 – click image to read the article
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Jack Gibson did not coach Balmain. In 1973 he coached Newtown and in 1974, he was in his second stint as coach of Eastern Suburbs. ↩︎
Roy Masters later became a prominent journalist and columnist with the Sydney Morning Herald and is now based in Melbourne. ↩︎
Foundation Member, Chairman and Long-time Penrith Clubman
Ken “Poker” Ausburn was one of the foundational figures of Penrith Rugby League Club and among the generation of local volunteers who helped transform Panthers from a small district football organisation into a major community institution.
A lifelong Penrith resident, Ausburn served the club across many years as a committee member, director and eventually chairman. Remembered for his humour, warmth and strong community spirit, he became one of the best-known personalities associated with Panthers’ formative decades.
Though he died in 1976 before the club’s later expansion into the entertainment giant it would become, Ausburn remained widely respected within Panthers history as one of the men who helped establish the culture and identity of the early club.
Role in the Narrative
Ken Ausburn appears within the early development period of the Panthers, Passion and Politics narrative — the years in which Panthers evolved from modest local beginnings into an increasingly ambitious football and licensed club organisation.
He represents the generation of volunteers and local administrators who laid the foundations upon which later Panthers success would be built.
Ausburn is closely connected to Panthers’ long campaign for admission to the NSW Rugby League first grade competition, and to the club culture that developed during the 1950s, 1960s and early 1970s. His involvement reflects an era when Panthers depended heavily upon local personalities willing to contribute time, energy and leadership to both football and licensed club activities.
His life and reputation also provide insight into the strong community identity that surrounded Panthers during its formative decades.
Background
Born: 9 February, 1921, Penrith Died: 6 May, 1976, Penrith
Profession: Boilermaker; long-time employee at the St Marys Munitions Factory
Panthers Roles: • Foundation member • Director • Chairman • Hon. Secretary Penrith Rugby League Golf Club
Community Involvement: • Supporter of local sporting and youth activities • Associate with support for Police Boys Club initiatives. • Long-time Penrith community volunteer
Recognition by Panthers: • Life Membership, Penrith Panthers (1964) • Poker AusburnAward – for most improved Panthers player (now discontinued).
In 2017 Penrith City Council named Ausburn Reserve — between Nepean St and Annett St, Emu Plains — to honour the contributions to the Penrith region from the Austbun family and specifically “Poker” and his brother, Bob.
Known As: “Poker” — a nickname reportedly derived from the poker face he adopted while telling stories, joking with friends or “spinning a yarn”.
Relevance to Events Described
Ausburn belonged to the generation that guided Panthers through its difficult formative years.
He witnessed — and helped contribute to — the club’s evolution from football played at very basic local facilities to the construction of larger licensed club premises and ultimately the development ambitions that would reshape Panthers in later decades.
Bruce Turner’s Footprints on the Banks of the Nepean reproduces the cover of Ausburn’s copy of the proposal supporting Penrith’s elevation to first grade competition in 1967. Although the full submission itself does not appear to have survived publicly, the surviving cover reflects the determination among local administrators to secure top-level rugby league representation for the growing Penrith district.
Contemporaries consistently remembered Ausburn not simply as an administrator, but as a personality. Family members and friends recalled his humour, generosity and capacity to engage people socially. Those qualities appear repeatedly in recollections of early Panthers culture.
His life was also marked by resilience. Following a serious motor vehicle accident, Ausburn endured long-term injuries and health complications, yet continued working and remained active in club affairs.
When he died unexpectedly in 1976 at the age of 55, Panthers tributes described him as one of the “small band of men who pushed the club onto its feet in the very beginning.”
Funeral procession for Ken “Poker” Ausburn, May 1976. The accompanying tribute panel reflects the respect held for Ausburn within the Penrith community and Panthers organisation. (Click image to enlarge)
Legacy
Ken “Poker” Ausburn is remembered as one of the local figures who helped give early Panthers its personality and community identity.
He represented an era when the club relied heavily upon volunteers, local businessmen, tradesmen and sporting enthusiasts whose commitment extended well beyond formal administrative duties.
Although later Panthers history would become associated with major commercial development, political influence and large-scale expansion, figures like Ausburn reflected the grassroots community culture from which the organisation originally emerged.
His reputation for humour, sincerity and loyalty ensured that his contribution remained warmly remembered long after his death.
The licensed club was going from strength to strength despite ongoing problems between its board and the football committee. This conflict was to plague Cowan for fourteen years. He would tell every board member in those years,
This club is never going to be truly successful until we bring it all together – the club and the football. We have to be totally united.
There had always been two bodies. Merv Cartwright was the first secretary of the football club, while Cowan managed the registered club.1
Prior to the commencement of the 1967 season, the board of the licensed club had been asked to approve a budget of £40,000 to cover all rugby league-related expenses for the year. At the end of the season, Cartwright informed the committee that he would need £90,000.
The blow-out of more than 100 per cent was a huge impost on a club that was still struggling to establish itself. At that time it was easily the smallest registered club supporting a first grade team. Cowan was furious. So much hard work had been put into making the club profitable and Cartwright appeared to have little regard for budgets and financial controls. He seemed to have the view that there was a bottomless pit of money. Cowan says there were absolutely no controls over the football spending, with money continually wasted on unnecessary things.
When he took the job on the three-month trial, Cowan was confident that if he worked hard for a few months he would be on top of it all and then could take it easy. He was halfway through a university course as an external student of Armidale University. His plan was to get everything sorted out, and once that was done, “I’ll have plenty of time to study and take some time off”.
It did not quite work out that way. At the beginning of 1967, after 16 months of working 7 days a week, Cowan took his first day off since taking on the job. The Cowan family enjoyed a four-day break, driving to Broken Hill and returning via Mildura. The university course was never touched again.
Football expenditure in 1968 again exceeded the budget, and a couple of other problems had arisen with Cartwright during the year.
Eventually they called an extraordinary meeting of members. Realising the controversial nature of the event, they invited the mayor, Bill Chapman, to be chairman for the day. The Board’s recommendation was for the licensed club to cease rugby league funding unless Merv Cartwright resigned.2
Directors involved with the club during that period later described Cartwright in mixed but revealing terms.
Merv was an excellent PR man. He had the ability to influence and manipulate people. He did do a lot to build rugby league in the area and was very involved in the campaign for Penrith to join first division.
But he had lots of problems managing the money. Merv was always overspending, and Roger was trying to build a reliable business. That’s where a lot of the friction started.
The issues underlying that recommendation were more complex than this account suggests, particularly in relation to the Club’s financial position and governance arrangements at the time.
Around 1,000 of the club’s 6,000 members attended, with 80 per cent supporting the recommendation.
Cartwright did resign and moves were made to heal the rift between the two boards.
Sydney Morning Herald — Saturday, 20th March 1971
The District Club committee approached Cowan and asked him to take over as Secretary of the football club, a move that surprised him, given the history. The committee members said that they hoped such a move might help build a more co-operative relationship between the two clubs.
Cowan decided to give it a try. The move gave him responsibility for both entities but after less than a year, the frustrations of managing both sides of the organisation while reporting to separate Boards with competing interests proved unworkable. So, Cowan began advocating his policy to unite them under one board and one CEO.
On two separate occasions after his removal as secretary, Cartwright ran foul of the board of the licensed club and had his membership suspended. The board was adamant that he would never be allowed back into the club. This issue remained unresolved for many years, and intensified, particularly when his sons started to show outstanding rugby league skills and were selected to play for the Panthers.
The board received regular written appeals to lift his suspension.
Long-time director Barry Hubbard (1973-85)3 told of the meetings in the years after Cartwright left:
Every AGM, Tom O’Connor, who was on the board at that time, would stand up and ask for the reinstatement of Merv Cartwright’s membership. This would get a very cool reception from the chairman, Ken [Poker] Ausburn, and the ensuing debates were the fieriest I experienced in my whole time on the board. Ausburn and O’Connor would scream at each other across the room, and O’Connor would invariably end the argument with the words, “It is not British justice that Merv Cartwright, who has done so much for rugby league in this area, is barred from this club”.
Hubbard says the resolution was always beaten, and Ausburn would rule that the matter was resolved and was not to be raised again for the rest of the year. Apart from O’Connor the entire board was against the reinstatement of Cartwright’s membership.
At times, the disputes became highly confrontational, even farcical. In a heated discussion at one of those AGMs, the deputy chairman, Murray Clarke, who was the most vocal critic of Cartwright, was told never to venture into St Marys. If he did, said the speaker, he would never get out alive. It was Clarke who had previously cited Cartwright to appear before the Board after allegedly abusing him and threatening him in public.
The removal of Cartwright was to have ramifications for Cowan far into the future. The two had repeatedly clashed. Cartwright and his supporters blamed Cowan, not the board, for the loss of his membership. It was a festering antagonism that wouldn’t go away. In fact, it was one of the many small pieces in an intricate maze of events that would place Roger Cowan before Ian Temby in June 2004.
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At this time, both football and licensed club operated under the single entity of Penrith District Rugby League Football Club (PDRLFC). Separate committees had oversight of the football and licensed club operations. Penrith Rugby League Club Ltd was established in June 1967 to take responsibility for the registered club. ↩︎
On Monday, 4 July 1966, the New South Wales Rugby League confirmed that Penrith and Cronulla would be admitted to the First Grade competition for the 1967 season.
Within the club, the decision was received as a defining moment. The July 1966 edition of the Penrith Rugby League Football Club Journal captured the announcement simply and emphatically on its cover: “We’ve Made It!”
Inside, the accompanying article described the promotion as “the biggest step forward ever taken in any sporting sphere in Penrith” and emphasised that it was the culmination of many years of work by club officials and supporters. It also acknowledged the contribution of civic leaders, including mayor Bill Chapman and town clerk Harold Corr, whose efforts were said to have played a significant role in the final decision.
The sense of achievement within the club is also reflected in later recollections. Coach Leo Trevena described the moment in more understated terms, recalling that when he heard the news, his reaction was immediate and practical: “The bell’s ringing; now the fight’s on.”
Different Reactions
Beyond the club, the reaction was more measured. Contemporary coverage in the Penrith Press focused on the implications of the decision — including improvements to facilities, increased junior opportunities and the challenge of competing at a higher level — rather than celebration.
The contrast between the club’s own presentation of the moment and the more restrained tone of the local press is notable.
The Sydney Morning Herald also highlighted how narrow the decision had been, including Wentworthville’s unsuccessful attempt to have the matter deferred following the announcement.
Three weeks later, Sydney Morning Herald journalist Alan Clarkson published a more cautious assessment of Penrith’s prospects, while acknowledging the club’s improving financial position and the support provided by the leagues club.
For Penrith, however, the significance was clear. Entry into First Division marked the transition from ambition to reality — and the beginning of a new phase in the club’s development.
The financial stability that had recently been established allowed Penrith to pursue something that had previously been out of reach — entry into the NSW Rugby League First Division.
Not long after Cowan took over as CEO1, the Penrith club had started making a push for one of two new spots that were being created in the First Division of the NSW Rugby League. It appeared that one of those holes had pretty much been filled by Cronulla. And while the credentials of the Penrith team were strong enough to give it a chance, the financial woes of the licensed club had to be overcome. Penrith needed to prove it had the resources to support a first division club. It also had to have sufficient player strength to be competitive.
The main rival for the position was Wentworthville. It was one of the most successful registered clubs in the state, had been the leading club in the Second Division competition for a number of years and was favoured to win the 1966 competition. It was a David and Goliath match up!
Early in 1966, Cowan advised the football committee that the club could confidently forecast a profit. The licensed club committee agreed it would support the bid for a place in the First Division competition. With a bit of extra money, the committee was able to pick up a number of established first grade players.
All stops were pulled out to build local support for the bid.
One of the more deliberate moves was the establishment of a monthly club magazine for members, largely written and produced by Cowan. Its aim was to push the First Division claim and stir up local support.2
Cowan also began to foster ties with Penrith mayor Bill Chapman and the town clerk, Harold Corr, both of whom would play key roles in Penrith’s promotion to first division.
The football committee led by Secretary Merv Cartwright, had worked strongly throughout the campaign.3
Another factor in Penrith’s favour was that Jack Argent, the Parramatta delegate to the New South Wales Rugby League, didn’t want Wentworthville in there, and he was very influential in those days. Roger Cowan s
Halfway through 1966, Penrith was able to prove to the NSW rugby league that it was profitable. Many factors contributed to the success of the bid, but we would never have got into First Division if the club had remained in the financial state it was. It was a narrow decision and we made it by the skin of our teeth. Six months earlier we would have had no chance of showing we could finance it.
Looking back, it seems logical that Penrith would be a better choice than Wentworthville, situated so close to Parramatta and competing for supporters. It was different back then though. Souths, Easts and Balmain were good examples of successful clubs competing in the same areas. The NSWRL showed great foresight in considering the geographical qualifications and Jack Argent made sure they did.
Penrith supporters today can reflect that it was a very close call. Just a couple of votes and Penrith would have remained in Second Division.
The entry of the Penrith Panthers into first grade was a time of great celebration in the young city of Penrith. The team would have mixed fortunes over the next 24 years. They first made the semi-finals in 1985 and won their first premiership in 1991.
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Cowan’s formal title was Secretary-Manager, the standard senior administrative role used by rugby league clubs at the time. ↩︎
The monthjly Club Journal is the precursor to The Panthers Magazine – which later becomes central to a number of governance issues. See Beyond the Book — The Panthers Magazine ↩︎
The campaign involved the efforts of many people, including club officials, local supporters and civic leaders such as Penrith mayor Bill Chapman and town clerk Harold Corr. Chapman and Corr were instrumental to the process. ↩︎
Penrith in the 60s was, in many ways, still a country town. Some of the trains were still steam hauled, and holidaymakers would pass through on their way to the Blue Mountains – or stop off and catch the Bales’ bus out to one of the many guesthouses at Wallacia, some ten miles out of town.
Through 1963-64, Roger Cowan continued teaching while acting as honorary treasurer of the football committee. What started out as an amicable relationship with Merv Cartwright gradually deteriorated into frequent clashes.
The registered club’s main function in those days was to finance rugby league.
In 1964, the registered club committee had agreed to a football budget of £10,000 and player contracts were agreed within that budget. Payday for the players was planned for the traditional end of season picnic on the banks of the Hawkesbury River — Bungool1.
When Cowan went to the club administration to organise the cheques for the players, he was informed that they didn’t have the money. He had no warning of the problem. Merv Cartwright who sat on the registered club committee and was also secretary of the football club, would known much earlier that the Club was in financial trouble — yet the football club had been allowed to proceed on its merry way without any warning.2
Before this Cowan had never thought about getting into club politics. It was this failure — the inability to meet its obligations to the players — that first motivated him to stand for election onto the committee of the licensed club – ‘to understand how £10,000 could be promised and not paid’.
He was elected, and soon after asked to take on the role of treasurer. It quickly became apparent that the club had virtually no systems of control. Dishonesty was widespread, enabled by the absence of basic procedures.
I started to look into why the club wasn’t making any money. We were losing money hand over fist. The bank was threatening to take action.One of the first things I did was to install control systems for poker machines. This included a monthly analysis of each of the 26 machines to ensure they were operating within carded percentages.
I also put as much time as I could into getting some systems operating. There was no system for stock control, no cash systems, there was nothing. I began with cash systems. We started to count the money, and balance it against the cash register tapes, and so on. Basic stuff, but it had never been done.
Cash control was a simple system before then. When trading finished for a shift, the cash would be taken to the vault and tipped into a large container with all the cash from other cash registers. Nobody checked the cash register tapes to see if there was a balance. Each morning the money in the container would be counted and banked.
Rumour has it that one employee boasted that he never bothered taking less than a twenty pound note when he wanted some cash. He bought a new car in less than 12 months working as a bar steward. After getting a system started, I came in one Sunday morning and discovered a £1,700 discrepancy between the cash register tapes and the money we had. That was a lot of money in those days for such a small club.’
At a special meeting, the board decided that the Secretary-Manager Rocky Davis wasn’t managing things properly, and asked for his resignation. There was no suggestion of dishonesty, only mismanagement.
The Club immediately advertised for a replacement. But the small size and low profile of the Club meant that the quality of candidates was not very high. After three months of advertising, they had still found nobody suitable. In the meantime, Cowan continued holding things together in his spare time – evenings and weekends – and continued to improve the systems.
I was doing the job anyway, as well as teaching. I was convinced in my own mind that I could put systems in place to make the place work. So I just said to the committee one night, “I’m prepared to resign from teaching. I’ll take the job for a trial period if you want to give it to me. And I’ll give you a guarantee that if I’m not making a profit within three months, I’ll resign and you can keep looking”. I agreed to commence on a very low salary.
That was October 1965. The Board agreed, and Cowan remained in the position continuously for almost 40 years.
There is a logical question here, of course. Here is a young man – 29 years old, married, four young kids. He’s a schoolteacher, which is a reasonably secure job for life. He suddenly decides to turn his whole life upside down. There is no contract, no security of tenure – just ‘give me three months to make a success of it. If not, I’ll go’.
Phyllis Cowan says it was the challenge.
He loved school teaching, he was an excellent teacher, but he didn’t like the system. I don’t think he wanted to be doing that for the rest of his life. Many people advised him against it at the time. But he always could have gone back to teaching, she said –- it was easier back then.
It was the challenge that attracted him, and kept him there, she said. He was being successful, the club was making money, it was growing, and he was introducing all these new measures. She spoke of a couple of nights in the early days when he took a blanket and pillow and sat on a roof where he could watch for the people that he knew were stealing stores from the club.
Under Cowan’s stewardship, the club began to more stable financially. The systems he implemented, some while acting as treasurer and others when he took the management role, had already begun to have an impact on the profitability of the business.
Within a year, the club had moved out of the red. For the first time, it had the financial stability needed to think beyond survival.
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Bungool’s location was at Cattai on the Hawkesbury River where Riverside Oaks Golf Resort is today. ↩︎
This failure became evident at the end-of-season Bungool picnic, when players could not be paid in full. See Beyond the Book:The Bungool Picnic. ↩︎
Panthers, Passion & Politics - The Roger Cowan Years 