The NRL has made their stance on fans and their talent receiving a COVID-19 vaccination clear recently through the “Let’s Tackle This Together” advertising campaign.

New South Wales’ current lockdown forced the competition to be moved to Queensland to keep the season alive in mid-July, an expensive move by the NRL that ARL chairman Peter V’Landys confirmed was going to cost millions of dollars.

V’Landys has once again reinforced the game’s stance on players getting vaccinated this morning on Channel Nine, urging them to receive their vaccination.

“I think they’re going to have to come to the party because they won’t be able to travel, between states, between countries,” said V’Landys.

“It will be a natural progression where, if they want to play rugby league or play sport, they’re going to have to vaccinate.

“We’re not going to force them. It’s freedom of choice, but they have to bear the consequences. They may have to be put in a bubble, they may have to be treated differently.

 
“We’re in the hands of governments, and governments may not allow us to go to New Zealand, or go to Queensland, or go to Victoria, without them being vaccinated.

“So the destiny’s in their own hands.”

The NRL has claimed that three-quarters of its staff have already received their first dose and that they are striving to be the first sports organisation in the country to have 100% of their players and staff fully vaccinated.

Peter V’Landys statement today comes not too long after reports that the Sydney Roosters are set to announce that they will only allow fully vaccinated fans to attend their home games in 2022, with the Sydney Football Stadium rebuild set to be complete just in time for the finals. Other clubs will likely follow suit.

For now, the NRL is gearing up for its 24th finals series since we returned to a united competition in 1998, with the first-placed Melbourne Storm to kick things off tomorrow night in a blockbuster with the fourth-placed Manly Warringah Sea Eagles. Then a Townsville doubleheader takes place on Saturday between the fifth-placed Sydney Roosters going up against the eighth-placed Gold Coast Titans, and the second-placed Penrith Panthers against the third-placed South Sydney Rabbitohs before we finish things off on Sunday afternoon when the sixth-placed Parramatta Eels take on the seventh-placed Newcastle Knights.