John O'Neill (businessman)

John O'Neill (1951 - ) is an Australian sporting administrator. He has been involved with both rugby union and football (soccer) at the national level, after being head of the NSW State Bank.

He was formerly CEO of the Australian Rugby Union, instrumental in staging the 2003 Rugby World Cup. In 2004 O'Neill was appointed head of the newly created Football Federation Australia by businessman Frank Lowy, a position he will remain in until March 2007..

Rugby union

O'Neill held the position as chief executive of Australian Rugby Union between 1995 and 2003.

The 2003 Rugby World Cup was originally scheduled to be hosted by Australia and New Zealand. However in April 2002, the IRB decided that Australia would be the sole host of the tournament after the ARU, led by O'Neill, made a proposal to that effect.[1] Upon visiting New Zealand with Kiwis unserstandably upset with this decision, O'Neill described himself as "surprisingly well recognised" and that he "walked through the crowd at Eden Park at one point and that was an adventure. I used that old Paul Keating bit of advice 'don't make eye contact'." He said further that he is "probably a better known face there(N.Z.) than I am here(Australia), which is terrifying."[2]

Prior to the 2003 Rugby World Cup, after the International Rugby Board decided that "no formal musical performance will be permitted other than the playing of the national anthems", O'Neill described the decision not to allow the singing of waltzing matilda as a "half-pregnant situation where you can sing it but not when the players are on the paddock."[3] He attracted much media attention with the statement, even starting a media campaign which included Sally Loane and Alan Jones. John Howard even suggested that "its ridiculous".[4]

O'Neill is credited with the successful organisation of the 2003 Rugby Union World Cup which made the ARU a handsome profit of over 30 million dollars. A genius of sport's organisation, O'Neill was named Sport Executive Of The Year 2003. O'Neill left the ARU just after the World Cup. ending his contract a year early. He was described as "flamboyant" by Tim Glover, a journalist [5].

In December 2003, O'Neill announced that he would not seek a renewal of his contract with the ARU. Andrew Stevenson, a journalist for the SMH's Rugby Union website "Rugby Heaven", described the decision as having been reached at a board meeting with the ARU. Stevenson describes the following reasons for the sacking of John O'Neill:

"he was offside with members for a number of reasons - and top of the list was his ego.

There were serious concerns within the ARU that he had turned the World Cup into "the John O'Neill show".

It started when he agreed to take part in a television documentary that focused heavily on him.

There was also concern that he was always with Prime Minister John Howard. It was felt that ARU president Peter Crittle should have taken that role.

There was a feeling that he didn't offer enough praise for the success of the World Cup to the hard-working Carroll, who played a massive part in the success. ARU insiders were of the view he didn't receive enough acclaim.

O'Neill had also lost the support of the majority of Wallabies players and there is irony in the fact that skipper George Gregan is now putting the finishing touches to a new deal.

O'Neill and Gregan had a frosty relationship and only just managed to work together professionally.

It was a poorly kept secret among the Wallabies that O'Neill did not want Gregan as captain and he was even suspected of leaking stories to the News Limited media to destabilise the skipper. O'Neill strongly denies the claims. {Note this was written despite the fact that O'Neill had resigned George Gregan as captain [6]}

O'Neill lost the players' support during the battle over World Cup pay." [7]

O'Neill "decided to move on earlier", as the prestigious rugby.com.au website described it, from the ARU in January 2004, instead of the end of his contract in December 2004. O'Neill described his decision thus"I said during the Tournament that I would take a family holiday and think about my future over the Christmas, New Year period. Since then, I have had the chance to reflect on the Tournament and its acclaimed success and my eight fruitful years at the helm and have decided that now is the best time for Australian Rugby and me to move on with Rugby at such a high point."

Bob Tuckey, chairman of the ARU said "On behalf of the Board I would like to thank John for the outstanding contribution he has made to Rugby. We have just staged the best ever Rugby World Cup and John will leave the game with a much enhanced profile and a significant supporter base." O'Neill himself said "The Board and I have accordingly agreed to bring forward my departure. The ARU and Rugby are in great shape with excellent people and a very bright future."[8]

In 2004, he defended the ARU over an argument between it and the NSWRU over rugby league footballer Andrew Johns.

A prominent journalist within the rugby union community, Spiro Zavos, wrote in his weekly column with the SMH arguing for the return of John O'Neill to the ARU in 2006[9].

Soccer

Within a week of leaving the ARU, O'Neill was appointed by what is now the Football Federation Australia to help reorganise their game. The Australian Soccer Association had at that point debts of over A$16 million a year and its national competition had an average attendance of little more than 4000. Its previous administration was overturned with Frank Lowy taking over the reins to create a new national football competition.

O'Neill has been instrumental in creating a much higher profile for football. O'Neill oversaw the introduction of the A-League which reduced the number of teams in the national competition to 8, representing the economically sound regions of Sydney, Melbourne, Brisbane, Perth, Adelaide, Newcastle, New Zealand and the Central Coast of New South Wales. The first year of the A-League saw the competition average over 10000 per game and the grand final sold out at Aussie Stadium in Sydney.

Nationally, O'Neill had guaranteed Australia coach Frank Farina's job to the World Cup, but after a poor Confederations Cup campaign he sacked Farina and was instrumental in securing Guus Hiddink as the national team coach. Under Hiddink's guidance, Australia did better than expected, not only qualifying for the 2006 FIFA World Cup, but finishing 2nd in group F to progress to the round on 16. Australia was knocked after contentiously losing to Italy, the eventual world cup winners.

On August 29, 2006, O'Neill announced his decision not to seek a renewal of his contract, which expires in March. This was despite the fact that less than two years earier he had said "I would not want to leave unfinished business, so I would be looking at least five years"[10]. Citing personal reasons for his decision to step down, despite rumours in the media that there was tension between O'Neill and Lowy,[11] he described his involvement with football as "an exhilarating ride and while we’ve achieved so much, the potential to take the game even further is enormous". FFA chairman Frank Lowy said "John established the foundation for 'New Football' and he's achieved tremendous success during the past three years,".