From King Wally to Gordie and Madge. The Brisbane Broncos soap opera rolls on |
From King Wally to Gordie and Madge. The Brisbane Broncos soap opera rolls on
March 27, 2026 — 10:18am
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John Ribot will always remember the day the Broncos announced they had shot Bambi.
After just two years in the competition, Wayne Bennett had sacked Wally Lewis as captain following the 1989 season.
“I had to be the bearer of bad news then. It was the first public hanging in Brisbane for a hundred or so years,” quipped Ribot, the club’s inaugural chief executive, who was in charge when the club won its first two titles in 1992 and 1993.
“That was probably the most controversial thing we did - we had to tell Wally we had to move him on.”
In the code’s extensive catalogue of soap operas, the powerhouse Brisbane Broncos have featured regularly since their entry to the then NSWRL in 1988.
But even by their lofty standards for generating headlines, the past two months have been noteworthy.
It kicked off with the revelation that Payne Haas would be leaving for South Sydney after this season and a mountain of conjecture about head coach Michael Maguire that came with it.
Then they surprisingly lost the World Club Challenge to Hull KR and dropped their first two NRL games as they started the defence of their 2025 premiership.
In the background has been a deepening gulf between the Broncos and former captain Gorden Tallis, a sustained detractor of Maguire and the Brisbane hierarchy.
A first win of the season, against Craig Bellamy’s Storm in Melbourne no less, appeared a panacea to the Broncos’ early 2026 woes on and off........