BIGGEST feedback to the Wednesday Whinge in the past week has been dissatisfaction with the calendar for the new racing year released recently by Racing Queensland.
Here are just a couple of examples which we hope gets the message across:
DAVID J of BRISBANE writes:
“THE pathetic effort at a new Racing Calendar for the coming season is another reason there needs to be some major head-lopping from the top down at Racing Queensland.
Most of us who have been involved or following the industry in the north for more years than we care to remember would start with the RQ Board Chairman Matt McGrath but this bloke from Sydney has just been appointed after many believe he created the role for himself when he completed the Review.
Lachlan Murray might be a good bloke who has tried hard but the general opinion of those who have watched him doing the job as Interim CEO is that he is a ‘lightweight who isn’t up to the task.’
Don’t dispense with his services but find him a more suitable under-study role.
Under the leadership of McGrath and Murray racing in Queensland is heading on a downward roller-coaster spiral. If Murray is appointed permanent CEO, the dead-wood First Lieutenants he has will no doubt also hold their jobs.
Forget about the lack of foresight in planning the new Racing Calendar, the biggest embarrassment for the sport in Queensland is in the outback where there are insufficient jockeys to enable runners to start.
I read a report that the owners of 20 horses missed a run on the five-race Mt Isa card last weekend because there were only five available riders at the track. This is an absolute disgrace which just keeps happening every weekend.
What is Lachlan Murray or the duo he relies on most – the RQ Racing and Country Managers – doing about it? SFA, just like the high rollers at Deagon HQ’s before them.
Spare a thought for Greg Blanchard, a gentleman who I don’t know that has been telling them how to correct this problem for years – but they treat him like he’s an idiot. Truth be known, Greg would do a better job as Country Racing Manager than the one who is earning big bucks right now.
RQ desperately needs someone like Mary Collyer to right the ship and clean out the dead-wood. She was the first lady to chair a major Australian race club (Doomben) and in trying circumstances did a terrific job.
And while we’re talking of replacements many believe that Matt Nicholls, now looking for a job after the on-line newspaper he was running in Mt Isa hit hard financial times, would make a great CEO. Just read what he writes. It makes a lot of sense. He knows racing in the city and the country. And best of all he thinks there are too many of those making decisions with backgrounds in corporate bookmaking but little grass roots knowledge of the overall industry.’
‘WHAT A HOPELESS BUNCH WE HAVE CREATING A RACING CALENDAR IN QLD’
GLEN J of TOWNSVILLE writes:
‘MATT Nicholls was right when he wrote that the closer you look at the new Queensland Racing Calendar the worst it gets.
Have the people at RQ drawing up the programming got any idea or do they just largely cut and paste from the previous 12 months to make their jobs easier?
Matt was so right to suggest that neither the NRL nor the AFL would have allowed such a pathetic document to be released. One wonders what input did the Sydney-based new Chairman of RQ (Matt McGrath) or his chosen one for CEO (Lachlan Murray) have?
If it comes to anyone being thrown under the bus for this pathetic effort at producing an attractive Racing Calendar, it will no doubt be RQ Racing and Strategy Manager Ross Gove and RQ Country Manager David Horne? Were they among the ones celebrating as guests of the Brisbane Racing Club recently?
Half the problem with not having the right people doing the right jobs at RQ lays at the feet of former CEO Jason Scott. He reportedly hand-picked Murray and Horne from the corporate bookmaking industry, where all they are worried about are major meetings that attract the most turnover.’
