Basketball On The Internet.

THE South Australian State Government should bite the bullet and buy the Adelaide Arena from the Commonwealth Bank, then sell it to basketball for $1.

Every financial struggle the sport has experienced in SA since it made the decision to erect its own purpose-built venue (its third major centre for the times, having led the nation with Forestville Stadium in 1953, then Apollo Stadium in 1969) is either directly or indirectly the fault of the Government.

Here we are in SA, finding relief the Commonwealth Bank tomorrow will give the Adelaide 36ers (hopefully) a workable lease which will preserve the 2012-13 iiNet NBL Championship at Adelaide Arena.

But the Bank, which won ownership of the venue through the courts from Eddy Groves when he defaulted on his loan, still is intent on selling it, so we basically have a "stay of execution" until after the season in April, 2013.

Then it's going to be another frantic scramble to save a venue (built by basketball for basketball and recognised nationwide by basketball as being the best for basketball), from being converted into a church or something.

Crazy.

Basketball in SA has pretty much tried to be the master of its own destiny since the early 50s when men like our pioneering Hall of Famers such as the late, great Merv Harris and Keith Miller mortgaged their homes to get Forestville Stadium built.

Then another of our late greats, Frank Angove, was at the forefront of the push for the building of the Apollo and when that baby was finally paid off, there were celebrations and great justified pride in what had been achieved.

Who knew the NBL would come along and change the sport's landscape so dramatically?

As the 36ers capitalised largely on what West Adelaide initially had created (Bearcats imports Al Green and Leroy Loggins were the first bona fide American superstars to regularly keep filling the place) it soon became evident even the 3000+ facility would not be enough to accommodate the team's incredible statewide support.

On more occasions than anyone would care to revisit, State Governments of differing ideologies purported to have an "entertainment centre" on their drawing boards so basketball waited  patiently to be a part of that action.

But it was more about inaction as far as the politicians were concerned until, yet again, basketball decided it once more had to go it alone.

So in 1992, the Clipsal Powerhouse was opened for business, the Premier at the time, John Bannon, making the declaration.

Figure projections based on how much the sport had earnt at Apollo by its use as a multi-purpose venue for concerts and other activities, meant the expectation was the Powerhouse would be paid off in around a decade.

And it would have been, too, had not the State Government, after years of to-ing and fro-ing (always wanted to write that) finally built its own Adelaide Entertainment Centre.

Seemingly overnight, Adelaide went from a city with no indoor entertainment facility capable of catering to more than 3,500, to boasting TWO that were 7,500-plus!

And what did the Government do?

To ensure it had a monopoly at Adelaide Entertainment Centre on interstate and international acts coming into the city (after all, it didn't want to be seen to have built an unnecessary white elephant) it was party to a raft of restrictions on the Powerhouse's usage.

Effectively, the Powerhouse could stage basketball events and precious little else. Ah, but to compensate this slight inconvenience, it gave the Basketball Association of SA an annual $250,000 for its trouble.

(Of course, when you are repaying $1mill-plus annually, "receiving" $250,000 is little more than a joke.)

Hamstrung from using the venue as an income source as had originally been estimated, of course BASA could not maintain the loan repayments.

So who do we blame here? Bad administrators?

No. I blame the Government. One hundred per cent.

So the sport slumps into the toilet and sells assets such as Athol Park Stadium to gather a bucket of financial water it can throw into its swirling ocean of debt.

Ok, I will concede that may have been a bad administrative decision but these were now desperate people.

Notice, as the mire deepened, less and less was/could be spent on the 36ers team which, consequently, went from a "powerhouse" to the outhouse relatively quickly.

(We can talk about salary cap breaches and rorts another time. I'm not trying to paint people here as saints. But on the venue issue, they have been very harshly treated.)

So the Clipsal Powerhouse becomes the Distinctive Homes Dome and now, the Adelaide Arena.

In between, BASA is in such debt, the Government steps in to sell its assets. Thank you so much to our Government friends and allies.

Eddy the Avenging Angel comes flying in on his winged stallion, winning the rights to the venue AND the 36ers with a bid of $3.95million. His partner and the man to be 36ers owner, is none other than Mal Hemmerling, one of the Government's most popular "entrepreneurs" and Adelaide City Council CEO at the time.

Link Engineering boss Vince Marino buys Adelaide Lightning, forever to be scorned for it by a small section of our ungrateful basketball community, despite the fact if he had not, the state would not have a WNBL team now.

(Let's get into his motivations another time. No-one else, including the BSA, put up their hand.)

And further, the Government's task force to set the basketball ship on course, leads us up the path we now have with the sport slowly going from vibrant to inert.

And so, life rolls on until Eddy gets thrown under the bus by his US business ventures.

And thus begins a multi-year ordeal for present 36ers management, Basketball SA, Lightning and SA Country Basketball, who all call Adelaide Arena "home".

Oh, and by the way, the annual $250,000 the State Government is supposed to hand over to compensate for not being allowed to hold concerts at Adelaide Arena? That just gets (legally?) overlooked along the way, around the time Eddy takes venue ownership.

So here we sit, the Commonwealth Bank now the default owners of a basketball venue which seats 7,800 rabid patrons (close to 5,000 of which STILL keep coming out to support a few very lack lustre 36ers teams) and a problem still lurking on the horizon in April.

Meanwhile our State Government can blow $85million on a Bradman Stand at Adelaide Oval, then budget for a further $450-$500million for that ground's redevelopment, having already built a netball venue and an athletics stadium. Oh yes, let's not forget hockey or the velodrome or the $40million being set aside for a footbridge to cross the River Torrens to Adelaide Oval.

Footy? Cricket? Hey guys, come on in, the wallet is open.

Basketball? You guys can go on the "far queue".

Like I said at the start, it's time the State Government bit the bullet and, for the first time, REALLY did the right thing for our sport.

Basketball built the stadium and the sport should own it.

Adelaide Arena should be allowed to become the multi-purpose venue it was designed to be and sports such as netball (for their bigger events), volleyball, indoor soccer, European handball ALL should come to regularly use it.

The Government should laud and applaud a sport which has forever been driven and pro-active (maybe not so now but we're talking about the visionaries who weren't prepared to sit back and wait). It simply could take one railing off the footbridge so it can afford to buy Adelaide Arena and give it back to basketball.

If Adelaide ever bids for a Commonwealth Games, the more facilities it has, the better.

With all due respect to any and every religion out there, Beverley doesn't need the Arena to become a church.

It needs a Government to be a saviour.

Amen.