The NRL may consider stepping in and potentially even taking the Wests Tigers’ licence off their controversy-plagued owners after fresh board chaos this week.
The Holman Barnes Group, the Tigers’ majority stakeholder, is again in turmoil after chief executive Daniel Paton stood down pending an investigation in mysterious circumstances.
Paton, who is a Tigers director, was abruptly placed on leave following an emergency board meeting at the club’s Wests Ashfield base on Wednesday night.
It’s understood Paton was made to wait in the corridor outside the meeting room as HBG chairman Dennis Burgess arrived with a lawyer and told fellow board members that allegations had been made against the CEO.
The claims were not shared in the meeting, leading two HBG directors to abstain from a vote to stand Paton aside. It’s believed Paton has also not been made aware of the nature of the allegations against him.
HBG and Paton were contacted for comment.
The development is the latest in several years of turbulence at the $100 million licensed club operation, which has a 90 per cent share in the Tigers and has the balance of power on the joint-venture’s board.
The bloodletting and dysfunction has now reached a level where the NRL may contemplate intervening.
At the extreme end of possibilities, it could weigh up stripping HBG of its licence to run an NRL team.
Whether it gets that far remains to be seen, but there is a growing belief that something needs to be done about the Tigers’ ownership.
HBG is effectively the Western Suburbs side of the merged entity that was formed in 1999 between Balmain and the Magpies.
It is rich with poker machine takings but amid interminable infighting it has overseen an NRL team that has not made a finals series for 15 years and rarely threatened to.
The Tigers are run separately to HBG, but far from being immune to the travails of the leagues club, they are inextricably linked to it.
It has the numbers to call the shots on the Tigers board after dispensing with the notion of an independent-run board last year less than 12 months after it had been put in place.
That episode cost the Tigers their seasoned CEO Shane Richardson, who resigned only 18 months into a four-year contract.
Just days after HBG reclaimed control at the Tigers, coach Benji Marshall was re-signed for three additional seasons until the end of 2030 , reportedly without provisions that allow the club to part ways with him without a full payout.
While the Tigers still have faith in Marshall’s ability to return them to the top eight, it has left them facing the prospect of a multi-million dollar settlement with him should their fortunes not improve and they decide to replace him.
Behind the scenes at HBG, there is friction about the organisation’s shift into soccer, in particular its backing of the A-League’s Central Coast Mariners.
Paton, who was HBG’s chief financial officer for nine years before becoming CEO in August 2025, was the driving force behind the deal, under which it has assumed the reins of the Mariners’ women’s team and become a minority investor in the men’s side.
It effectively rescued the Mariners’ women’s side from oblivion after they were left out of a club takeover by the group behind English soccer’s Queens Park Rangers.
However, the spending of HBG resources on another code has angered Magpies loyalists, who believe it is money that should be directed towards Wests and rugby league.
HBG also bought a stake in APIA Leichhardt FC and soccer administrator Frank Primerano has become a leading voice as deputy chairman and a Tigers board member.
The conflict at HBG could be played out in the NSW Supreme Court in coming months after ousted director and former Tigers board member Tony Andreacchio and his wife Denise launched legal action three weeks ago .
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