After 25 years in hibernation, the Bears are preparing to roar

Less than a year out from the 2027 season kick-off, how are the Perth Bears sizing up?

Key signings include Melbourne Storm’s Tyran Wishart, the son of successful league player Rod Wishart, who will likely play hooker or five-eighth, and goal kicker Nick Meaney, who has signed for three years.

In total, the Bears have announced the signing of 16 players, including Cronulla-Sutherland Sharks second rowers Siosifa Talakai, who played for NSW in the 2022 State of Origin and Scott Sorensen, who has won four grand finals with the Penrith Panthers.

The lineup also includes three Super League UK players: Hull F.C. centre Harry Newman and Leeds Rhinos’ Mikołaj Olędzki (prop) and James McDonnell (second row).

Former Canberra Raiders coach Mal Meninga was announced as the Bears’ inaugural coach in June last year. Last month he set a goal of taking home a premiership in the team's first year. “You’ve got to have ambition,” he said.

What next: The Perth Bears will need to lock down their roster of up to 30 players before pre-season training starts in November.

Meninga has said the Bears are in talks with “a few Rabbitohs players” but that the team was being patient about new signings.

“We want to have money still in our [salary] cap to make sure if a big fish, or a couple of big fish, come on the market, we’re ready to go,” he said. 

Details about becoming a Perth Bears member will be released “in a matter of weeks”, according to CEO Anthony De Ceglie. 

Any crumbs for North Sydney Bears fans?: While the Perth Bears have previously committed to playing one game a year at North Sydney Oval, some key figures have different ideas.

“North Sydney Oval is too small,” former Bears star Billy Moore said on the Perth Bears podcast. “We’ve got to take that [one Sydney home] game every year to the Sydney Football Stadium.”

A tough sell: Perth is competing for available talent with the Papua New Guinea Chiefs, a new franchise that will launch for the 2028 NRL season. 

Wests Tigers captain Jarome Luai has been lured to the Chiefs, in part due to the fact the club can offer players tax-free salaries. Perth cannot match that, but may argue the lifestyle has more to offer.

Travel — flights of up to five hours — will be a key challenge for any players joining either club. 

This is not the first time a rugby league franchise has set up on the West Coast.

In the mid-1990s, the Western Reds played two seasons in the ARL (now the NRL) and one in the breakaway Super League competition, before becoming a casualty of the truce between the warring sides.

Building a loyal and patient fanbase is a top priority for the club, which is setting up shop in an AFL state.

Meninga reckons it will be at least five years before local talent may be brought on to the team. He has announced plans to open an academy in Perth in hopes of laying the foundation for future players. 

On the North Shore, the Bears have strong local support. A foundation club, the Bears were formed in 1908 and won premierships in 1921 and 1922. 

A casualty of the Super League war — a commercial rivalry resulting in a reduction of league teams in 1999 — the Bears merged with the Manly Warringah Sea Eagles to become the Northern Eagles in 2000. 

The team collapsed and reverted to the Sea Eagles in 2002, leaving the Bears without a cave.