Southern Expansion was a failure.
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It was emphatically rejected by the public.
So while former NSW premier and long-time Dragons fan Morris Iemma has valid criticism of St George Illawarra's plight, it's a bit rich to be firing shots, as if his bid for the struggling NRL club would have been some grand saviour.
Here they are at 0-4, preparing to face bitter southern Sydney rivals the Sharks on Sunday, after an emergency board meeting to firm up support for coach Paul McGregor, at least in the short-term.
And like global politics in these times of crisis, the Dragons are fraying at the seams again as they search for answers.
Iemma, the ex-Southern Expansion chairman and Hurstville MP with his loyalty firmly in the old Kogarah camp, joined the pile-on.
"It's a club whose only ambition is to just be there," Iemma told the Sydney Morning Herald.
"Meanwhile, other clubs are competing for premierships. It's a simple betrayal of what the Dragons should stand for. We've become a symbol of mediocrity."
They're running last and haven't scored a try in 177 minutes of playing time, so mediocrity would be a blessing right now. But let's add some context.
The Gordon family WIN Corporation empire took over the Steelers share in 2018 and with Andrew Gordon the chairman, effectively took control of the club.
Iemma was the driving force behind one of the other two bids, which came about after Southern Expansion's failed attempt at gaining entry into the A-League.
The geographical behemoth had support from the St George, Sutherland and South Coast football associations and relevant councils.
But despite having the biggest player catchment and a cashed-up Chinese investor, was despised by the football-loving public, particularly in the Illawarra, because it had no identity.
As a result, Football Federation Australia went with the significantly more organic Macarthur bid and instead left the carrot dangling in front of the Wollongong Wolves, if promotion, relegation and a second division is ever to materialise.
They couldn't make Southern Expansion sing, so Iemma's team turned its focus to the NRL.
And this column is hardly a love letter to WIN Corporation and the Gordon family.
They've made a significant contribution to bail out the Steelers and Illawarra rugby league, but if you're going to take control of an NRL club, you have a mandate to make it successful.
The Dragons have won just two of their past 17 games, both against the Gold Coast, under McGregor, which is clearly unacceptable.
A very influential NRL official told this columnist a key reason the Gordon bid was approved, was to ensure the Illawarra's share of games and toehold in the competition.
The clear inference was the alternative provided a much more bleak outlook about Illawarra's NRL future.
The third bid has since been revealed as Sydney Kings owner Paul Smith, who lives on the South Coast and has every reason to support the region.
All of this political background brings us back to the fault lines within St George Illawarra. Dragons captain Cameron McInnes this week denied the playing group was split over issues dating back to Jack de Belin's rape charges last year.
As this column wrote last Saturday the 'allegations brought unwanted external scrutiny and while it may not have split the playing group, it produced some passionate and polarising opinions internally about it'.
But the issues run much deeper than player unrest and McGregor's future.
When McGregor was appointed full-time, it prevented a push for 2010 premiership coach Wayne Bennett's return, largely coming from the Kogarah faction.
The greatest failing of the Dragons after lifting the Provan-Summons trophy was their complete inability to plan ahead, particularly when Bennett had geared the salary cap into a short-term, premiership-or-bust strategy.
They cleaned up the mess, only to set off on a new path of disappointment.
Now new chief executive Ryan Webb has put his feet under the desk with an overflowing plate of problems in front of him. What happens next could define the entire club's future.
