NRL Grand Final Goes Without Pre-Game Show as Tones and I Talks Collapse

For the first time in recent history, the NRL grand final will run without pre-game entertainment. The absence follows the collapse of negotiations with Tones and I, the ARIA award-winning singer behind "Dance Monkey," who was leaked this week as having turned down an offer to perform at next weekend's decider.

The rugby league boss Peter V'landys said negotiations broke down due to "artistic differences." Some reports claimed the singer declined because she did not want to perform her biggest hit.

The breakdown has produced conflicting accounts. The Guardian, which first reported the story on 24 September, framed the dispute as a three-way standoff: "Emma, the NRL and Tones and I seem to be at war – but I can't make sense of what's going on," the outlet wrote, referring to the singer by her given name, Toni Watson, whose stage name abbreviates "Tones and I."

At the centre of the affair is a striking number. Reports put the declined offer at $90,000 a minute – a figure that, if accurate, would place the short pre-game set among the most lucrative per-minute performance fees in Australian sport. Neither the NRL nor the singer's representatives have publicly confirmed the exact terms.

"Dance Monkey," released in 2019, became one of the most streamed songs by an Australian artist, topping charts in more than 30 countries and earning Tones and I multiple ARIA awards. Her reluctance to revisit the song live, if that is what scuppered the deal, would not be unprecedented: artists from Radiohead to Ariana Grande have publicly resisted performing their signature hits.

V'landys's use of the phrase "artistic differences" – language more familiar from band breakups than sports administration – has done little to clarify matters. The NRL has not said whether it will seek a replacement act or proceed with no entertainment at all, a first for the grand final in recent memory.

The singer has not publicly responded to the leak. The Guardian's full account promises to unpick what "actually went down," noting that "everyone has a different story" about the failed negotiation.

The episode leaves the NRL scrambling less than a week out from its showpiece event, and leaves open the question of whether one of Australia's most commercially successful pop exports will ever perform her defining song on a stadium stage again.