==Only club excluded?== 

 Sorry to be a pain but I think this is incorrect: "...in 1998 and a 14-team competition by 2000, South Sydney were the sole club from 15 applicants to be cut from the premiership at the end of the 1999 season."  There were three classes of criteria that clubs needed to meet in order to take one of the 14 licenses: 'basic criteria', 'qualifying criteria' (which provided licenses to the one-team city clubs) and the 'selection criteria' which was applied to the remaining 10 applying clubs. While it is true that Souths were the only team out of the final 10 to miss out on a license based on the 'selection criteria',North Sydney Bears had already been exlcuded based on the first criteria (solvency). This is why when the Northern Eagles folded the license reverted to Manly whose license the Northern Eagles were using. So, it should be '16 applicants' and 'both Souths and Norths being excluded'.