"again a decision to only please the 20 who play euro."
It may please them, but it would surely please the WNBL a lot more to have them back here.
Batkovic, Summerton, Camino, Grima, Randall, Wilson, O'Hea, MacLeod, Richards, Screen, Porter ... some pretty handy players to potentially get back into the league, which is really suffering at the moment due to lack of depth. The current situation will have long term negative effects on the Opals as well IMO if it continues.
Obviously the media is AFL-focussed in the winter, but how much media does the WNBL get anyway?
I think of far more concern would be the ripple effects of this move into the next tier of leagues around the nation.
They would have faced this same clash pre-2000, before the WNBL switched to summer, so I'm assuming it shouldn't be a huge problem to deal with.