Whatever the outcome of sexual assault allegations made against three Broncos players over an incident in a Brisbane nightclub last Saturday night, the club has a problem it cannot continue to ignore.

There has been much talk in the past 48 hours about the Broncos having one of the toughest player conduct codes in the game.

The axing of Julian O’Neill, Neville Costigan, Brett Seymour, Ian Lacey and John Te Reo are cited as examples of that toughness.

However, anyone who regularly goes out in Brisbane’s nightclub district when the Broncos are on the town could attest to a pattern of behaviour that should be unacceptable in any circumstances, let alone in such a high-profile sporting organisation.

That it has been allowed to continued unchecked speaks volumes for what the Brisbane public and proprietors of licensed premises are prepared to tolerate as acceptable from so-called sports stars and the perceived power of the club.

A night at a Broncos’ home game is not only very much a part of the social fabric of this state’s capital, it is where the big end of town in government and business meet to socialise and do deals.

The Broncos may no longer be Queensland’s team, but it is very much Brisbane’s team and loyalty to it runs deeper than is healthy.

Monday week ago I stood in the carpark at the chambers in Nambour before a council meeting and spoke by phone to a young woman who used to love rugby league.

From a central Queensland city, she had grown up in a culture where her dad and his mates would gather on a Friday night to enjoy a couple of beers and watch the Broncos play.

She told me how, since moving to Brisbane where she works in a central city bar and nightclub, she had come to hate the game.

“I see what they’re like close up and it’s ugly,’’ she told me. “I can’t watch the game any more.’’

The previous Saturday night, exactly one week before last weekend’s alleged sexual assault, she had been abused in the most disgusting manner by several Broncos players as she went about her work.

Two of those players have been named as persons of interest in relation to the incident at the Allhambra nightclub.

The girl I spoke to had previously, and briefly, gone out with a young Broncos player. Just why that should spark the foul-mouthed abuse she received in full view of her employer, other staff and customers, she had no idea. But it left her shaken and mortified.

The players were ejected from the premises, the floor manager later vowing to have nothing further to do with promotions involving the football club.

Drunk and arrogant with it, they then stumbled out into the street, throwing food and reportedly pilfering drinks from the counter of a bar across the road.

Nightclub patrons with mobile phones recorded these antics, a “ha, ha, check out the Broncos” moment to share with their friends.

Perhaps unfortunately for the club, no one made an official complaint to either police or the Broncos.

One of our reporters spoke to the girl, her boss and the manager of the bar from which drinks were taken. All gave similar accounts of what had occurred.

The girl, understandably given the way she was treated as she tried to go about earning a living and doing her job, did not want to be named.

Floor managers are floor managers and his hotel’s owners did not want to press the matter. The other manager was not prepared to go it alone with a complaint.

And so another game was played and another Saturday night came around and once again the Broncos were out on the drink.

Broncos management may genuinely be unaware of the pattern of behaviour in the heart of town that is turning fans off their home team.

But it is difficult to believe that no one has had a quiet word in the ear of someone of influence.

The days of “nothing happened if no one made an official complaint’’ should have been long banished from the approach of a professional sporting organisation.

It was the height of cynicism for the club to use Ben Tennant, a Mormon and non-drinker, to front the media after news broke of the assault complaint.

Or was that an indication of how desperate the club has become in its attempts to hide the elephant in the room?

Broncos CEO Bruno Cullen has announced that, as well as the police investigation, an internal investigation will look at the matter. It is not before time.