The Great Sydney balls-up

[timthefish]

Originally posted by liz
Getting 7 year old kids to play AFL doesn't seem to be very hard. Right from 1996 onwards, when the first GF appearance marked the start of the Swans starting to be taken seriously by Sydney, the AFL has reported consistent growth in Auskick numbers in the Greater Sydney region. One would expect that the premiership will create a spike in those participating.

you couldn't be more right about the importance of this transition period for young players in schools. i think this is starting to happen to some extent but there is a huge way yet to go.

[goswannie14]

Originally posted by SimonH
The problem is that after the disastrous Kangaroos in Sydney putsch of the late 90s/early 2000s, surely even the AFL administration would be aware of what's obvious to all Sydneysiders: if you just turn up and say 'We're here! Love us!', you can expect to regularly get fewer than 10,000 paying customers to your games. If you reckon you can survive on that for 10 years while you build up loyalty and a fan-base, then good luck to you.

That's the sort of crowds North Melbourne/Kangaroos have been getting for years, but the league keeps propping them up.

Timthefish...sounds like you should be running NSW/ACT AFL. Great work.

[Old Royboy]

TTF, some terrific ideas on local development, but relocating Melbourne clubs is not I think an option.

The problem with the AFL is that is it is in reality not the AFL ? it is in fact still the VFL with six interstate clubs tacked on as window dressing. Relocating struggling clubs is NOT the solution. The core support of any club in a new area will be pre-existing Aussi Rules fans. If say North Melbourne or Footscray were to relocate they instantly alienate about 95% of those existing fans in whatever area they go to - because those fans have loyalties to other clubs and wouldn?t be seen dead supporting them. A brand new club with local affiliation would have a much better chance of success. This is the reason it took so long for our club to develop a decent Sydney supporter base. North Melbourne?s pitiful attempts in Sydney and now Canberra prove this point.

I reckon at least 4 of the Melbourne suburban clubs should be relegated back to the VFL. This would leave room for 2 NEW expansion clubs with the Gold Coast the most obvious first expansion club, then Western Sydney down the track. If a new expansion club on the Gold Coast was based around the Southport team or a relocated Footscray, which would generate more support?

Until the AFL rids itself of it?s Viccentric administration it will not make any significant progress to being the undisputed premier competition in the land. Impoverished Melbourne suburban clubs are millstones around the competition?s neck it can ill afford, but while Vlad and his gang of idiots are in charge correct decisions on the future of our competition will be ignored in favour of propping them up.

[goswannie14]

Originally posted by Old Royboy
Until the AFL rids itself of it?s Viccentric administration it will not make any significant progress to being the undisputed premier competition in the land. Impoverished Melbourne suburban clubs are millstones around the competition?s neck it can ill afford, but while Vlad and his gang of idiots are in charge correct decisions on the future of our competition will be ignored in favour of propping them up.

The sad thing is that it went from being an outward looking league under Wayne Jackson, to a naval gazing pat on the back for the mates boys club under Andrew "The Fat Controller" Demetriou. Things won't chnage until he is gone.

[Rizzo]

Football is tribalism. Choosing a team to support is not a purchasing decision between brand X and Y. Sure, you can export a victorian team the first time around, but after that you are treading on someone's established turf...and in the case of the two exports their turf is not financially certain. The only way I see second teams succeeding in NSW and QLD is through a grass roots team getting big enough to make the leap, and that's not going to happen for some time.

[timthefish]

old royboy,

i think you're right or may be right on many points. i think the southport opportunity should be top priority right now and it seems that the establishment of a new club appears to be the right model in that situation. i wonder though exactly how it will work however (this is the voice of ignorance not scepticism). will they immediately have a squad that can play at afl level without getting badly injured let alone win a game? will their playing list be supplemented with one or two players viewed as expendable from each other club in the afl? i'm a relative newcomer to this game so i don't recall clearly the creation of recent clubs like those from the west of the dingo fence.

regarding relocation, i think there can be expected a bunch of malcontents that withdraw their support from a relocated team, but i think the rediscovery of the south melbourne identity of our club last year demonstrates that not all turn their backs entirely. your username also leads me to point out the support brisbane received in melbourne in the 2001-04 years. also, how many would be as involved in the support of a vfl team?

[Tuesday]

Re: The Great Sydney balls-up

Originally posted by Mike_B
Now I still don't know how much attention I'd pay to a Caroline Wilson article...

I am still awaiting the explaination on this one, Mike...

Originally posted by Rizzo
Football is tribalism.

I really think you're missing the mark. Football does not equal tribalism. It has tribal qualities, yes, though you could really only say that football's tribal nature revealed itself through the suburb-based VFL competition. The current competition does not possess the suburban divides that the VFL originally did, irrespective of whether clubs still carry their original name. There are only shards of tribalist sentiment still remaining, and these flames fade with each year. It's a national comp now -- a whole new ball game.

[Bart]

Originally posted by timthefish
[B then relocate the bulldogs in an amalgamation and use the local clubs name as at least part of the new clubs name. give it a strong local western sydney identity. [/B]

This is the key. A relocation will not work in Western Sydney. It has to have a new and local identity. It must be seen as WS' team from Day 1. Sure don't forget the heritage of the new team if it is taking the licence of an existing team.

The Western Force Super 14 team (although struggling on the park as expected) is a great example of a team built from the bottom up with a local identity. A-League is another good example, and I have no doubt that the Gold Coast Titans in NRL will be enormously successful.

Give WS their own team, not a half-ar sed effort bu simply plonking Footscray or North Melbourne in Blacktown or Homebush.

[goswannie14]

Originally posted by Bart
The Western Force Super 14 team (although struggling on the park as expected) is a great example of a team built from the bottom up with a local identity. A-League is another good example, and I have no doubt that the Gold Coast Titans in NRL will be enormously successful.

It's a bit hard to judge the above mentioned teams after only one season. Best measuring stick will be if they are still getting the same crowds in 5 years time. It's good to see initial success, but wait until the hype wears down before declaring these as a success. Having said that I understand what you are saying.

[Rizzo]

Re: Re: The Great Sydney balls-up

I really think you're missing the mark. Football does not equal tribalism. It has tribal qualities, yes, though you could really only say that football's tribal nature revealed itself through the suburb-based VFL competition. The current competition does not possess the suburban divides that the VFL originally did, irrespective of whether clubs still carry their original name. There are only shards of tribalist sentiment still remaining, and these flames fade with each year. It's a national comp now -- a whole new ball game.

This raises an interesting hypothetical question. If the Swans moved to Newcastle next year and didn't manage to keep one current player would you still support them?

[Mike_B]

Re: Re: The Great Sydney balls-up

Originally posted by Tuesday
I am still awaiting the explaination on this one, Mike...

Just my opinion on the general quality of her work, which from past experience I don't rate too highly. Simple as that.

[katie-scarlett]

Re: Re: Re: The Great Sydney balls-up

Originally posted by Rizzo
This raises an interesting hypothetical question. If the Swans moved to Newcastle next year and didn't manage to keep one current player would you still support them?

Newcastle Swans.

Novacastrian Swans.

I dunno..

[Tuesday]

Re: The Great Sydney balls-up

Originally posted by Rizzo
This raises an interesting hypothetical question. If the Swans moved to Newcastle next year and didn't manage to keep one current player would you still support them?

Obviously, you're going to try and bring it all back to the fact that if I agreed (or even disagreed) that I would still support them, you believe you will have been proven correct in saying football = tribalism.

But I am a fan of the sport and not so one eyed for a certain team that I cannot accept change. Realism is necessary, especially in this age where the pocket rules. I also know the chances of such a move are slim to none.

So we agree to disagree.

[hammo]

Originally posted by timthefish
short version

1. kangaroos to canberra full time
2. development of small sydney/canberra comp with local teams
3. build up western sydney club
4. move doggies in amalgamation

I admire the thought you've put into this but this is probably the least likely scenario.

You can write off Canberra as the home of an AFL team. It simply doesn't have the population to support an AFL team, let alone one already as poorly supported as the Kangaroos.

Look at their crowds in Canberra - they struggle to top 10,000 for any other than Swans matches. Admittedly this is due to poor scheduling but there's no reason to suggest it would change in the future.

The AFL will not foot the bill for a 40,000 seat stadium which will never be filled and a market which simply isn't big enough. I doubt the other clubs would be interested either.

The only viable locations for clubs to relocate are the Gold Coast and Western Sydney. Both have growing populations - already of about a million people (more for WS).

The AFL should hurry up with establishing a team on the Gold Coast given the NRL side debuts next year. Western Sydney will be harder.

In my opinion, Bulldogs, Kangaroos and Melbourne are the three candidates for relocation. I love the tradition of the Victorian clubs but commercial reality is that these clubs don't and never will have the financial clout of teams like Adelaide and West Coast. Corporate dollars in Melbourne will always go to Collingwood and Essendon. This leads to deficiencies in training facilities, size of coaching staff, etc and in the end it all makes a difference on the field.

My final point is that the new TV rights deal makes gives the poorer Melbourne clubs a false security net. It delays the inevitable in my opinion.

[mocaholic]

Some interesting thoughts in the age-old problem.

Realistically, a 'new' club would only go to Western suburbs of Syd or the Gold Coast corridor as the support in other proposed areas (ACT, Tassie, even Darwin) is simply not big enough. I'd plump for the GC everytime, given Carrara is there, some support via ex-pat Vics, the profile and support of the Brions is (arguably) better than the Swans and the QAFL is by far a better league than the SFL...probably the ACTAFL too.

Given what happened with the Brisbane Bears (a team cobbled together by the rest of the clubs) it is unlikely that this scenario will be followed, and even a combined QAFL team would get pounded week in week out in the AFL, let alone a Southport Sharks FC being granted a licence.

It comes back down to relocation being a lesser evil than creating something from scratch. Perhaps a Southport/Dogs or Kangas merger may be on the cards, although effectively this would be a 'takeover' in every sense of the word, with a hope that in time the Southport fans would come around. But to not lose the support of their existing fan base, a relocated team would have to retain all it's main branding icons: at least the colours and nicknames. With that, it is noted that 'North Melbourne' and 'Footscray' no longer (effectively) exist!

I honestly think the AFL is damned if they do, damned if they don't.