Do we have defensive injuries?
Do we have defensive injuries?
Probably for when our owners recruit Natta
Hmm...
APL to *consolidate* operations as financial problems lead to redundancies
Horror crowds across the A-League?s Unite Round in Sydney compounded financial issues which have prompted huge job cuts to streamline operations.
Marco Monteverde
@marcothejourno
January 16, 2024 - 4:49PM
NCA NewsWire
The A-League is in financial turmoil, with the Australian Professional Leagues undergoing an ?organisational restructure? that has led to mass redundancies on the back of horror crowds at last weekend?s Unite Round in Sydney.
The APL, which has run the A-League men?s and women?s competitions for the past three years, has confirmed staff cuts in an attempt to ?consolidate? the business, with up to 50 per cent of the staff having been made redundant.
As part of the cost-cutting measures, KeepUp, the APL?s digital and content arm which is understood to have cost the organisation $40 million, will cease to exist.
However, the A-League?s separate competition website, which started this season as under the broader KeepUp banner, will continue in some form.
In a statement without attribution to A-League commissioner Nick Garcia, the APL stated a need to ?create efficiencies through consolidation? as poor crowds continue to be a problem for the men?s and women?s competitions.
?In the three years since unbundling (with Football Australia), APL has implemented a strategy that has seen a period of rapid growth across our business,? an APL statement said.
?With the original three-year strategy coming to an end, a planned full strategic and commercial review has taken place over the last several months.
?The review has identified significant opportunities to create efficiencies through consolidation and this necessitates an organisational restructure that is now underway.
?APL?s priorities remain the same ? to deliver commercial growth and sustainability by creating the most exciting competitions possible for our fans ? with strong teams producing great young players across Australia and New Zealand.?
Club owners are divided as to whether the A-League men?s and women?s competitions should remain under the APL?s control or return to be run and governed by Football Australia.
However, it?s understood FA isn?t interested in regaining control of the nation?s top men?s and women?s competitions, which continue to be marred by low crowds.
Last weekend?s ?Unite Round? ? in which all 12 A-League men?s and women?s matches were played in Sydney ? attracting a cumulative attendance of less than 48,000 people.
However, the seems an inflated figure, with the APL having included crowds at the weekend?s double-headers as separate attendances when adding up the numbers.
For example, the 8147 people who attended the Melbourne Victory and Central Coast Mariners? 1-1 men?s draw in the first match of Saturday?s double-header at Allianz Stadium, weren?t included in the 11,918 crowd figure for Adelaide United?s 4-3 win over Sydney in the later match at the same venue despite the likelihood that spectators from the first game would have stayed for the second match.
And despite the popularity of the Matildas after their stunning run to the World Cup semi-finals, only one of six A-League women?s matches last weekend attracted more than 2000 people. The total attendance for those games was just over 11,000.
However, Garcia was confident of a stronger ?Unite Round? next year.
?This is just the start of a unique tradition in our game,? Garcia said.
?We?ve already begun planning for Unite Round next season, and will take on feedback from fans, clubs, players and partners, as we look to build on this success in years to come.?
There have serious been questions raised about its broadcast deal with Network 10/Paramount +, with sagging ratings have failed to meet required targets needed for the total sum of broadcast deal to be paid to the APL.
There was also significant fan backlash over the decision to sell the grand final to the New South Wales government (taking hosting rights away from the top-placed team), a decision which was reversed after just one year and replaced by ?Unite Round?.
The APL has also been forced to fund the struggling Perth Glory, with the Newcastle Jets have required the financial assistance of other club owners to remain afloat.
Despite the APL?s financial problems, the men?s league will expand next season with the addition of a second New Zealand team, while a Canberra club is also expected to be part of the 2024-25 men?s competition.
?We are in advanced negotiations about the Canberra licence,? Garcia said.
?We are working towards a further update in the coming weeks, and it is our ambition that this new club is part of the 2024-25 season.?
Life isn't the same without Con... but it can only improve without Tinks...
Obviously not good when people lose their jobs, but I have two thoughts.
1) How the hell do you burn through $30 million on KeepUp? I think Townsend has a lot to answer for.
2) The decoupling has failed. Everything the APL do is a disaster. Sydney GF, Unite against Sydney FC round, ladder rules etc. They need to come out and acknowledge this and focus on running the two clubs sustainably. Don’t worry about anything else, just focus on that. Get the crowds back, get the product to a solid foundation then expand.
Middleby Gone
Lawrie Out
Agree everything they touch turns to crap at the moment.
FFA ownership seems like a well run operation in hindsight.
Their sole purpose should be boosting crowds however possible. Free tickets. Paying actors. Whatever they need to do. Get as many people into those stadiums as possible.
When you get lots of people in a stadium many things happen.
- sponsors get interested. More exposure. More money.
- broadcast people take interest.
- people don’t want to miss out on something a lot of people are going to, and go themselves.
- create a demand for tickets for those operating out of smaller grounds
At the moment the images you see of games are abysmal. No crowds. You see a goal and they go celebrate with the 3 supporters.
Nobody is seeing those images thinking, I want to be there.
100% and I think we also need to go back to, and it may be controversial, the aleague of 12/13 (I think) where we had big name marquees like ADP, Heskey and Ono to attract crowds. Yes it’s not the best thing long term, but we need to get crowds back and I don’t think a spattering of Socceroos at Sydney fc or Melbourne city is enough.Originally Posted by Bremsstrahlung
Middleby Gone
Lawrie Out
peak z-lig
also 3 games b2b into premier league on foxtel every saturday arvo...we don't know how good we had it
this is amazing lol$30 million on KeepUp
boz must be close to these numbers for the foz with no ad-traffic
This isn't getting said anywhere near enough.
OK
Genuinely curious how everyone else (club owners) feels about the cluster f*** they have let the league devolve to.
I’d be curious to see what metrics have improved.
I’d be particularly interested to see how clubs have shifted toward development and if the data supports anecdotal memory that we seem to be shipping a few players overseas
Last edited by Bremsstrahlung; 18-01-2024 at 11:40 AM.
Game is on its last legs in its current form.
Poor crowds.
Poor TV numbers
The standard of the comp has nosedived
Standard of officiating is have a influence over results
Clubs on financial life support and those that are not are losing money
I have a family member who for the very first time since the A League started has not been a season ticket holder and if you ask him he says he feels like he has not missed a thing about it.
And the fact of the matter is the game relies so much on revenue from broadcasting deals and as it is they will be worth diddly squat to sell when the current deal expires furthermore impacting the viability of the game financially moving forward.
No idea what the answers are simply because the questions have been allowed to be ignored by administrators of the game and get so bloody huge.
IMO all this negativity surrounding the game in the last few days probably has any potential buyer of the club asking themselves do i really want to own a club trying to operate in the current climate Football finds itself in this country. I know we can joke and all about price being cheap but ultimately it doesn't matter how little you paid to acquire the club if it all goes to shit then even a little is too much.
Last edited by 380; 18-01-2024 at 11:25 AM.
The Jets are a microcosm of the A league in general. The wrong people are in charge. Fix that and the league might prosper
The problem is all the leagues in the gulf have blown the A League out of the water with how much they offer.
All these competitions are now in direct competition for players along with MLS, Japan and China. The A League falls well down at the bottom of those.
In my opinion we don't well enough to promote and retain the foreign players that are here already. Marcelo is potentially the best defender in pedigree the league had seen, played at Lyon for a few year. DaSilva at victory another good professional. Hendrix at wanderers is quality and I believe people don't respect how good Germain was and still is after years at Marsielle and Monaco.
Well when the organisation running the league identify themselves as being Media & Entertainment rather than Football Administration, you can probably pinpoint where the sole problem lies
Sydney have had their Russian money blockaded by the government, so no more ADP, we have no chance of a Heskey anytime soon, and even City group are being very frugal this year, which is worrying, they could bring Messi and Ronny if they wanted
The gulf has changed things, but that may only be a short term thing like China was. The money isn?t in China the same way it was 15 years ago. Their economy is in much worse shape. Japan and the MLS are competitors, but they were also there 10 years.
Some of the foreigners at the moment are very good, but they don?t have the same crowd pulling power that those 3 did back in the day. Just a quick look at transfermarket shows players like De Gea, Mata, Lingard (I?m a Man U fan :shrug: ), Sakho, Douglas Costa, Chicharito, Carlos Vela are all free agents. I know it wouldn?t be easy, but it?s the only short term solution to crowd numbers I can see. I don?t know what else the APL can do except charge Townsend with malicious mismanagement, but that ain?t happening.
Middleby Gone
Lawrie Out
This is something I have been thinking about - what happened to the thrill of the matchday - the passion and spontaneity are missing at the moment. And alot of the whole experience has become sanitised, especially the TV coverage.
On Fox, not only would we get good coverage of the games but they were hosted by football people with passion who would talk about the negatives as well as the positives. They would also have at least one analysis show during the week where the issues of the day would be discussed. You didn't always agree with Bozza, Harps, Rudes and Slater but at least they were prepared to speak their mind. P+ use "robots". Beige CH10 hosts who smile and gush over what they call "the greatest league in the world" and pundits who look like they have been told to put the smiley face on, talk up the game and not rock the boat too much. There is little to no discussion about the state of the game in general. For example last night watching the game in Brisbane, there was no chat about the lack of crowds on the weekend or the APL retrenchments on what I saw. They highlighted the "success" of the Unite Round by playing the expected vignette of all the goals over the weekend.
As for matchday, you can see what they are trying to do, but instead of supplementing the good things (especially active support), they appear to be trying to create a "sports entertainment" package. The whole experience is "sanitised". The active group trying valiantly are never mentioned at the ground, we get kickoff countdowns and choreographed chanting which I abhor. Remember the "stand up in the 87th minute if you love the Jets"? And the daft idea that never eventuated of playing chants and music during goal kicks as they were "quiet periods".
Atmosphere has always been created tribally and has never been able to be forced. Remember the game against SFC when Roy was wrongly sent off - the atmosphere changed, it wasn't pretty or nice but the crowd got behind the side, hated on Sydney bigtime, and I have no doubt carried the team to victory. I am not sure that would happen now, even if the same thing happened and we had 20,000 there. It doesn't help that crowds are poor right now.
I get it that we are in changing times, and sport is now business, but alot of the emotion is gone - add in overbearing security, mid strength alcohol and bloody VAR/refereeing which has noticeably killed off celebrating a goal (not all APL fault of course). This is happening overseas as well but the football "culture" is much stronger there, and there is sensible balance.
Last edited by Jetmaster; 19-01-2024 at 11:26 AM.
Only one bloke on this foz constantly makes me laugh Plague and it ain't you - MFKS
Good post, Jetmaster
The Championship Chronicles - The Jetstream's review of the 2007/08 season. www.newcastlefootball.net/chronicles
Stop talking sense or you'll be banned
My medication must be working...
Will also add that the constant inability of any Newcastle entity to get long term and stable ownership has really taken its toll over the last 40 years.
The frustrating thing is that we have seen what it can be.
Last edited by Jetmaster; 19-01-2024 at 09:41 PM.
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