probably because the biggest participation sport in the country (and world) should have an immeasurable advantage in this country but time after time has failed to even get the smallest foothold in the top tier of the sporting lexicon.
and if you've been paying attention, people who lived through it are spelling out the reasons why 'they' (as individuals) felt disenfranchised from their own damn sport.
stop wagging your social justice finger at them and listen, you may see a common thread. one that was removed from the current incarnation of the sports attempt at mainstream success and lo and ****ing behold it may just be getting somewhere.
Go back and read jetmasters post from a bit back, then read it again, then again.
it will help.
Back to expansion.
The way I see it.
Pro/Rel is a long way off at least 20+ years, but we need to start laying the foundation for the future and stop thinking in 4-5 year cycles. If any of you have time look up the 100 year plan of Japanese football. In short the JFA in the early 90's set the goals to have 100 professional clubs and win the World Cup sometime in the next 100 years. Just over 20 years has past and they are already over half of their goal for 100 professional clubs.
The Second Division needs to be established ASAP.
From that the A-League can have it's expansion from promoting second division clubs, promotion based on not only on results but also criteria and geography. The FFA can identify clubs/regions it wishes to have in the A-League and said clubs can use the second division to ready itself for the A-League. All the while the remaining second division clubs can use the time to grow and prepare for the eventual implementation of Pro/Rel once all second division are A-League ready.
It just needs some forethought and correct planning but it needs to happen. We need to stop concentrating on 2016-2020 and start thinking were should football be in 2050 and how do we get it there.
i don't think we moved away from it.
the last few posts have been making the point that theres no point introducing a 2nd tier if we are just going to fill it with established clubs.
the whole reason the A-League exists is to get away from those established clubs.
the 2nd division will need to be made up of 'a-league lite' versions of the blueprint already in operation.
It was never an issue for me because I had family that were foreigners and grew up with people of many nationalities. My club for example was predominately Dutch when I started and became more English / Australian by the time I'd finished.
And you have it all wrong about not embracing the ethnicity of certain clubs back then. It was quite the opposite. The predominately ethnic clubs were without a doubt the most respected / feared and fixtures against them were never taken lightly. In fact you tended to put in extra at training that week so as to not be the recipients of a flogging. The players at these ethnic would have found game day was probably the only day of the week where they felt respected. At school and work many of them would have felt some form of alienation be it through being labeled a wog, dago... and so on by non football types.
I mean if you want to get to the nuts and bolts of it in the 60's and 70's you were considered feminine if you played the game regardless of your ethnicity. It was no doubt even worse in 50's.
Do I think those times should be embraced today ? No. The game has moved on / evolved and repeating the past makes no sense. We tried a national competition where the ethnic ties were strong and it simply did not work for many reasons not just ethnicity alone. We are all Australian's now no matter what we look like, how we speak, or where we were originally from.
I have no problem embracing the roles these clubs played in developing the game but the us vs them shit based on ethnicity should never be allowed to return because it didn't really help anyone.
Flame away.
Last edited by The Dunster; 15-10-2016 at 10:00 AM.
Agree. The only problem I see before you can have pro/relegation is you must have (1) more A/league teams, ten is not enough (2) you need the to be as close to self sufficient as possible (break even) otherwise you will end up with a bigger mess than we have now. (3) The expansion team/places that you think of are different to where the FFA think of.
Would the status of the 2nd tier teams be professional and if so what access and influence would the PFA have ?
My guess would be that their involvement would increase costs to clubs to levels they do not currently have to endure - and perhaps may not have even considered.
Last edited by The Dunster; 15-10-2016 at 10:25 AM.
We had a bit of a discussion on pro/rel & expansion at the end of the Jetstream preview podcast released yesterday. Some good points raised.
Subscribe to The Jetstream Podcast http://www.newcastlefootball.net/podcast
I've heard that the FFA are looking at Adelaide and Brisbane to expand to next as they want derbies
I'm skeptical of another team in either city. Current membership numbers:
Adelaide: 8,911, after just winning the title and being pretty consistent for the last 11 seasons.
Brisbane: 4,653, despite winning the grand final 3 times and the other thing twice, as well as having some of the best players in the league grace their pitch.
Jets: 7,787.
I can't see how teams in either of those cities could really attract new fans. To me WSW made sense because it was a whole different area of Sydney. I'm not sure where the Melb City fans came from, but at least they have the population and sporting interest to warrant it.
I could maybe see perth with a second team.
But anyway, doesn't another sydney team give you 6 more "derbies" whereas adelaide only gives you 3?
For me the first steps should be to create a summer based second division to work in unison with the HAL. It would need to be considered professional, but would need to be reflective of the tier two status, by negotiating suitable player salary cap and conditions, it will need to be cheap, if anyone actually thinks TV broadcaster would pay large sums of money for the rights they are deluded. Funding is going to be very hard and their would be a good chance no TV revenue of any significance would be available.
The Most suitable NPL teams should be targeted, facilities, management levels, cash etc should be used to grade them and then combine them with the HAL youth teams.This would have 2 benefits, 1. Increase the current level of competition for the HAL youth teams, its currently well below par, whilst hopefully reducing the amount of travel by having less interstate transit by utilising a conference system, even though I dislike the concept. 2. Provide another step up for exposure for organisations to show they are capable of running club before getting the keys to a HAL spot.
This type of set up would also allow HAL clubs to loan players up and down between the two divisions as injury replacements, which should be used to 1. get players returning from injury some much needed game time, 2. create a revenue stream for tier two clubs & 3. if a player has a good NPL season they could take a loan spell upto the second division to test themselves.
By utilising the youth teams you wouldn't need to create a huge new division and have to find all these extra professional players, you could start with two 10 team conferences and work from.
there. The point of a second division should be about creating a step up in class from the NPL and concentrating the talent pool is necessary to achieve that, currently with the NPL system players are very spread out.
In my mind initially no, (and just no in general imo) however it could be used to meet the requirements of P/R. You could have a set criteria that extends beyond just league finish, the k-league I believe has a similar system.
A system could perhaps be to finish top two of their conference (remembering that they would be competing against, and need to finish above all the HAL youth teams), win a playoff of the top conference teams (two from each) in a home and away mini season and then still meet the criteria, well if they achieve that, why not bump them up and expand the HAL organically, for me P/R has good points and bad but for the most, I believe the bad still out way the good at this point.
I admire the J-league for having the balls to set bench marks and have real world goal's & targets in their 100 year plan, in short it's aspirational, compare it to the FFA's large on concepts and rhetoric but completely devoid of any measurable outcomes, strategy or implementation plans that is the whole of football plan. They should have just called it what it is, Australian Football's Great Hope.
.....and WHY will it have to be made up of "a-league lite" versions?
You say a lot of things I agree with plague and a lot of the times I can see you are just trying to take the piss and sometimes I just don't agree with you but this just won't happen mate. You might as well tell these clubs to fold because there is nothing for them to aspire to other then to rot away in state NPL.
We need to be inclusive if we want the game to grow and achieve it's potential, treating established clubs like outcasts is not good for the game to grow and be united.