Grassroots Football

[Aegon]

I'm from one of the bigger clubs that's fee are not as high as the clubs you mentioned but higher than most. I have been around in these circles for some time now and believe what we are charging which has been the same for the last 3 seasons is fair and reasonable. I think it is highly irresponsible of David Eland and his team at NNSW to post all the fees without going out to clubs and asking what is actually included, I will admit they put a small disclaimer at the bottom recognising that they have no idea what the figures include. I have no idea what Valentine and NL include in their fees but certainly know what we do at our club and although will look high at 1st glance it is fair and reasonable. What it doesn't say is that entry level kids at our club play up to 10 competition games more than any other club that I know of and have done so for years, they get a personalised playing shirt as well as socks, very nice trophy and presentation day. Coaches don't have to drag there equipment to from the training park each week its all their for them to access each week. If you are in the Macquarie football area you have to pay a council fee of $40 per youth player to play and train which also appears in each clubs fees, so when you take that out there is actually 1 club by the figures posted is either subsidising 1/2 that fee or have some other arrangement which is good on them.

There is one club I see who's registration fee was $175 yet they have to pay $65 for uniform when they go to the registration day. Other clubs have an additional fee for presentation day's, others make you sell chocolate boxes. Which none of this is wrong it's just the way each club operates but it is not reflected on the list of fee's David and his team has put out. Although parents and kids like to play close to home paying registration fees is like anything else in most cases you get what you pay for and if you don't like the product you are free to go and try a different product.

So in all the list irresponsibly put out to all is not a true apples for apples comparison and I personally don't know of a community club that doesn't have hard working volunteers that give up many hours of their busy lives to help provide a place for kids to play football at and i am sure everyone of them would love to have no cost associated with it. And being honest the whole article in most cases looks like a pot shot at all those hardworking volunteers.

As I said earlier, my son was at a miniroos club that was $180 all inclusive and gave the breakdown of where all costs went.

If I read that list and saw my club charging $200+ I think I am well within my rights to ask for an explanation of where fees go - because they should be provided up front.

I'm still waiting for the fee comparison on JDL, NL1 and NPL clubs to come out from David Eland and his team which is a competition that NNSW have complete control over yet some u9's I here are paying nearly $2k but once again I am not sure what is included in that amount but from my clubs point of view I think the true cost for a kid that age in the JDL competition is between the $700 and $800 including everything except boots and pads.

I 100% agree with this. Considering these competitions have a much heavier involvement from NNWSF they should be providing comparisons for all of these competitions.

There will of course be variance. For example my sons JDL club charge $1200 another I know charges over $1500, however the higher price club trains at LMRFF once a week whereas we don't.
There will be other differences obviously but the onus should be on clubs to explain how and where that money is spent.

When we were last provided a breakdown of fees distribution:
$237 goes to Northern
$14 to Football Australia
$900+ to the club
Of this: $250-300 on uniform & another $200-300 on TD/coaching costs. Lots of other little incidental costs like Electricity, Water, council fees.