And the payments have stopped whilst no games are being played. The AFL is currently getting zero income
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$220m a year on player payments alone at their full rate so without and funds coming in it wonât last long at all
Can anybody name another professional code in the world that has 10 teams out of the one farkin city. I count Geelong as well in this number. Throw in three A league clubs, two NBL clubs, one NRL clubâŚtheir simply isnât enough coin to go around.
Time to merge 4 clubs to 2!!!
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Itâs all due to the mess that ensued from a bankrupt VFL. This discussion has been had before on here, but this is why we have this mess of an âaflâ.
Great, who are we merging with?
North.
Coz geez it would really tick there two supporters off.
Yep north to either merge with the bulldogs (two smallest supporter bases) or relocate down to tassie and keep it at 18 teams.
Itâs not just the AFL HQ, every sporting club and the companies that survive on supplying them are cooked. I think we will see 1/3 or more of Australias sporting clubs vanish over this. The AFL club are about the only ones even capable of guaranteeing Being there going forward.
But again its not the 10 Vic clubs who are draining hundreds of millions from the game - its the expansion clubs who can only dream of having the same support levels as the smaller Vic clubs. Iâm not against the idea of merging North or relocating them to Tas etc but the very 1st & foremost cost saving measure should be get the fark rid of the abominations of GWS & GC. They have no business existing in a true competition & only survive 100% through the draining of resources from the rest of the league. I donât think for a second the AFL would consider admitting it was a horrible plan from the start but even if its a purely numbers decision they have to be cut before anything else.
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StKilda took the 2nd most amount of money last year, around $20million. And outside of GC and GWS, Iâd have thought most interstate sides (besides Poort) were quite stable financially, especially if Sydney and Brisbane were no longer splitting supporters (and were given statewide junior/grassroots development pathways).
As much as Tasmania deserves an AFL team (being the only state without one) if the objective is to save money by folding clubs then it wouldnât make sense to build one from scratch.
If they were to start a national reserves comp, then a standalone Tassie team could be included as part of that which would allow them to grow organically and to see whether Tasmanians actually get behind them.
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The issue is too fold. We have these inflated footy departments which made the AFL make a soft cap as wealthier clubs spent more on different areas. You just have to look back at Barrassiâs coaching days where there were 5 people in that coaches box max. The midfield, defender, senior assistant, Forward and the head coach.
Now we have bloody IT assistant, IT data analysis, people in charge for GPS tracking clubs end up with up to 17+ blokes in both the boxes and on the ground with the players.
Yes we might not get back to a Barrassi style 5 man coaching box, but thatâs what we need to do. Itâs not great to say as there are livelihoods at stake, but you could save millions per club doing this.
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Having 2 small supporter base teams merge does not really help, their combined supporters (assuming some disappear because they do not like the merger) would still be too small to be self funding.
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South Melbourne should have gone to Tassie coz itâs South of Melbourne and North Melbourne should go to Sydney coz itâs North of Melbourne.
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Reckon if youâre focusing too much on IT youâre asking the wrong questions. They didnât use computers or technology during Barrassiâs coaching days therefore didnât need people to manage it, they do now. Coaches know footy not how to setup and manage IT, but getting access to vision and stats and so on is vital in modern footy and any club that stops using it will be left in the dust - so some IT support is going to be necessary. Likewise if they continue to use GPS tracking to understand and manage players workloads, and they will, theyâll continue to need someone to manage that, because coaches know footy, not managing GPS systems. Not suggesting clubs donât run fat in some areas of the footy department, they absolutely do, but focusing too much on IT will see you missing the bigger picture IMO.
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Yeah I agree itâs both
A) too many clubs in Melb to support the 10 clubs
B) one of Gold coast or GWS or both should fold
The AFL canât force a club to relocate.
They tried that with North to get them to relocate to the Gold Coast for a decent pay package and North said no.
True but all clubs receive money from the AFL. The AFL could simply stop handing out money and leave it up to the individual clubs to make a profit or go cap in hand to its supporters or banks
I agree, I donât think North took it to the supporters (not that all 40,000 or so would be happy to move).
They tried to get Melb and Hawthorn to merge and that didnât work.
Hawks and Tassie are a match made in heaven send them and their fair-weather fans packing
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who knows, maybe there might be some more scrutiny by all and sundry into the actual benefit of 1 extra game a rd compared to what at a rough guess a 60 million dollar constant financial bailout to gws and GC every year.
either way surely more people start asking where the money is actually going and how itâs being spent.
you know governance and all, that you canât prop up the competition and require mass sackings and pay cuts just to barely survive for 2 months, sorta begs alot of questions.