Me? Serious?
OK. They should save their $100k, and put it into juniors, which have gone down the ■■■■■■■ the last 10-15 years. I’ll give them a feasibility study right now:
Not.
A.
Chance.
But sure. ■■■■ a hundred large against a wall for a big pile of BS. Meanwhile they had, what, 1 kid drafted last year??
Should have 1 strong team in Queensland and Sydney to unite the state.
Maybe when the swans and Lions reach 60,000 members think about another side.
While we have them I would rename GWS,
Western Sydney think greater is superflous
And just play most of their home games from SCG, Freo/Eagles And Port/Crows share a ground so Western Sydney can too. Would still keep a couple of games in Canberra though.
I would make Gold Coast play 4 home games in Darwin and get rid of Melbourne/dogs playing games there similar to tassie not ideal but something I guess.
Would put a Tassie team in AFL before NT.
Already 8 games played here a year.
So really only need another 4 home games.
Would play 8 games in Hobart 4 in Launceston.
Get rid of North and Hawks from the state.
Although I guess they could sell their home games back to Tassie so we get 2 more home matches.
AFL could have had a Tassie AFLW team but went with a crappy north side instead.
There’d be a lot more turning up to Mararra to watch NT vs an AFL side than currently do for non. If that’s all the numbers GC and GWS are getting, then I’m pretty confident NT will be outdoing them pretty quick.
Aussie rules is very popular in the NT, unlike NSW and QLD. However, as HirdMentality has mentioned, the AFL’s priority is to build interest in non-AFL (and populous) regions, rather than try to satisfy low population regions already into the AFL but lacking their own teams.
An NT team would probably end up being every fans ‘second’ team, especially if it was heavily infused with indigenous talent. It wouldn’t be as reliant on on-field success as many other clubs to draw a crowd.
If we can afford to bail out beschissen clubs like Norf and the Aints year in year out with no hope for their future improved membership and commercial success, why not take that money and instead of continuing to pisss it up against the wall use it to fund two new clubs in the NT and Tassie ? Or else tell them, Norf and the Aints, move or fold…
The only argument I can see against this is, I’d hate to see either of these shyte-stain clubs with a free pass into the Tiwi Islands.
If that’s what they’d be relying on, then they’re going to need an awful lot of ardent support from neutrals to sell any meaningful amount of memberships and merchandise and attract sponsorship dollars. These things are the lifeblood of clubs and they only come from passionate support in significant numbers, not from supporters of other clubs thinking that NT team are alright
The Gold Coast also has a population that is nearly three times higher than the entirety of the NT. Queensland has a population that is 20 times that of the NT.
These aren’t insignificant numbers, no matter how popular aussie rules is there.
I’m Tasmanian and would totally support the establishment of a Tasmanian team, except I don’t think it would be viable because everyone here already has an AFL team. I certainly wouldn’t change allegiances. Same reason I wouldn’t expect an NT team to work, except the problem is compounded by an even smaller population.
It would take a generation for either team to have a chance of being viable through local support.
I would
Take tassie as second team and go to matches at Launceston.
Currently only go watch hawks if I get free tickets, as they don’t interest me. I used to go watch Tassies VFL team more.
And would travel to Hobart if Essendon were playing.
I can’t agree with that…almost everyone in Perth and Adelaide would have had a team they followed in the VFL, or even AFL, but now all those clubs have in excess of 50,000 members.
The call of a local team was pretty strong obviously.