The A-League is about to put the other codes to shame

 
The Crowd Roar Pro

By The Substitute, 4 Jun 2008 The Crowd is a Roar Pro

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A week ago I was so irate that I was almost prepared to denounce my football fanhood for good. Frank Lowy made comments about introducing a promotion and relegation system for the A-League and I just lost it.

The salary cap would die, I thought. Aussies won’t take to the idea, I thought.

I foolishly saw this as an attempt from Frank Lowy to exert his club-centric, Europeanized, traditionalist views on the Australian public.

But then I saw the genius in it all.

How blind I was to blog in a manner so vehemently opposed to such a brilliant idea. All I had to do was let go of the salary cap and then it just hit me like a moment of epiphany.

Confused? Let me enlighten you.

One of the main benefits football has over other codes is that is not bounded by traditional “strongholds” like League has with New South Wales and Queensland or like AFL has with the southern states.

It is, in a sense, a national game. Not because it has the highest level of support across the country, but because it has a fairly good standing across all states, not just a handful of them.

Promotion and relegation would exploit this leg-up and help football reach its full potential – and then some – by taking advantage of one of the biggest holes in the Australian sporting landscape. (No, I’m not talking about the Gold Coast or West Sydney).

A “PandR” system would offer citizens of regional centres the opportunity to follow a team that genuinely competes at a national level.

Even if they seem perennially bound to participating in a second-tier competition, the door is always open to move up from the AL2 (well, at least it’s better than the “B-League”) and into the A-League. Then chuck in an annual crack at the big boys through the mooted FFA/Australia Cup and you practically have a top flight team.

The Darwins, Tasmanias and Sunshine Coasts of this world can finally see their region represented at the highest level.

Through the magical wonder that is PandR, football can afford to hand out licenses to these cities without using them simply to make up the numbers or having them drag down the value of broadcast rights. They will either hover down the bottom of the A-League or make up the AL2.

Can the AFL afford this luxury?

Heck no.

As much as the AFL would like to give a new team to Tasmania, the fact is it would drag down the value of broadcast rights, because it is a fairly small market compared to the options north of the border and it is already AFL territory, so there aren’t any more fans left to convert.

As for league, it seems unlikely the competition could mount a serious blockade to football’s raid either. Although David Gallop’s expansion plans, which seemed crazy at first, are closer to the mark than what everyone first anticipated.

As for union, well, it would be happy to just get a fifth local team at this stage.

The only other option for rival codes is to build a strong second-tier competition, but given the ARU’s recent attempts, that could prove difficult. Such a move would be particularly controversial in AFL circles where the SANFL and WAFL seem intent on keeping whatever is left of their VFL-destroyed significance.

But even if such an example was to happen, without promotion and relegation – without the chance to “mix it with the big boys” – it all becomes a much harder sell.

One gets the feeling that by the time rival codes wake up to this fact, it will all be too late.

Football is about to, quite literally, take over the country and it is going to put rival code’s expansion plans to absolute shame in the process.

So well done, Frank Lowy, you really are the genius I thought you were before last week. I offer my sincerest apologies.

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