The AFL bets its expansion future on marketing ploys

 
Adrian Musolino Columnist

By , 2 Jun 2010 Adrian Musolino is a Roar Expert

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Israel Folau - Greater Western Sydney

Israel Folau speaks to the media during a conference announcing that he will switch codes and join Greater Western Sydney AFL club at Blacktown Olympic Park.

Behind the smoke and mirrors of Israel Folau’s defection to the AFL is the simple fact that the Greater Western Sydney franchise (and the AFL?) will reportedly fork out $6 million for four years for a player who hasn’t played a game of competitive Aussie Rules in his life. This is a marketing ploy of the highest order.

After all, it’s an awful lot of money for a speculative prospect and even the AFL and the GWS franchise couldn’t disguise in yesterday’s press conference that the signing of Folau is more about marketing than it is potential.

Let’s put aside the question of potential for the time being anyway, for even GWS and Gold Coast FC won’t know how Folau and Karmichael Hunt will adapt until they are tested in match conditions for their learning curves are steep as they come into the game as total outsiders.

But the money on the table, considering the huge question mark over potential, is excessive and, in my opinion, bordering on the absurd.

When the pay packet of Gary Ablett, Chris Judd and the other greats of the game is overshadowed by a rookie, then the current players have every right to complain about the sum awarded for such a marketing exercise and the AFL’s role in it all.

Brisbane Lions coach Michael Voss cut to the heart of the debate when he said in relation to the $3 million deal Gold Coast FC have with Karmichael Hunt: “I genuinely hope (Hunt) makes it but the fact we’re adjudicating the project on how many articles he gets in the paper as opposed to how many games he plays in the AFL then I don’t get that.”

The fact that this opinion is so widely held, even within the AFL, should be a concern for them, but the fact is they aren’t disguising it.

Andrew Demetriou took the unusual step of writing to teams and players to justify the AFL’s role in this poaching, arguing: “Our development team headed by David Matthews has judged that both players will be invaluable in promoting our game as a viable career option for first choice athletes in Queensland and New South Wales in particular and to communities which currently do not have a strong connection to our game in both states.”

It’s interesting to note that the AFL’s recruitment manager, David Matthews, featured in the GWS press conference yesterday – and again the AFL isn’t hiding its role in all this.

When Matthews defended the recruitment to difficult questions from the Sydney press, he interestingly used the term “we” – another indication of the AFL’s hand in GWS affairs.

We saw this with the exorbitant draft concessions, also.

The AFL is playing an integral role in its expansion franchises; a key role in direction and influence and that should have neutrals and rival teams’ fans concerned. The clubs’ cultures are being manufactured by the code itself – condemning their ability to develop their own culture in their local communities and perpetuating the idea that these clubs are soulless creations manufactured for fiscal considerations only.

The perception of the AFL’s undue influence isn’t going down well in other codes either, which are being targeted by an invading behemoth, and an Australian public who doesn’t appreciate bullies.

Folau, for his part, was hardly convincing when selling his interest in AFL – watching and liking a couple of games and all but acknowledging he has the option to return to rugby league when it’s all said in done is hardly reassuring for prospective GWS fans, and it failed to convince us that this was anything but a marketing ploy.

But will this marketing ploy pay any dividends?

Obviously it is contingent on the ability of Folau and Hunt to adapt and play a meaningful on-field role for their clubs. Having them in the stands won’t do much good.

But the AFL’s strategy of winning over fans through such poaching and the media interest it receives is flawed on two fronts.

Firstly, the notion of poaching star players as a way of winning over fans is a fallacy.

This isn’t motorsport in which we have favourite drivers who we follow as they swap teams and categories around the world.

The NRL, like the AFL, has community and club based support.

Support is built around a lifelong connection with a club, not a player. Players come and go, but it’s the clubs that are loved. It’s why a club like Richmond can still pull 50,000-plus crowds dispute woeful performances and zero star power. It’s the club that matters.

The NRL survived when Wendell Sailor, Lote Tuqiri and co headed to Union, and they survived when Willie Mason, Greg Bird and co disgraced themselves with their off-field behaviours.

It survived – diminished in popularity or not – because at the heart of west Sydney and the code are clubs like Parramatta, Penrith and co.

And their connection to local areas and histories is something the AFL cannot poach and override by signing up some of their brightest stars.

It also assumes that rugby league fans will suddenly convert to Aussie Rules.

But again, fans have grown up with their clubs and codes, which won’t change with the movement of a few stars (not to mention the anti-AFL feeling that still exists in many parts of NSW).

There was no mass movement of fans from the NRL to Union when the ARU was poaching earlier this decade because the fanbases of the relative codes are more ingrained in us than that.

This will only take generations to change – if it can at all – and I fear the AFL is doing more damage by alienating itself from the western Sydney natives with its aggression to their local code, making it harder for them in their long-term goal of winning over future generations to Aussie Rules.

Which leads us to my second point, which is that the notion of poaching star players as a way of giving the code and franchises immediate respect and positive recognition is flawed.

Not all publicity is good publicity, and while the AFL and GWS would have been delighted at the storm the announcement caused in the press (free-to-air networks cutting to live coverage of the presser!), what of the thoughts of the NRL loving population who are GWS’s potential audience?

Is the best way for GWS to endear themselves in the hearts and minds of these people by appearing to be invading conquistadors pillaging clubs of their beloved game (NRL)?

The media in Sydney is helping portray this notion of victimhood, as evidenced by the line of questioning in yesterday’s press conference from the cities press hounds, and the AFL is not helping by its integral role in the poaching and its aggressive overtones through its wads of cash.

The Daily Telegraph screamed “Stunt Man – the AFL’s marketing tool” on their website last night, and that perception of marketing over substance is going to stick.

Clubs are about passion, commitment and grassroots connection, not acts of bluster and players with questionable commitment and hunger for the club, let alone the code.

GWS coach Kevin Sheedy is a master of spin, and he gave one of his greatest performances in yesterday’s presser when detailing how the club will reach out and win over the hearts and minds in the area.

It’s a long-term goal, but even he couldn’t convince us that this ploy will help that development.

The AFL isn’t messing around with GWS, but the approach is flawed.

An initial and fleeting bang for their buck isn’t going to help the empire conquer its final frontier.

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