A-League clubs must have their own identity
Roar Pro By Michael Turner, 27 Aug 2010 Michael Turner is a Roar Pro
- Tagged:
- A-League, football, World Football
As we all know, the Hyundai A-League works on a franchise system, similar to the one used in the MLS, and more locally, the NRL. There has been no real questioning to this system of club management.
However, is it the best option for the clubs, fans and, more importantly, the growth of Football.
As it currently stands, each club is a franchise, a license to play.
To enter the league, they need a required amount of capital before they are awarded a license. This view is one of the biggest selling points of the system. Financially, the franchise system is the best for the A-League, in such financial uncertainty and such competitive competition from other codes.
Each club has a salary cap enforced, as well as three marquee players (Under 21, Australian, and non-restricted) that fall outside of the salary cap.
Once again, this model prevents clubs from overspending.
An entity bid that tries to change this model is usually always rejected. One big example is Sydney Rovers’ more highly advanced rival bid, Sydney Wanderers, headed by Chris Tanner, Peter Begley, Richie Williams, and Joe Pinto. With the Wanderers’ bid having presented a one year plan, with several revolutionary ideas, including Singaporean sister club, strong ties with the community, outreach plans, returning Socceroos, and financials and stadiums all sorted out.
This bid was rejected for one that was only one month in the making, with no reasoning.
According to Mr Tanner however, the reason for the rejection, was, of course, football politics. He stated that previously the FFA had asked for a 30 per cent stake in another bid, and 4 out of 7 seats on the board.
Is this the way to go for football? I believe it is not.
Chris Tanner’s bid had a slogan on the bottom of its paper “The People’s Bid”. All of these A-League bids should be “people’s bids”. They should be run by the community, for the community. The FFA should still have control over finance such as the salary cap, but give the clubs some freedom.
Even the simplest things such as club websites need to be non-linear. At the moment, all the clubs have the same website, with different articles and pictures.
These small things all contribute to a club’s identity. Its own match day feeling, posters, and advertisements let the clubs call the shots. Still, credit to the FFA, they are starting to let that happen ever since season 3.
However, they are still rigorously regulating the way they are run. The clubs are all generic, bringing back the debate of “Old Soccer vs New Football”. Those clubs had identities.
Despite the obvious ethnic ties that some had, they still had that thing that you could recognise as being truly “Pan Hellenic”, or a real “Melbourne Knights” supporter.
Still on the topic of identity, the same old ‘Reebok’ standard jersey is slowly tiring out. Teams in the EPL have their own jersey. Each year the unveiling of the new jerseys is such a large thing. Sometimes it defines the team’s future, or season to come. It leads to some amazing looking jerseys, as well as some shockers, and companies work long and hard to create new looking jerseys for the clubs.
It becomes a competition.
You often hear “Have you seen the new Manchester United Away strip?”, “Have you seen Chelsea’s new third kit?” Rarely do you see “I love Central Coast’s new jersey,” because they are all the same theme.
Either plain coloured, or striped.
The only real breakaways were North Queensland Fury’s inaugural kit, and Melbourne Victory, who began the V style strip. It’s a part of identity, more or less.
The A-League is a growing young league, with a large amount of promise, however depending on the decisions the FFA make, will define its future.
Until the association gives clubs their own true identity, the A-League will have its growth stunted.
Recommend this story.
The Turkey 10
The Turkey 10 teams have now been selected, as Wild Turkey Bourbon's sport sponsorship kicks into the next exciting phase.
Choose which side you're going to support and get in the running to win $2,500!
Simply visit Wild Turkey Australia on Facebook for your chance to win.
Find out more.
- Explore:
- A-League, football, World Football
August 27th 2010 @ 8:14am
Ben of Phnom Penh said | August 27th 2010 @ 8:14am | Report comment
Odd you should pick out CCM as I was thinking only the other day how good their strip looked. Identifies are definitely there and are maturing as the clubs get older. Already different fan groups have different little rituals and different clubs have different approaches and positioning within their local communities. I see no real problem with progress to date.
August 27th 2010 @ 9:21am
Michael Turner said | August 27th 2010 @ 9:21am | Report comment
The idea is there, because naturally each club is going to develop it’s own identity, however they are limited. They won’t be able to reach their full potential with the control the FFA is maintaining.
August 27th 2010 @ 9:30am
AndyRoo said | August 27th 2010 @ 9:30am | Report comment
I think it’s important that the FFA maintain some standards while allowing the clubs to do things themselves if it’s better than what the FFA could do.
For example clubs could be allowed to have their own websites in addition to their generic A League one. in reality i don’t think many of them would actually come up with better sites but the one or two that do would benefit greatley.
Shirts and Merchandise too the FFA need to relax the control a little but a free for all would see some amateur deals.
August 27th 2010 @ 9:45am
Michael Turner said | August 27th 2010 @ 9:45am | Report comment
I believe that clubs should have control, but the community of the clubs should have a strong input.
I strongly condone “The People’s Bid” ideology, but I do believe that the FFA should still control finances, such as salary caps etc.
August 27th 2010 @ 9:54am
whiskeymac said | August 27th 2010 @ 9:54am | Report comment
Nice article.
re relaxing control it hink its true, the need to eventually, but i assume by controlling their product the FFA is doing all it can to ensure success – a modest but solid foundation to build upon – the true identity is probably going to come from the fans anyway and theres a host of non official fan forums and sites. all the fancy websites and kit changes wont develop a “kop” like atmosphere. The FFA’s subsequent over control of the crowds is likely to cause more damage to developing the identity than whether websites are generic.
as a thought how much of the controlling aspects of a FFA licence compare to a lease from Westfields?
August 27th 2010 @ 9:13am
AndyRoo said | August 27th 2010 @ 9:13am | Report comment
Ironic that the “peoples bid” were going to play out of the least popular with the people stadium (homebush).
“Despite the obvious ethnic ties that some had, they still had that thing that you could recognise as being truly “Pan Hellenic”, or a real “Melbourne Knights” supporter.”
I don’t understand what you are saying here at all. Apart from their ethnicity in the 27 years of the NSL I can’t recall much distinctive about their fans at all.
August 27th 2010 @ 9:49am
Michael Turner said | August 27th 2010 @ 9:49am | Report comment
The Ethnicity of the fans contributed strongly. Despite the ethnicity being the downfall of the NSL in some aspects, it created an atmosphere.
It is quite debatable, however I believe that the fans style contributes to a club identity in many many ways. E.g the identity of the Turkish fans, the identity of the English clubs.
Now however it is great that the adelaide united fans have a sort of identity, the atmosphere at Hindmarsh, and Melbourne, with it’s large crowds and vocal supporters. Can’t wait to see the Melbourne Derby
August 27th 2010 @ 10:12am
whiskeymac said | August 27th 2010 @ 10:12am | Report comment
agree – re homebush. i cannot see that stadium being the choice for western sydney siders – unless they consider western sydney to start at Croydon and end at Auburn/ Granville.
August 27th 2010 @ 9:24am
mahony said | August 27th 2010 @ 9:24am | Report comment
Clubs to select own strips next year if well placed rumours are to be believed. MVFC and Scum FC to Addidas apparently…..
August 27th 2010 @ 10:07pm
Michael Turner said | August 27th 2010 @ 10:07pm | Report comment
hmmm…i’m listening more. Where did you hear that?
August 27th 2010 @ 10:54am
Fussball ist unser leben said | August 27th 2010 @ 10:54am | Report comment
How about a few Friday proverbs …. “All good things to those who wait”; “Rome wasn’t built in a day” …
and, my favourite ….. “The ox is slow, but the earth is patient”.
I agree with all Michael’s observations. I guess, I’ve waited so long to have a decent Football product in Australia, I’m happy to continue to be patient as the product develops and grows.
In my opinion, there has been a huge improvement in the standard of football in the HAL this season and slowly other aspects of Football in Australia – on and off the park – will also improve. And, once this wagon builds momentum hang on for the ride of our lives!
August 27th 2010 @ 12:08pm
macavity said | August 27th 2010 @ 12:08pm | Report comment
lost me when you said NRL is a franchise system.
the NRL is just as much a club system as the AFL, it just happens to include some franchises (ie the broncos and storm)
August 27th 2010 @ 1:53pm
Fez's are cool said | August 27th 2010 @ 1:53pm | Report comment
You could concider the AFL to have “franchises” too… what else would you call GWS, GC, Swans?
August 27th 2010 @ 3:34pm
Mister Football said | August 27th 2010 @ 3:34pm | Report comment
Both of GWS and the GC Suns will be membership based clubs like the rest of the AFL clubs (in fact, the Suns already have 7,000 members, even though they’ve been playing in the 2nd tier of footy).
August 27th 2010 @ 5:59pm
bob said | August 27th 2010 @ 5:59pm | Report comment
Except that the AFL is pouring 200 million into the club before it starts.
Hardly “community” if it needs to be subsidised like that.
It’s a franchise. Coat it however you like, but the AFL is a competition of franchises.
August 28th 2010 @ 12:15pm
Danny_Mac said | August 28th 2010 @ 12:15pm | Report comment
Actually, thats not strictly true… they AFL are spending $200m over ten year on the game in western sydney, which only benefits GWS (the Swans might get some benefit though), however the money isn’t being given to GWS to spend. This way the AFL can control where the money is spend and how. Most of Israel Fallou’s contract is actually a 3rd party payment from the AFL for “Marketing and Promotion”, and only 40% of his wage counts towards their cap, but the money comes from the AFL directly…
August 28th 2010 @ 12:28pm
beaver fever said | August 28th 2010 @ 12:28pm | Report comment
Thanks for pointing that out, i could not be bothered to correct these ignorant posts, of which on this subject and many others about Australian football are extremely common.
August 28th 2010 @ 2:01pm
Mister Football said | August 28th 2010 @ 2:01pm | Report comment
bob
as I said, the Suns already have 7,000 members, and they are only playing in the VFL this season, which is one tier below AFL standard.
That’s a very healthy number and is indicative of plenty of local community support (certainly far more than what GCU enjoy, or will ever enjoy).
The Suns will have little problem attracting at least 12,000 members and averaging 15,000+ home
crowds in its first season.
That will happen not because the club is being underwritten by the AFL, but because there has been a stack of community work in getting the club up and running the last two years.
August 27th 2010 @ 11:25pm
jimbo said | August 27th 2010 @ 11:25pm | Report comment
AFL clubs are not franchises – they are not privately owned – they are funded by the AFL.
“Memberships” don’t give you a share of the profits – its an inflated AFL term for season ticket holders.
August 27th 2010 @ 3:40pm
Working Class Rugger said | August 27th 2010 @ 3:40pm | Report comment
The NSWRL and QRL systems were Club based system. However, with the inclusion of teams like Brisbane and Canberra that begun to change. It jumped further when the Cowboys, Sea Gulls, Warriors, Crusher’s and Reds joined prior to the SL fiasco and really went nuts during SL .i.e. Adelaide, Hunter. Prior to this both NSWRL and QRL clubs built up over time while those listed and the likes of the Storm and Titans are for all intensive purposes ‘franchises’. They were put in place by either the ARL,SL or NRL with any real history behind them. The CC Bears and Reds will once again follow this model as will another new teams in the future. It’s has been an interesting evolution experienced by all the football codes in Australia. The AFL went from the seperate state leagues to introducing West Coast, Adelaide, Fremantle and Port Adelaide. Now we have both the GC and Greater Western Syd consortiums. Rugby has followed suite with the Brumbies to some degree, The Force and now the Rebels.
In fact, if you look right across the Australian Sporting landscape only Cricket still maintains its traditional format. Though in saying that it will soon change at the very least in the T20 arena with a supposed expansion of the KFC Big Bash forming city based teams.
August 27th 2010 @ 3:23pm
Brett McKay said | August 27th 2010 @ 3:23pm | Report comment
So if the A-L clubs don’t own them, could it be the said that the FFA is guilty of identity theft??
I was interested to hear a Roarer state on the site in recent months that of the 32 AFL and NRL clubs, the Gold Coast Titans were the only club to actually own their own identity, in terms of trademarks, etc. News Ltd’s subsidiary, Valimanda Pty Ltd owns all the associated logos, TMs, for the Melbourne Storm, but in all other cases (apparently) the govering body owns the identity.
This seems to be rather strange in my mind, if this is the case, as the clubs really have no way of forging their own identity, in which case, Michael’s piece here could easily apply to more than just the A-League…
August 27th 2010 @ 3:49pm
Art Sapphire said | August 27th 2010 @ 3:49pm | Report comment
Correct Brett, the AFL owns the colours, the guernsey and even the mascots of every competing club.
This is from 2003
“Collingwood has called on the AFL to protect the most famous emblems of the club – the magpie, the black and white colours and its stripped guernsey – or it will seek to win back the trademarks from the league.”
http://www.onlymelbourne.com.au/melbourne_details.php?id=3185
August 27th 2010 @ 4:46pm
smfc4Life said | August 27th 2010 @ 4:46pm | Report comment
Great story – a club should be an analogy of the community it represents – The HAL Clubs are rather generically compromised – I agree whole heartedly regarding assimilation of strips – websites and broader marketing campaigns – 11 clubs – however 1 model
The FFA should loosen up and allow the clubs to express themselves more freely and regularly
Football as still got a long way to go in this country – I am not convinced that the HAL has matured or is safe
time for your traditional clubs to be given an opprtunity to apply provided they meet criteria – even if they do not succeed – it will atleast keep the franchises honest
So we had a community bid – and the FFA wanted the controlling majority – I was not aware of that – what a joke
Keep up the good work ROAR – tell it the way it is for a change
August 27th 2010 @ 6:30pm
Michael Turner said | August 27th 2010 @ 6:30pm | Report comment
thanks mate, its good to receive some praise.
I had no idea about the controlling majority idea, before I was in contact with Chris Tanner, who ran the Sydney Wanderers bid, as he told me Joe Messeiner’ South Coast Bid was rejected for not giving 4 out of 7 seats.
Politics.
I believe in individuality. Websites, kits etc i dont think are a waste of time. They all contribute to a sense of identity.
August 27th 2010 @ 5:41pm
Troy Mouni said | August 27th 2010 @ 5:41pm | Report comment
Great article and great read.
I refuse to take my family to see either Melbourne Franchise’s as its just way too expensive. The FFA have to recoup their money back some how.
Considering Heart reneged on their deal to base themselves out at Casey, seems they are just trying to be a carbon copy of McVictory.
Have these community bids such as Southern Cross and Sydney Wanderers, been given official written reasons why they weren’t accepted or just phone calls to say sorry your rejected and that is it?
Additionally when they do introduce a promotion and relegation model which is mandated by FIFA, what will they do with these franchises? Will they create other teams cookie cutter / or Maccas style and deploy them to regions that don’t have a team? Considering the financial life line that the FFA already extends to most teams, where will these new franchises come from and how will they be financed / survive?
Many underestimate or don’ t understand the importance that winning the WC bid in 2022 is to the FFA. It is win at all costs for them. If they lose the bid, watch the football landscape change again.
Keep up the great work ROAR, where others fear to tread you romp it in.
August 27th 2010 @ 9:51pm
Art Sapphire said | August 27th 2010 @ 9:51pm | Report comment
Its $450 to take 2 adults and 4 kids to Melbourne Heart 15 games Troy Mouni.
Thats $30 for up to 6 seats. How is that expensive???
How can you take someone seriously when he gives himself the greek description for going down on a woman.
August 27th 2010 @ 10:10pm
Michael Turner said | August 27th 2010 @ 10:10pm | Report comment
I would agree, that because the A-League is not free to air, it is not viable to watch on television.
These bids have been given official reasons, however most do not publish these, the first real mention of it seems to be here, because a bid member I’m in contact with gave me information on his, and Joe Messeiner’s bid.
A promotion and relegation model is not viable in the forseeable future, as relegation can spew chaos for clubs such as Newcastle, and even Sydney. With Australia such a competitive sporting landscape, any sort of downfall can spell the end.
August 30th 2010 @ 1:03pm
Danny_Mac said | August 30th 2010 @ 1:03pm | Report comment
As far as I’m aware, there is no FIFA mandate to have promotion/relegation. The MLS does not have such a system, like us, they have a two tier system of Major and Minor leagues, basically the same as AFL/State level, NRL/NSWRL+QRL.
The problem with the game in emerging football, but established sporting countries is that, the game cant stamp its “Euro-Centric” culture on the society. Football sides in europe relate to small towns very well and most have 100+ years of history behind them, they are moderately well supported, but when you go below say the Championship, very few clubs have 100% support, ie, i’m a Hereford United fan AND an Arsenal fan. Infact the crazy PL ticket prices has actually been positive for smaller, lower league sides, as people want to go and see football.
Football needs to fit into the existing sporting landscape, the culture here (and in the US) is one of a Major/Minor system, with no movement between the two. Salary caps and drafts also come in here. Again, there is no FIFA requirement to have or not have a salary cap. but they exist in some places to help the game grow, survive and (perhaps most importantly) fit into the “target” culture.
Ultimately, FIFA are hell bent on world domination, so they’ll do whatever they have to for the game to take a hold in new territories…
August 27th 2010 @ 6:01pm
bob said | August 27th 2010 @ 6:01pm | Report comment
Websites are a waste of money for A-League clubs.
All the AFL and NRL ones have template based sites, and most of the teams in England (for example), especially the lower down the club gets, have either tacky, horrible ones or identikit (look at Wolves and Stoke).
August 27th 2010 @ 11:07pm
Midfielder said | August 27th 2010 @ 11:07pm | Report comment
Rome was not built in a day … the A-League is decades away from having the same community acceptance and feel of the aFL & NRL…
But this should not create any fear … we simply grow a little each year and every now and then have a huge year and set up a new level… like the next media deal …
Mike go back to 2003 / 04 … in the last NSL total revenue by the NSL was under 4 million dollars, crowds averaged about 4, 000 take away Perth Glory, South Melbourne & Newcastle and averages were less than 2, 000…
Broke, no media deal, no stadiums, no broadcaster, SBS wanted it nothing …. so were where the new investors ore clubs going to come from… The system we have is the only one that could have worked…