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North Queensland victims of FFA’s flawed planning

1st March, 2011
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1st March, 2011
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Any hope of last-minute salvation was dashed yesterday when Football Federation Australia (FFA) axed North Queensland Fury from the A-League; saving $2 million for the governing body but costing the league a presence in the region and exposing the flaw in the FFA’s expansion plans.

To summarise the developments, the Fury were unable to reach the $1.5 million capital target that would have granted them another season in the A-League with the support of the governing body.

“Despite the hard work put in, the target of $1.5m of capital from the Retain the Fury campaign was not met, with less than $300,000 being pledged,” FFA chief executive Ben Buckley said.

“Whilst the club and the advisory board had attracted some very encouraging sponsorship commitments, the projected loss to run the club next season is still in our assessment in excess of $2m.

“FFA had been looking for capital from the campaign to set the foundations for a move to local ownership and a long-term future for the club.

“However with the capital-raising falling well short of the target, FFA has had to make the hard decision that it cannot continue to own and finance the club in these circumstances.”

There was an inevitability about the decision. Even as the Fury fought on gallantly, raising just under $300,000 from their community ownership model as floods and cyclones battered the region, all of the signs coming from the FFA indicated that their fate was already sealed.

After all, there are still those who insist the Fury were condemned to death by Australia’s failed 2022 World Cup bid. With no need to redevelop a World Cup stadium in Townsville and the demise of the stillborn Sydney Rovers leaving the A-League with an odd number of teams, the governing body seemed content to count its losses in a region of no great significant commercial importance; killing off the Fury and consolidating with a 10-team competition.

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“We need to concentrate our resources on the growth, promotion and stability of the entire Hyundai A-League competition and this level of investment would prevent us from undertaking programs to achieve the above,” Buckley said.

The FFA’s purely fiscal decision leaves us with three questions. Firstly, why confirm the Fury’s axing in the midst of the finals series? Secondly, was it not worth the FFA covering the $2 million for another season, giving the Fury greater time in more stable economic times to build on their community ownership model? And thirdly and perhaps most importantly, why expand there in the first place if there was not the community backing and financial pull to sustain a club?

In terms of timing, it couldn’t have been worse – right in the middle of a so far exciting A-League finals series involving two Queensland teams.

All those involved in the Fury, from the players, coaches, members and club personnel, deserved an answer as soon as possible so they could plan accordingly, but the delaying and indecision meant the announcement fell at a time when the league should be building traction towards its showpiece event.

Now all the media focus will be on the Fury’s axing and the renewed questions regarding the A-League’s future and sustainability; clouding the drastic improvements in the on-field product at a time when it should be on full display.

It was as a mighty own goal from the FFA.

Secondly, could the FFA have not stepped in to fill the breach for another season? Expecting the North Queensland community and Queensland government to come to the aid of the club at a time when they suffered from one of the greatest natural disasters to hit the state was an unrealistic expectation. There were other more pressing financial concerns than the fate of a football club.

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If the Fury’s fate was sealed well before this time, then this would hardly have mattered. But if indeed there was a chance the club could have been saved by the injection of new investment, then there should have been some leniency from the governing body.

As Fox Sports commentator Andy Harper pointed out, “When you look at the numbers involved that ($2 million shortfall) must be two, two-and-a-half per cent of the FFA’s business.

“In the scheme of things it doesn’t seem a lot of money, particularly when you consider how much money has been invested to get to this point.”

The fiscal decision overlooks the greater cost to the game: the supporters of North Queensland Fury who are now lost to the game (they cannot be expected to switch allegiances to Gold Coast or Brisbane), isolating the huge catchment area of the region and their grass roots clubs which now don’t have a direct path to the top tier of the game, and the loss of confidence in the governing body that comes with a failed expansion exercise.

Having made the decision to expand into the North Queensland, deeming the area worthy of a franchise, the FFA should have stayed there and accepted the financial cost of keeping the club afloat during its time of need, as a matter of honour.

This leads to the third question and the lesson to emerge from this sorry saga; the mistake in awarding North Queensland (and Gold Coast) a franchise as part of the A-League’s flawed expansion plans.

Expanding into Gold Coast and North Queensland seemingly had nothing to do with significant market research or the overwhelming desire for an A-League franchise in those regions, but more to do with the deep pockets of Clive Palmer and Don Matheson respectively.

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It was a capital driven approach that completely ignored the level of support in those regions, in terms of commercial backing and fan interest.

This flawed strategy left the fate of the franchises at the whim of individuals, as witnessed by Matheson’s departure, which all but condemned the Fury there and then.

Gold Coast United, despite all the reassurances from Palmer, hinges on its owner’s personal fortune and business interests.

These clubs failed to engage with their communities because they never belonged to those communities, but rather those individuals who treated the clubs like their own personal fantasy teams.

Surely there should have been some due diligence to ensure there was the community backing to save the clubs in the event of their owners’ departures. The community ownership model came far too late to North Queensland and across the A-League.

Having now decided there was not enough support in North Queensland, we can only ask why the FFA didn’t discover this when they were handing out franchises.

“We need to know why we went there in the first place if the whole thing was so precarious,” said Andy Harper.

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The greatest flaw in the A-League’s expansion plan was ignoring the advice of the PFA in their “Australian Premier League” manifesto back in 2002 and not starting with or at least expanding into the two leading markets, Melbourne and Sydney, with multiple teams, instead of awarding Sydney FC and Melbourne Victory with five-year exclusivity rights.

Melbourne Victory bursting out of the gates and leading the way with crowd averages and fan engagement and Sydney FC’s first season success (their fall in attendances and the backroom shambles is entirely self-inflicted), proved that the FFA underestimated those two cities’ ability to embrace the new look domestic game.

If we take this season as an example we’ve seen: Gold Coast United continue to pull awful crowds; North Queensland’s attendances fall and the collapse of the club; and Melbourne Heart, a club with no geographical differentiation from Victory trying to carve out a supporter base in a city owned by their intra-city rivals for the last five seasons, pull double the crowd average of their fellow expansion clubs, off the back of one of the success stories of the season, the birth of the Melbourne derby.

This proves that the way to expand was, as the PFA encouraged, in the major markets such as Melbourne, followed by the regional/smaller population centres.

Just imagine where the Melbourne rivalry would have stood today had the Heart started last season or earlier. They wouldn’t have had to steal as many fans from the Victory, for one thing.

The FFA failed to do that and must live with the consequences – great financial costs, isolating fans from the league, the ongoing concern over Gold Coast United, and so forth.

So the A-League is left to consolidate with ten teams and grind through this difficult aging process.

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“Many leagues around the world have adjusted the composition of clubs in early years and we feel this move will strengthen the Hyundai A-League just as it did for Major League Soccer in the United States and the J-League in Japan,” said Buckley.

Trotting out the examples of the MLS and J-League struggling during their developmental phase is all well and good, but are the lessons from those leagues’ experiences being taken on board?

Hopefully the harsh reality of this situation and the public outcry forces the FFA to reexamine how it is running the A-League. After all, it could have been a lot worse than this.

The A-League dodged a bullet with Nathan Tinkler’s last-minute salvation of Newcastle Jets; Wellington and Brisbane have recently teetered on the financial brink; and Gold Coast United remains a basket case left to the whim of Mr. Palmer.

It’s time for the FFA under the leadership of Buckley to restore the fans’ faith in the governing body, if they can, and steady the ship.

Hopefully that begins with some genuine attempt to revive North Queensland Fury. Rumours abound that the club could be entered into the National Youth League next season with an eye at re-entering the A-League in the 2012/13 season. That’s a pretty steep ask. But leave them dead and the majority of North Queensland is lost to the A-League for good.

The A-League can’t afford to follow the NSL’s path, where franchises came and went through a constantly revolving door. But can the FFA avoid the mistakes of the past? If the North Queensland Fury saga is anything to go by, it remains to be seen.

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Follow Adrian on twitter @AdrianMusolino

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