Sometimes you need to hold your nerve and understand there are greater things at play. To do this, you need a strong belief akin to faith in your leadership.
Under Frank Lowy, stewardship of football has come a long way. I believe Frank knows what he is doing and has built an impressive leadership group around him.
I have faith in Frank because of his past record in both business and his management of football to date.
If Frank says we need twelve teams and has a timetable, I assume there is a very good reason.
Have Frank and FFA made mistakes? A few, some quite bad.
The initial treatment of Perth Glory by JON and Matthew Carroll was very poor; the current issue pertaining to FFA controlled teams (i.e ticket prices, the past treatment of Home Ends, changes to starting times), seems not to be working.
But the pluses well out number the negatives, and my guess is FFA are learning from their mistakes.
Why Frank wants and is driving for expansion is for us to guess: the next media deal and the World Cup bid? Recognition by influential business and government folk of Asia?
Whatever the reason, I trust Frank knows what he is doing and have faith that he has plans in place.
mahony
Guest
ACL participation is a part of the picture. TV rights also. Positioning the league within the national landscape as rugby continues its decline to 'sop up' the various and increasing list of 'jilted' corporates is a third IMO. But you can bet that for every one reason we know about - there are another three that the FFA are responding to. The ARU mob did a good job at the start of the new football landscape - but in Frank we trust - and with good reason......
NUFCMVFC
Guest
Nice article Midfielder As far as expansion goes, 12 teams is worthwhile despite a recent article IMO, and I think it is predominantly being pushed by AFC requirements for ACL spots, 4 spots is worth a little less crowd attendance if we have to go into AFL/NRL season a bit more than is ideal, in this context A League crowd numbers stack up quite well in comparison to many other leagues so from that perspective isnot too much of an issue But there are a lot of neworking opportunities that will be developed through having 4 teams continuously in the ACL FFA have made some mistakes, have got a lot of things right but for the most part know what they are doing and have a bit of business nous which is what we have always lacked There are usually a lot of issues with startups. and some things have been done fantastically a but a few mistakes have been made. What is important though is that they are open minded to learn from it and rectify and adapt quickly. One thing though is that while they have a lot of business nous which is great, and there are some people with good knowledge of the Australian sporting industry which is necassary, this needs to be balanced out by some good football knowledge as the way football fans fuse with their clubs is different to fans of other clubs, there seems to be a bit of a dearth of football understanding as hard core fans and offiicals don't seem to read from the same page at times. Frank does need to watch the culture of the organisation as well, there are a few signs that there is a bit of a business centric groupthink, and not enough of a cultural focus for lack of a ebtter word. The most optimum outcome will be where there is a good mix between the two, too much of one and there are issues, need the business nous to attract and be able to network with and accomodate sponsors and develop healthy long term relationships with Business community (Australian and Asian) etc, an absolute necessity. But there is also a 'cultural' nous needed to forge a good relationship with the football fraternity and anchor it to Australian football and the A League and keep them engaged, and the football authorities at FFA and club level have lacked in this regard at times. If the fans etc of various perspectives become disengaged because of ko times, ticket prices, HE policies or other reasons, it is going to be harder to get them back, and a strong community is needed to surround clubs to unerpin them, then you build on that by engaging the generalist sports fan. The thing with football is that the fans have so many leagues from Euro leagues to State and grassroots that there are plenty of viable alternatives to get ones football fix than A League, this is true even of the Socceroos, people will always follow their country naturally but to what degree is something that can fluctuate (how many people will travel and how many will support say ACQ or will people just choose the big WCQ?) No doubt that Frank is one of the best if not the best canditate to lead football, need to consolidate gains
drew777
Roar Pro
after a long personal absence, this is the first article I've read and it's got me thinking: what if the rapid expansion is a left field play to try and attract wealthy foreign investors who want to buy a club cheaply who are underachieving, such is that of Man City's take over, and the imminent Birmingham City take over. I know it is obviously not in the FFA's plans for a team to fail, but as it stands, Fury owner might bail out, leaving the door open for a new buyer who is willing to spend the big bucks. Only trouble to this logic is the salary cap... A more accurate guess might be the world cup bid, as I don't see A-League on free to air TV any time soon. Frank Lowy is the right man for the job, and I agree with your article.
cab711
Guest
Lowy is channeling Johnny Warren.
whiskeymac
Guest
its his passion for the game which gives me the encouragement that ultimately he has the games interests at heart.
Midfielder
Guest
Agga78 My take on the ACL push is .. we need to trust those at the top... FFA are getting heaps of coin from government and big and very big sponsors ... to keep them and to keep them happy ... maybe we need 4 spots... BUT my guess sorry belief is that Obie Wan knows what he is doing..
Midfielder
Guest
I agree wthat having FFA control the clubs is the better option ... however that does not mean they are without fault in their management of those clubs..
Pippinu
Roar Guru
A 10 month season in total, early July to late April, as Sir Humphrey once said: A courageous decision.
AndyRoo
Roar Guru
I bet a lot of that gets fudged in the end because a lot of leagues won't be able to make the 5k fan figure (UAE still get 4 spots with a crowd avg of 2k and one of their teams pulling out) so in regards to that the difference between us having 30 games a season instead of 33 and no poor quality 2nd tier is pretty small.
sheek
Guest
Yeah, he's a good man, Frank Lowy. And his love for football is obviously genuine.
agga78
Guest
Expansion is being driven by what the AFC want, the criteria set out and is avialable to read here http://www.the-afc.com/uploads/afc/docs/acl2011criteria.pdf By 2012 to participate in the ACL you need to have a minimum 12 teams, 33 games, 8 month season with 2 months of pre season or cups. THe reasons for A league expansion are 4 ACL spots competing for big money in ASIA, A longer season, more teams, more matches, more content equals a bigger TV deal, as long as FFA keep the ship steady, the rewards will be huge by 2012, and if by some fluke we win the World cup bid, then you can double that TV deal.
albe
Guest
he's doing well with the Cup bid... even if we don't win, its putting us on the football map politically. The key now is we have a strong board and administrators (Fraser heading the league especially). We need the depth in running football now with the chairman pursuing the bigger picture stuff. Agree on the Perth stuff... thought the aru guys that were running things were out of their depth dealing with football issues. But O'Neill served his purpose opening boardroom doors in sydney, and guys like Carroll were his people. The FFA controlled teams are a better proposition then the past when the governing body was in no position to be shepherding the clubs between ownership groups. Least the clubs stay intact.