Football the big winner in the 2009 ERASS

Borey Have you got the Touch/Tag figures for Queensland?

I had a look at Qld in relation to the 4 codes for males between 2001 and 2009 and there is some interesting results 2009 (000) Football (outdoor) - 152 +20 (2008) League - 83 -5 Union - 42 +22 ( not sure an this one doesnt seem correct) AFL - 31 +3 On a little expontial growth 2020 will mean 2020 Football - 230 League - 120 Union - 70 AFL - 50 ( i would expect it to be a little higher due to the Gold Coast AFL team )

Great article - tells us what we know except for the changes in the order of sports etc.... While football has a challenging commercial environment to navigate it has a bright future regardless. Add in the junior numbers and football has a compelling 'value proposition' for any commercial entity considering sports investment.

Jimbo - nothing to do with code vs code - simply that you've misrepresented the figures. They have context. Heck - the most obvious example is regarding the Roy Morgan research where you're claim is : the 2 most popular sports programs ever on FTA TV and Pay TV are Socceroos (football) games well, the Roy Morgan research was ONLY ever conducted over a period of 2006. So, firstly, you can't say 'EVER', and, as illustrated, the Roy Morgan poll ONLY tested the following 'events': --------------------[All Australians 14+(million)] 2005 Melbourne Cup 10.5 2006 Australian Open Men’s Final 10 Commonwealth Games 2006 —Opening Ceremony 9 Soccer World Cup Qualifier — 2nd Game (Nov. 2005) 8.5 Commonwealth Games 2006 — Closing Ceremony 8.5 Cricket One Day International — Australia vs. South Africa (Jan. 2006) 7.3 2006 Soccer World Cup — Australia vs. Japan (Jun. 2006) 7.1 Cricket: Test — Australia vs. West Indies (Dec. 2005) 7 2006 Soccer World Cup - Australia vs. Italy (Jun. 2006) 6.7 2006 Soccer World Cup - Australia vs. Croatia (Jun. 2006) 6.5 2006 Australian Open Women’s Final 5 2006 Fosters Australian Grand Prix 4.9 2006 Soccer World Cup — Australia vs. Brazil (Jun. 2006) 4.6 AFL Monday Night —Collingwood vs. Adelaide 2.2* (not shown in QLD) so, can we agree, it's hardly an exhaustive list, no SoO, no NRL or AFL GF's, no Boxing day cricket and no Bathurst. It's quite one thing to seek a defence in having quoted numbers.......but, you MUST understand the CONTEXT and the LIMITATIONS of those numbers. Don't go trying to shelter behind a code vs code attack......where's the last time I mentioned Aussie Rules??? I'm engaging with you 100% on the subject matter that you introduced. i.e. the ERASS survey and your favourite 2006 once was conducted survey by Roy Morgan.

Fussball - yes, exactly, it was seemingly out of the blue - - nothing like it in the 4 years since. My concern? The Roy Morgan report claims In the last eight months Roy Morgan Research has measured viewing audiences of all the major Australian sporting events: which, quite clearly they DIDN'T do. I choose to judge them in part on their ommissions as I've mentioned previously as much as on what they have included. The ommissions are pretty ordinary given their claim above.

Let me give an example. Johnny plays korfball for his club 10 times a year in a korfball league Johnny plays korfball for his school 25 times a year in an organised competition. Johnny plays korfball 120 times a year at lunch time. My guess (and it is just that) is that he would be classified as a regular club participant. Not sure it is a big deal since 1. I think my example is extreme 2. if you wanted to restrict the category to people who had played in a club setting at least 156 times a year you would restrict yourself to semi-professionals which I do not think is the focus of ERASS.

Michael C - I'm not sure what concerns you about the Roy Morgan research in 2006. Why is it "out of the blue"? What was unique about 2006? Well, the Socceroos qualified for the biggest sporting event in the world for the first time since 1974! So, all sorts of organisations - advertisers, sponsors, even rival sporting codes - would have been extremely interested to assess the level of interest in the television broadcast in Australia for this event. Since the FIFA WC was controversially omitted from the Federal Government's Anti-Siphon List, I reckon the Federal Government would have, too, been interested to gauge the level of interest in the tv broadcast figures. I cannot think of any other event - sporting, musical or theatrical - that could command broadcast viewing figures similar to the the Socceroos in the early hours of the morning. Perhaps, if man landed on Mars it would generate similar tv ratings at 3:00 a.m.?!!

aubgraham - good point the increases being greater than natural population growth - - the old chestnut about standing still is going backwards, and even seemingly moving forward may not be really moving forward!!!!! Given the ERASS questionaire allows for up to 10 codes activities, and then the Q's 3-5 are asked for each one, so, I'd assume that outdoor soccer can only be entered once, and that if so - - the answer of 'some' is enough??? re organised. I guess it's got to 'default' to the highest order or 'participation', and that would mean that regular-club based will win out. However, school based indoor soccer could still appear in the indoor category, along with the weekend club based outdoor. But, school based outdoor irregular would get 'trumped' by outdoor 'regular' club based for example.

Fussball - I don't deny or argue your points. That doesn't change that Jimbo was misrepresentative and that the Roy Masters polling was under representative your points don't change any of that. and I repeat, I don't deny nor argue your points. However, that Roy Morgan 'out of the blue' conducted 4 surveys in 2006 around the SBS socceroos coverage, and used some selective criteria (or selective ommissions) to portray it as well as possible???.......suggests some form of 'sponsor' for those surveys???? or an agenda or sorts. Now - - whether that agenda was simply to try to discredit OzTam and further reinforce Roy Morgan as the ONLY accredited Australian 'Gallup' poller,.....I dunno. But, it was an odd diversion for Roy Morgan to take,.......was 2006 a quiet year re state elections etc???

I think this is the original aim of ERASS. I believe they are interested in "regular" participation because of current health guidelines (not sure they ever had codewars in mind). Since many people do many different things it is easy to be regularly active but not regularly active in any particular sport. In a similar vein, the fact that a sport has a relatively large number of unorganised participants may be 'bad' from a commercial perspective, but great from a public health perspective. After all, most sport is unorganised - 87% of participants played an unorganised sport, Over half only played an unorganised sport. Adults have to work and don't have parents to drive them to training during the week. A sport that is relatively easy to informally 'organise' and play will be viewed more favourably by government from a public health perspective (I did notice that 'kick-to-kick' was not a listed activity unfortunately).

If you have a look at the earlier reports, say 2001, they break out the 'double dipping in organised and unorganised (not for specific sports unfortunately), the percentage who participated in both organised and unorganised is approximately 1/3. Let me understand your question. What does regular organised physical activity mean (e.g. figure 26). It could be someone who has participated regularly and particpated in an organised way. It could means participated regularly in an organised way. If you look at the survey, Q3 is Was any of this (activity) organised by a club, association or other type of organisation? and allows the the response of All,Some, No, Don't know. My guess is that it is the first way. Not sure if this is what you mean, after all the individual ERASS numbers don't double (or triple) count - it is only when people start adding them together that that happens. Oh, I forgot to mention that for most of the sports above the growth easily outstrips the increase in population of approx 13% (I make no comment on the statistical significance of any of these claims).

Michael C - 1. Roy Morgan Research is not owned by any media organisation. 2. OzTAM is jointly owned by the Seven Network, the Nine Network and Network Ten ... enough said! PS: As someone mentioned, the Australia v Italy match was telecast b/w 2:00 a.m. and 4:00 a.m. If they ran the Melbourne Cup at this time or played the AFL GF at this time the ratings would be very interesting, don't you think - I know I wouldn't get up to watch either event.

Jimbo and Punter - - given that you're going on and on about this - let me point out what I'd commented on re female participation in the 'longer post' that was NOT published and to which I was referring when I prefaced that post with I hope my lengthy reply get’s published (if so, I apologies for the length) – - I’ll summaries. . including the typo on 'summarise', anyway, see below: The point of all this is to NOT take a swipe at soccer - - but to illustrate the challenge that the game has been having to face, of all participation, 34% of outdoor soccer is exclusively 'non-organised' compared to 23% of Australian Football. Conversely, the challenge for Australian football is illustrated in the male/female ratios - 25% outdoor soccer is female, whilst only 10% of Aust Football is female. I think that illustrates clearly that I was at no point intending it as a swipe at soccer that female participation was relatively high. And so, my 'summary' of my lengthy post succincted what I said above into this Soccer (outdoor) has about 25% female participation (govt’s like that) Now, please, stop taking offense at it as you should be able to recognise that I was being complimentary to outdoor soccer on this point!!!!

MC why are you foisting this argument on everyone? Football has huge participation and it is growing. It seems obvious. This article is largely about adult social participation and adult and older teen teams simply do not train much if at all, as by that stage they should know how to play the game to a sufficient level. I played on an adult basketball team for nearly 20 years and we never had one training session, anyone who needed a training session to learn the game or practice wasn't good enough to be on the team, simple as that. You train younger kids a couple of times a week to teach them the game. With football I think the junior participation is a pyramid heavy at the younger age groups and many teen boys try more physical athletic sports like basketball and the other football codes during those years but return to play football socially as adults. Basketball I know has far more U16 & U18 boys regos than U10's. Most football clubs I believe it is the other way around. I would imagine that AFL during those later teen years is at it strongest participationwise. Participation in sport should be an end in itself anyway and young people should get the opportunity to learn as many games as possible in order to carry on with some healthy pursuits throughout their life. It should not be part of some sort of sporting indoctrination or marketing exercise by the codes governing bodies. Very few people end up pro sportsmen and it is better if people can continue to participate rather than just cheer from the sidelines or type for it as the case may be.

Just to clarify: 274,400 versus 239,700 is for NSW male total participation in specific activities (organised and non-organised) "soccer is declining among under 34 year olds" - what sport(s) (indoor and outdoor?), what years are we comparing? (can't see this one) "The ABS shows soccer participation is declining among under 15’s as well." - what report (I'm guessing Children's Participation In Cultural And Leisure Activities) What years are we comparing? 2003-2009 I guess. Not saying your claims are as creative as you accuse others of, I just want some context.

exactly right aubgraham. Note too - the category of 'organised' activity DOES include schoolbased activity. The ERASS report also comments that Regular participation rates in any physical activity were also higher among universityeducated persons and those still at secondary school. This is where the soccer numbers (because they are so big, it's worth considering) that drop from 579,000 for organised down to 129,000 for 'regular and organised' suggests perhaps that there might be large 'organised' but irregular 'school based' participation. Now - - - I'm NOT saying that that isn't the case across the board and probably is important for Aust Footy in QLD and NSW? I don't really care. Please note -- the question raised below is NON-SPORT/CODE specific, it's a purely GENERAL question aimed at aubgraham who is seemingly the one most inclined to ponder it. What we HAVE seen is that a single person can be BOTH organised and non-organised, there's is a demonstrable overlap. Is there also then a potential overlap b/w say, irregular organised (at school) and regular club based outside of school?? I don't really know.......is it possible that there might be double and triple dipping????

guys - - you avoid the point. It's funny though - - - the 3 of you have come out with in the main, pretty feeble arguments that complete avoid the validity of my point that Jimbo is being pretty well misleading in making the statement that he did. Jimbo made an unsustainable claim. Fussball - - that Roy Morgan research was an agenda driven piece of very limited research done designed to pump up the WC viewers and discredit Oztam, conducted over 8 months in 2005/06, and why did it NOT include AFL GF, NRL GF, ARL SoO, Bathurst, Boxing Day Test match......etc etc. It's hardly a conclusive or fair piece of research OTHER than to illustrate that Oztam is as many of us suspect, ...... a tad bit outdated (back then in 2006 at anyrate - no argument there). Now, if you apply similar metrics re the Roy Morgan survey findings for the Melb Cup coverage and apply that, for a mid afternoon event to the AFL GF or prime time NRL GF then,....you'd probably get massive numbers there too. Which is why, when people try to stick to Oztam ratings only for discussions around broadcast rights etc,........I guess we all here recognise that there is MUCH more to the story than OzTam.

Obviously, you have a different definition of regularly to ERASS. I believe the origins of ERASS surveys is as a source of statistics for public health officials to determine patterns of activity levels of Australians. I think most on this website have a different perspective. I would consider some one who plays in an organised league and trains during the week for at least half the year as a regular participant in their sport. So, some with more than 53 times a year (compared to the 156 that ERASS uses). On that basis here is the change from 2001-2009 2001 2009 154.5 234.5 Australian Rules football 25.1 18.2 Cricket (indoor) 89.5 104.1 Cricket (outdoor) 36 45.4 Football (indoor) 173.7 339.6 Football (outdoor) 141.9 215.2 Netball 78.8 100.1 Rugby league 37.1 54.5 Rugby union 47.7 37.9 Touch football Again, you have to congratulate most of the sporting organisations for getting people more active (well, let's assume it has something to do with them).

MC- Aus open Tennis Final, Commonwealth Games opening ceremony were shown in prime time. World Cup was shown during regular sleeping hours, making them even more impressive.