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Modern sport is about money. Sports that don’t have money often become very minor. Sports that pay their best good money are on the increase.
In Australia today, the AFL has signed a mega-deal, the NRL will follow soon, and rugby union already has a reasonable deal for the number of teams and media ratings.
The mistakes made by FFA have largely been driven by money or lack of it. Both the Gold Coast and North Queensland had wealthy backers and this is why they were chosen.
Many of the programs football has are because we lack money. No sport anywhere in the world operates without decent media money.
All the things we want A-League clubs to do or FFA should do is driven by money.
Three years ago, FFA made a decision to spend a large amount of its income on developing our youth. No arguments from me on this decision, but it did take money away from the promoting the A-League.
Football needs a good media deal to start phase-three of its rebirth.
However, can FFA do it by themselves as a single soldier up against the established media and their built-in biases? My feeling is that it is up to everyone in football to get involved.
What we as fans do is simple: go to games, take as many friends as possible to games, and watch on television.
The existing fan-base will do this, I am sure. But what about the other football folk, the old NSL folk, who still have issues with the A-League? Do they want the A-League to fold to prove football cannot work?
The European snobs say the local product is not good enough, so if you don’t support, then you are right.
I am not saying FFA and football generally should be free from criticism, but there does need to be some balance between the sheer number of negative articles and the good news stories.
As I see it, we all need to play our part in delivering the next media deal.
Fans, both active and those who stay at home, the football media, the clubs, the players, national teams; essentially the football family needs to help FFA with its case.
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