A-League Grand Final 2013: Central Coast Mariners crowned champions

why is McBreen so disliked by WSW? There's no excuse for thowing flares and cups of beer at anyone, its disgraceful behaviour.

thats my question, who did all the fans go for last year! I'm born and bred in Western Sydney (Merrylands) and dont go for them. I wont ditch the team i follow just because a new team in my area comes along, thats shallow. Just because you live somewhere doesnt mean you have to follow the local team, what about regional football followers. I live on the NSW/VIC border and i go for Jets and my son CCM.

Well over the 29 matches that both teams played they are even, both would have been on 60 points if points were awarded for the finals series. The two most consistent teams were there at the grand final which is how it should be, and even without the supposed referee errors, CCM played better on the day, it could have so easily been more than 2.

In no way would you count me a football fan but that s a tiny bit mean spirited consider the relative populations of the teams catchment and of course the central coast fans were going to be out numbered. The wanderers did well and captured the attention for themselves and the code in general. But the Mariners finally got the prize, well done them! Now can ARLC take note and put a NRL team on the Coast!

That's the great thing about football is that the GF venue is up for grabs by the team that earns the right to host it. i would never want to have a football GF played at a set venue as in league and AFL. being from brisbane see how many fans in a 80,000 or 100,000 seat are from interstate for anz stadium and the MCG. it would always favour teams based in sydney or melbourne. i attended 2 league grand finals in 05 and 06 and the 06 grand final was between broncos and melbourne storm played in sydney. 05 was cowboys v wests tigers (that one especially had an overwhelming majority of tigers fans) the disadvantage of football is of course the short time to finalise the venue either two weeks before (with the previous finals format) or one week (with the new format). tickets will still get sold but as can be seen with the music festival at anz stadium and etihad having afl games on both april 20 and 21 it can restrict the venues. i still find it not a coincidence that the afl scheduled games at etihad on both the saturday and sunday.

Its up to the members to offer them for sale, you can't force them. A lot of stadiums now sell memberships to raise revenue, so a sellout is rarely = capacity, especially when a lot of members are rugby unon and rugby league members. A few of them are dead too. :)

If SFS was not available as well, it would have been played at Parramatta. They only have one week to book the venue which is dangerous and to put a deposit on the booking of many likely venues months out is expensive and wasteful. Tough decisions for the FFA. Do they keep up with the home team grand final model or have the Grand Final played at the same ground every year? But, if the CCM v WSW GF was played at Suncorp or MCG, would they get a sellout? Nice one for Gallop to sort out, but I suspect they'll keep on with the status quo.

apologies if this has already been mentioned and discussed. but the sight of 100s of empty seats in the members section really annoyed me. i thought they had worked out a way to re-sell those member seats?

I agree, LIVE sport is the only way to watch sport in the 21st century, however ... .. if it means: a) Not watching at all; or b) relying on a pirate video stream that may buffer & stop any time; or c) waiting 1 hour - staying away from Twitter, radio & TV - and watching in HD for free. I reckon the majority of people will choose (c).

The biggest drawback for SBS next year in getting decent ratings for the finals/Grand Final is the delayed telecast. The Friday night match is live so I would if I were the FFA be trying to extract the maximum possible audience for the Friday night match. Others may not agree,but for me delayed sporting broadcasts belong in the dark ages & I include Socceroo matches in that also.

And also watched live by tens of millions around the world http://www.news.com.au/sport/football/sydney-band-writes-western-sydney-wanderers-anthem-and-the-world-is-listening/story-fndm8bqv-1226624758962

JB Could not agree more....

I know alot of people that watched the game for the first time were amazed at the atmosphere and colour and enjoyed the game, i reckon if the game was free to air we could easily double that figure, football has a bright future here.

There's always a very small minority. All the fans we came across on the day, Marinators and RBB were great. The players were great too, but McBreen isn't the most popular player with us at the moment. :) But to follow a football team you have to be able to accept defeat and its a bit presumptious to expect to win everything at your first attempt.

You seriously have no idea. I'm wasting my time trying to convince someone who has zero idea about football.

Thats a great result. I know its a one off because it was a final. You would expect to get a good viewing number but I dont think even the FOX network was expecting that sort of viewership. A great result. Hopefully next year with the advent of FTA on SBS2, even more people will tune into football both on SBS and on Fox.

Real, you think every team that isn't Brisbane is boring and a poor advert for the league and as far as I can tell, this opinion is unaffected by the actual playing standard of the teams involved.

http://www.tvtonight.com.au/2013/04/sunday-21-april-2013.html The A-League was the top show watched ... 1 LIVE: FOOTBALL: A-LEAGUE GRAND FINAL FOX SPORTS 1 .... 297,000 2 LIVE: AFL MELBOURNE V GWS FOX FOOTY ..... 234,000 3 LIVE: AFL NORTH MELBOURNE V LIONS FOX FOOTY ..... 177,000

Very healthy result.

297k is an ALeague record and an enormous result for the sport.