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The amount of football that is being played in Tasmania currently could be increased if AFL Tasmania’s Chief Executive Scott Wade has his way.
Wade believes that AFL Tasmania would be able to present a viable model to an existing AFL club to play eight matches per year in Tasmania split evenly across Hobart’s Blundstone Arena and Launceston’s Aurora Stadium from 2017 onwards.
“We actually believe that we’re going to be able to present a proposal whereby the state of Tasmania may well be an attractive market for a number of AFL clubs,” Wade said.
“We’re an attractive proposition for a club that might want to embrace Tasmania as their primary development market without having to relocate.
“We think Tasmania can be a market for a club to prosper.”
Currently, Tasmania’s market is shared by Hawthorn who play four matches per season at Aurora Stadium while North Melbourne play two matches per season at Blundstone Arena.
The reason that AFL Tasmania would not be able to present a case earlier than 2017 is due to Hawthorn’s deal at Aurora Stadium finishing at the end of the 2016 season.
North Melbourne’s current deal with Blundstone Arena expires at the end of the 2014 season.
If AFL Tasmania succeeded in being able to lure a current AFL club to play eight matches per season from 2017 onwards, which club would it be?
Wade mentioned that the preference of AFL Tasmania would be to have Hawthorn as its club representing Tasmania solely.
However, while it may have been a serious possibility in previous years for the Hawks to consider, Hawthorn has turned their fortunes around to be a strong AFL entity in Melbourne both on and off the field.
Thus, the likelihood of Hawthorn being based predominantly in Tasmania would be highly unlikely.
When there is talk of AFL relocation, North Melbourne are generally spoken about as being a side to be relocated elsewhere.
However, the North Melbourne Board, led by President James Brayshaw, would be against playing most of their games outside of Victoria as they have maintained a strong stance on being a predominantly Victorian football club.
It is highly unlikely that other Victorian clubs such as Melbourne, Western Bulldogs and St Kilda would consider such a move to be playing the majority of their matches in the Apple Isle.
While there has been much discussion about Tasmania fielding their own AFL side, there is reluctance from the AFL to introduce a 19th side into the competition anytime soon.
At the moment, the AFL’s focus is upon supporting the new sides Gold Coast and Greater Western Sydney in becoming successful clubs that can stand on their own feet so expansion into Tasmania would be off the cards for quite some time yet.
If Tasmania want to have more AFL matches in their state, the most likely scenario for the short to medium term is to have Hawthorn continue its arrangement with Aurora Stadium while North Melbourne increase the number of matches they play in Hobart to either three or four per season.
Although that would mean there are still two tenants of AFL Football in Tasmania, Tasmania would be gradually stepping closer into making more of a viable claim to have its own team play in their state.
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