Monday night football wasn’t the reason the Boomtown Rats wrote I don’t like Mondays.
But the chorus of the song sums up the majority of views on Monday night football.
High-profile media personalities, the players and even die-hard fans all expressed their feelings on the issue.
Despite being a St Kilda fan myself, and someone who loves watching any game of footy, I made the decision on Monday morning not to attend the game.
Then, late in the afternoon I was offered a medallion club ticket, so I accepted.
The whole way through the match I kept thinking to myself that I was glad I didn’t waste my money on buying a ticket.
The atmosphere – or rather the lack of it – was another strong sign that Monday football’s time is up.
Yes, it’s kudos to the AFL for making the effort to experiment and trial different things in a bid to make our great game even better.
Though every experiment leads to a conclusion and for this experiment it’s that Monday night football doesn’t work.
The big point is the declining crowd numbers. Crowds have dropped from 42,866 in 2010, to 26,078 on the Monday night just gone.
That’s a drop of 16,778 over five years. The AFL has used many excuses to defend this decline, but the stats don’t lie.
There are many reasons as to why Monday night games haven’t been successful.
Firstly, it’s almost impossible for most parents to take their children to a weeknight football match which doesn’t finish until close to 10pm.
Add to that the number of young and middle-aged people who have just struggled through Monday after a big weekend.
Then, on top of that you go from the kids, right to the other end of the scale – the elderly.
For basically the same reason as the kids, the elderly will stay at home.
They don’t see Monday night footy being worth going out in the cold for, or to catch public transport late at night for.
So of course a majority of people would prefer to stay at home, but unfortunately for them, unless they have Foxtel, they won’t be watching the game.
The match was only aired on Foxtel and not on free-to-air television, which caused uproar.
That money-driven decision by the AFL put one of the last nails in the coffin of Monday night football.
The other nails were hammered in by the AFL’s failure to make Monday night football more appealing.
Sure Monday isn’t really anyone’s favourite day, I’ll pay that, but there was little to no effort made to try and make the fans flock to the game.
If you look around at some of the other rival sporting codes in Melbourne, you’ll see them using their imagination and innovative ideas to attract big crowds.
When Cricket Australia holds matches during the week or just wants to put more bums on seats, it will opt to give the match a theme or make it a fancy dress code.
Over at AAMI Park the Melbourne Storm has to try and bring in big crowds on a Monday night sometimes as well.
So does it just sit back and hope for some reason people will decide to head along and watch rugby league on Monday night? Of course not.
One of the Storm’s ideas to lure in more people to watch is by making it ‘Monday Mates Night’.
This is where they make it a 2-for-1 general admission entry offer and also run a promotion for a 2-for-1 movie pass as well.
The AFL didn’t try any of these tactics.
The AFL put Monday night matches in the fixture, and persisted with it, but never made any real attempt to make it work. And it’s shown.
Newly appointed chief executive Gillon McLachlin has already signalled his preference for Thursday night football over Monday night football.
And Gill, just quietly, nearly everyone else agrees with you. Just scrap Monday night football and let’s play Thursday night instead.
Knoxy
Guest
Personally I prefer it to Monday night because at least you have the start of the weekend the following day.
joe b
Guest
Thursday night far better option than Monday night...and the broadcasters will push for at least one of these, which is fair because they are the pay master. The AFL, on the other hand, really need to make sure crowds are up for these midweek games to avoid bringing the atmosphere into disrepute. A good example of how variable pricing can be utilized...but bad for full season members for clubs like West Coast and Freo.
Gyfox
Guest
"which I think is pretty good".............when compared with------------- (space for insertion of code of choice by people like Titus, Lazza, Epiquin, Yob, et al)
Mister Football
Roar Guru
Judging on last night's results, pretty good: 50,500 for a crowd on a Thursday night is damn good I think (close to stadium capacity). These are the Fox ratings from last night: 1 LIVE: AFL ADELAIDE V COLLINGWOOD FOX FOOTY 239,000 2 RIVER COTTAGE AUSTRALIA LifeStyle Channel 99,000 3 LIVE: AFL: THURSDAY NIGHT FOOTY ON FOX FOX FOOTY 92,000 4 LIVE: AFL: THURSDAY NIGHT FOOTY ON FOX FOX FOOTY 84,000 Plus on ch7 ratings were 568k plus 7 won the ratings for the night overall. The ratings on 7mate: 108k (Syd 17k Bri 30k Per 62k) So total ratings on the night of 915k, which I think is pretty good.
Jack Smith
Roar Guru
What is everyone's take on Thursday night football? I have my positives and negatives but overall a good thing or bad from your perspective?
Jack Smith
Roar Guru
Bad for going to (up late plus hassle on non-weekend night), bad for view (up late) and not good fro footy circles...can't talk about the round really until Tuesday. Actually poor for media.
Nick Inatey
Guest
not quite convinced on this article to be honest. After seeing Thursday night footy on the tv, if you play it in the right location, I think Monday night would be a winner. Adelaide is probably the best bet. Footy mad, GREAT stadium, great atmosphere whenever. A two team town makes it more attractive too.
Epiquin
Roar Guru
Probably worth remembering too that BBL takes place mostly in school holidays and in summer, when people are looking for any excuse to be outdoors.
Lazza
Guest
Monday night football works in the EPL as well, there’s always a full house for these games. All the excuses about why fans don’t attend here apply over there as well. No FTA coverage, school night, big weekend etc. Perhaps we’re just not as passionate about our sports as they are.
BigAl
Guest
With the excitement of a fantastic new venue, good weather and playing an arch enemy, this game was going to be huge no matter what day of the week it was played - and may there be plenty more of them !
Fernando
Guest
I don't think Mondays work, but you also have to accept in 2010 St. Kilda were a top side, and Carlton were also in the 8. Now they're both pretty mediocre sides, so I think the crowd would of been maybe only 5,000 more had it been on a Saturday
AR
Guest
For me, the priority must be sell-out stadiums. Big crowd = big event = big tv ratings.
Cat
Roar Guru
agree on the advertising, to be honest AFL does a pretty poor job of advertising the game as a whole, they seem to just rely on people knowing about it but if Monday is ever going to work, the AFL must advertise the hell out of it.
AR
Guest
Another key driver of the success of MNF in the U.S... was that the NFL declared it the biggest thing ever, and then advertised the bejeezus out of it whilst screaming "finally MNF is here!!" Sounds inane, but to be honest, that's how advertising works. The AFL simply scheduled it as a regular game, but, annoyingly, on a Monday. I think Thursday is the better of the two options. But if the AFL want to persist with Mondays, there's a few non-negotiables: first, it must be on FTA; and second, there should be variable pricing (say, half price) in order to pack out the stadium. If the stadium is full, it makes it a bigger event, which makes it a bigger TV event.
Gyfox
Guest
Correct, Milo. NFL is more a TV sport & Monday night works in the US. Of course, NFL is a whole different scenario, having been based on Sunday games for years. Saturday is the preserve of College Football. By contrast, we have a 150 year history of Saturday games. Altho these days Saty a/noon is somewhat downgraded (unfortunately) it has been a natural extension to Friday nights & Sundays. Time will tell if Thursday is a goer. Certainly Monday night is not. 2 for 1 on Monday nights....I wondered how Storm got 12,000!
Will
Guest
The broadcasters have framed this debate fantastically for themselves this year. They are desperate to have a new timeslot and to changethe current situation where a lot of Saturday games clash and cannibalise the viewership. they want a new night. Most of the footy public prefer the Friday Saturday Sunday split that we mostly have now. But all of the discsussion has been around "Thursday v Monday" or "Thursday v Sunday Night" as if one of them is inevitable. Where is the option most of us want?
Milo
Guest
Monday night was always a pretty ordinary idea based solely on the success of NFL. But that works in a country of almost 300million where the average game is sold out every Sunday. Apart from no FTA TV, it being cold and a battle between two bottom six clubs, last Monday's game wasnt in school holidays either. So why would parents take their kids? So they fall asleep at their NAPLAN tests ? NAPLAN is this week too - good timing AFL! Dumb & stupid. Thursday night makes lots more sense and should be progressed.
Cat
Roar Guru
Put a monday night game in adelaide, then it would be a fair comparison
EDsta
Guest
Based on last nights crowd of 50K + in Adelaide I think you're right that Thursday night seems to be more popular.
Cat
Roar Guru
1. Lack of free to air, this is just a stupid, stupid decision, how can you 'sell' a new timeslot to the public when the average public can't watch it? 2. Lack of any advertising, how many people even realised there was a Monday night game until, well Monday night?If the AFL is going to continue to borrow ideas from the NFL (and I have no problem with that) they need to borrow the whole package, the reason NFL have made a huge success out of MNF is they've advertised the hell out of it, everyone in the states knows there is a MNF game, its not a surprise, it doesn't sneak up on anyone (It does help that its a regular time slot and not an occasional one).