AFL scribe Jon Ralph caused an online kerfuffle following a Sunday Herald Sun article in which he extolled the virtues of last weekend’s A-League derby and, in particular, the atmosphere experienced at his first Melbourne Victory versus City clash.
“Frenzied fans envy of AFL”, claimed a breakout box just above the headline, Fandemonium.
Ralph enthusiastically described the spectacle as a “riot of colour and movement and activity and energy… A fan experience with more vibrancy and atmosphere than what the AFL stumped up last year”.
Port Adelaide, now that they have a winning team and new home ground, took steps last year to create a ‘Portress’, and Essendon are seeking fans to assist with their own ‘active supporter’ area. Indeed, Ralph wrote “Now we wait and see what the AFL has in store with its fan engagement measures this season”.
That Ralph is looking to the AFL to do something really misses the point. For what Melbourne’s North Terrace have created over the past decade has been fan-driven; an organised, collectivist, grassroots cause which champions independence of the club, and the FFA, and any outside forces.
The AFL, and more so its fans, must be wary of trying too hard to come up with gimmicks which are forced, just as a means to enhance the ‘matchday experience’ (awful term, that is).
What the North Terrace has created hasn’t come about easily. The group have been smeared by police, intimidated by security, and at times misunderstood by those within the game. Some individuals have suffered unjust stadium bans and others have been subject of spying by Hatamoto, a company which doubles as an anti-terrorism firm.
The fan scene in the A-League, and particularly in Melbourne, has evolved organically through all this. It feels real. It wasn’t created around a marketing table and whiteboard. Indeed, the one-in-all-in siege mentality has inspired intoxicating camaraderie.
Not just clapping seals, as a collective North Enders claim, as best they can, influence over the club, the matchday environment and the mentality of fans. The political, militant edge and the mere act of going to a game make you feel alive. It is a response to the corporatisation of sport; a living, breathing, chanting, drum-beating community.
Unsurprisingly, Ralph condemned the use of flares in his piece. I don’t want this piece and the below-the-line comments section to focus on pyrotechnic marine safety devices, so I’ll keep this paragraph brief.
Plenty of kids love them and I’m yet to see evidence that they deter families from attending matches. To the best of my knowledge, only teens acting alone smuggle and ignite them in the North Terrace. For better or worse, they are part of the game, and damage caused is usually negligible.
Now, back to the reason of the article. Comparatively, the atmosphere at some – certainly not all – AFL games can be sleep inducing. I go to watch my team play weekly, and hearing the players shouting is always a sign that the crowd aren’t sufficiently involved.
Other than administrators letting go and allowing atmosphere to be created organically by supporters, there are other factors which make it hard to see AFL atmospheres matching what we have at A-League games. One is the lack of fan segregation. Many punters enjoy going to games with barrackers of other clubs, and that in itself is fine, but it deprives the spectacle of that us-against-them tribal element, so crucial in the A-League stands and indeed in football crowds the world over. You feel so much more inhibited when surrounded by those who aren’t your own kind.
Furthermore, so called ‘ground rationalisation’ has meant footy has lost much of what it had. Teams have lost big parts of their identities as Moorabbin, the Whitten Oval, Victoria Park, Windy Hill and so on have fallen by the wayside. When I go to Etihad Stadium to watch the Bulldogs play on a Saturday, it’s hard to feel any sense of home when I know Essendon played a ‘home’ game there on the Friday night, and St Kilda or North Melbourne will on the Sunday.
The AFL has every right to make up lost ground in the atmosphere stakes, but as they go about trying to rectify that, I’d urge them to not try and control it, to let it develop spontaneously, and keep the matchday experience real.
Freycinet1803
Roar Rookie
I enjoy both sports, and this is article is not about one being better than the other (bit of insecurity if you see it that way). But I remember watching the Freo v Sydney preliminary final in 2013. When that Freo chant went up it was the first time watching an AFL game I thought "Wow, if that doesn't inspire them". I suppose the question is do you go to a concert to have a seat and watch a big screen or do you go to a concert to get into the music and crowd? Stadium concerts are very popular but give me a smaller venue and up close with the crowd and band anyday. Which one is "better"? Or is it just different tastes? AFL to me has really only one aim with the fans ... money. I personally think the AFL clubs do a really good job (at least in the West) but the AFL admin is the 'problem'.
AL
Guest
Do you mean like the Crowns v Pies game in Adelaide last season or the recent Cricket troubles (India v Pak). How does it feel to be far more superior than the rest of us.
Alex
Guest
'AFL is on your seat excitement' is that not an oxymoron?
Dalgety Carrington
Roar Guru
Why do those two concepts need to be mutually exclusive?
Luke Gaskett
Roar Rookie
Whilst I don't completely disagree Simon I also don't blame the AFL or the clubs for wanting to give their fans a nudge. I say this because I believe most AFL supporters don't understand the realities and meaning of football supportership. Most quite simply see it as something that fills in gaps between goals because of boredom. Whereas if you ask any football supporter (or player for that matter) and they'll tell you it is in the interest of driving and encouraging the team while intimidating and thwarting the opposition. This is a concept that is lost on most AFL fans.
Commo
Guest
At the end of the day not much happens in soccer (nil all draw), therefore you need the flare guns and the bongo drums to stop dying of boredom. AFL is on you seat excitement. Save the soccer atmosphere for the Euro wannabees
Gyfox
Guest
Ciudadmarron, you are partly right. Times were different 50 years ago & the football "industry" was more relaxed. I left school in 1965 - couldn't go to a pub as I was underage & they closed at 6 pm! Cheer Squads had formed spontaneously in both VIC & SA. They were a lot of fun & a natural result of the popularity of footy. They also were an outlet for teenage rebellion....remember all the cut-up paper we threw! And we lined up early to get our seats behind the goals. I look back with nostalgia on those innocent years where people rarely get drunk at the footy - & you would never hear swearing or blasphemy on TV! How times have changed.
Gecko
Guest
AL you don't have to follow AFL to be Australian. But if Australians can be proud of anything today it's their sense of a fair go for all. That includes being able to go to a sport (any code) without feeling the need to physically attack an opposition supporter or player. European soccer fans do seem to have more of a culture of violence than Australian sports fans. We should be proud of this and we should highlight this difference by doing away with the high fences in any code. 'Atmosphere' created by intolerance and segregation is not the sort of atmosphere we need.
AL
Guest
Ok I think I have it now, i need to follow AFL for the right culture and to be more Australian in all aspects. Then i need to look down on soccer and make low remarks aboutn soccer and the a-league, of which i probably dont watch. Inorder to make me feel more positive and dominant about my own code, sort of like putting someone elses light out to make my own brighter. In this way. as there is no international competitiion to compare afl as the best sport or athletes, i will compare it to a TOTALLY different sport to give me the felling of being better than a totally different sport to my own. Check.
ciudadmarron
Guest
So much better when you disperse the witless profanities throughout the whole ground.
ciudadmarron
Guest
Gyfox, would you say that the cheers quad of today is different to that of yesteryear? My understanding is they were a lot less sanitized and a lot more, well, organic, creative, passionate. Edgy as well.As others have said the change has probably come with the move away from the suburbs.
Vocans
Guest
I'm with you about the artificiality and hype. Sometimes the ONLY bit of silence comes during the game. It's a while since the breaks were quiet enough to bite a few nails and feel the suspense. While kids run on at half time 'entertainment' drowns them and everything else out. Are we so terrified to have a break these days that we distract ourselves with noisy trivia? This is not authentic footy culture as the writer says. While I don't want the worst of soccer culture I do want room for something real to develop. Let's keep marketing out of it. We need to find an enhanced 'tribal' voice we can celebrate and enjoy. It's there of course already, but its sound is more fragmented especially since we moved from the smaller grounds and their sense of local territory. I wonder who will lead in this because it needs creative lovers of the game and teams to inspire the rest of us.
Josh
Guest
How the standard of the GWS Giants treating you ?
Josh
Guest
instead you get 'whoooooo we aaaaaare, wheeeeeere we carm from' lol
Josh
Guest
Watching the Giants get steamrolled by 100 points is entertaining ? Is that why no one in Westerrn Sydney cares about them ?
Josh
Guest
It's 70~30
Josh
Guest
Blah blah you coexist happily with a team called the swans, another team called the Giants barbed in and were laughed out of town.
Blake Standfield
Roar Guru
If the standard of the AFL was as poor as the A League the fans would probably be more involved in chanting and illegal activities.
Floyd Calhoun
Guest
I've been to quite a few AFL matches at the MCG with crowds of 50,000 +, and have often lamented the lack of two segregated areas full of aggressive men chanting witless obscenities all game long. It's a real shame.
Gecko
Guest
Simon, you' prefer fences to create " the spectacle of that us-against-them tribal element" ? Simon they put those fences up to stop feral soccer fans attacking each other. They even put those fences up to stop feral soccer fans attacking players. Why would we want that sort of feral atmosphere in AFL? Soccer should be learning from AFL, where supporters can shout playful jibes at each other and at players but there's an overall spirit of tolerance. No need for fences. I'd even call that being Australian!