- Video
-
Club Roar
Captured a great grassroots sporting moment? We want to see it!Content Collections
The Roar Community
- Join
- Login
AFL has hit new lows in Queensland. This Saturday, the Brisbane Lions face off with the new kids on the Queensland block, the Gold Coast Suns, for what should have been a match for the AFL to crow about.
Instead, both teams enter the clash winless, and remain the only clubs in the competition yet to record a victory in 2015.
It is an indictment on both teams that one club will notch their first four points at the expense of the other.
And it is an indictment for the game in a non-traditional AFL state.
In Queensland, AFL fans float.
Take Brisbane, for instance: the team that, on the back of triple premiership success, went from having a membership of over 30,000 in 2004 to a mere 20,792 by 2011 when they were no longer a powerhouse.
While the Lions’ 2015 membership tally has surpassed that miserly 2011 figure – the Lions have 24,742 members at present – it remains to be seen whether this membership tally will translate to popular support.
And herein lies one of the AFL’s biggest problems for 2015 in Queensland: the success of Queensland’s NRL teams.
After eight rounds, the Brisbane Broncos are on top of the ladder, with the North Queensland Cowboys not far behind on fourth, and the Gold Coast Titans on seventh.
Supporting a team that’s winning is far more appealing than supporting one that’s losing, particularly when the winning team has a traditional fan-base.
Is it any surprise, then, that the Brisbane Broncos have over 500,000 followers on Facebook, whereas the Brisbane Lions fail to crack the 100,000 mark?
Does it raise any eyebrows to know that the combined Twitter followers of the Brisbane Lions and Gold Coast Suns are almost equivalent to the following of the Broncos on their own?
Some may question the relevance of including social media statistics in assessing the support base and relevance of NRL and AFL teams in Queensland.
But “bums on seats” is no longer the main indicator of a team’s ability to cultivate and retain a fan-base.
With AFL on free-to-air TV, Foxtel and online, many fans choose to watch from the comfort of the couch.
What’s more, it’s not possible for all fans to attend matches and social media provides another avenue of interaction between club and supporter.
But for those traditionalists who doubt social media stats, let’s have a look at the issue of crowds in Queensland, too.
Last year, the Brisbane Broncos averaged over 34,000 fans a game.
This is in stark contrast to the 21,379 achieved by the Brisbane Lions and the 20,841 recorded by the Gold Coast Suns.
Clearly, fans are doing the talking both with their bums and their use of social media.
However, what is important to note that, last year, the NRL’s Gold Coast Titans only managed to attract an average crowd of 13,194 to their games.
Is the Gold Coast simply a market too hard to penetrate? Should this sound even more warning bells to the AFL and the Gold Coast Suns?
While it may be too early to tell, it most certainly adds extra pressure to Rodney Eade’s plight and raises questions of whether a retention salary should be reintroduced in Queensland.
After the Brisbane Lions domination of the AFL from 2001-2004, Victorian clubs were quick to condemn the AFL’s decision to allow the Lions an extra $600,000 per year to recruit and retain talent.
It seemed that after three premierships in a row, the rest of the competition had had enough of the free hand being dealt to their Queensland counterparts.
But with the club having performed so poorly over the last ten years, perhaps the question of whether a retention salary should be reintroduced needs to be properly canvassed.
If not for the Lions themselves, for football in Queensland.
But, then again, the Lions recruited extremely well over the summer, adding two premiership players to their line up in Dane Beams and Allen Christensen.
This proves that, to an extent, they do have the power to recruit serious talent to a non-traditional AFL state.
The frustration at Brisbane surrounding the imminent departure of James Aish undermines the Lions’ ability to retain young talent, however.
So where does this leave the AFL in Queensland on the eve of Round 5?
Before the 2015 season started, expectations for both teams were high.
For the Gold Coast – with a new coach and a list that looked set to make a stand as men and not boys – finals were on the horizon.
And for Brisbane – a team that showed promise in 2014 and recruited big names in the off-season – the chance to shake up the competition and set the foundations for the club’s next premiership.
With these expectations, Queensland looked set for an exciting year of AFL.
But expectations don’t always match up to reality.
And unfortunately, for AFL in Queensland, expectations must not only be matched but hit out of the park to compete with the NRL.
Who’s in your ultimate team? Pick the best team and compete with other fans for daily prizes on Draftstars. For the best odds on the game try out Aussie bookmaker PlayUp. Think. Is this a bet you really want to place? Set a deposit limit.