The major issues with the Whole of Football Plan

Mister Football - you are right in saying most of the immigration was from lower class families, so would not have benefited Rugby, but would've benefited league, as it was still widely played in the North. It wasn't until the 60's that Soccer really began dominating these former league towns - back in the 50's England was actually stronger in league than Australia, but the decline really accelerated after the sixties, especially with the waves of immigrants who had no interest in league, which can be seen in Sydney as it becomes more of an all code city. So I think your comment is slightly flawed and I believe it has only been the past few decades where Soccer participation has passed league and accelerated to such an extent that it seems like it was always that way.

One thing,though,the FTA on the AFL fixtures list is definitely wrong,(so far as WA is concerned) so these could possibly be in error,too. I think WA threatened Secession when Foxtel wanted to keep the WCE & Fremantle games for themselves !! :) (Yes,Foxtel tried it on!) It seems CH7 had enough grunt to make a special agreement for WA. Hopefully a Commercial Broadcaster might be able to get such an agreement for "A" League games.

Another Fussy flip-flop: He says above: "In Syd & Bri: Football rates higher than AFL In Mel, Ade & Per: Football rates hither than NRL It’s very odd but unlike all other sports (football, basketball, tennis, etc.) the oval-ball sports have never managed to gain traction nationally." (and he goes on to further his point by discussing tv ratings). Moments later he says: "To understand if a sport has national traction, you don’t look at TV events." Genuinely bizarre how someone can flip so easily...

Fuss, I can't speak with great knowledge of Australian rules, but there is a small increase in kids playing it locally (Hills District in Sydney). Off a miniscule base of course. Seems to be a fair conversion of those kids (who drag Dad along) to GWS and Swans matches. Probably unlikely to grow dramatically much further in Sydney, and Sydney AFL match attendance and TV viewership (as argued ad infinitum on The Roar) isn't real flash. Regarding rugby, it has gone up & down a bit, but never the behemoth that football has always been for junior participation. Not too sure for rugby league, and I'm more or less ignorant of the grass roots game. Rugby, unlike football, has a massive conversion rate from players into paying and viewing spectators. Using your anecdotal method above, I'd say the %age of parents of junior football kids who have been to A League matches would track with Mid's original post. My kids' club may have been skewed by having a former Socceroo and then-current A League player as one of the team dads. Measuring the same at my kids' junior rugby club, however, shows a near 100% conversion rate of parents to Waratahs & Wallabies & even Eastwood fans. Unsure how football can make that leap. Seems that we've all played football as kids, but only 1/5th of us become football 'consumers' ... if the A League can address that it's arguable that everything will follow.

Middy,sorry I'm going off topic again--------I promise,just this once! I often whinge about the poor SBS coverage of Glory games. Just to see if I was talking horse faeces,I had a look at this forum's list of fixtures for 2015. If the list is correct,and/or I haven't forgotten how to count (senility is a terrible thing),the results for the 2015 Home & away seasons are as follows:- Out of 135 games played,40 games were available FTA. The number of times a supporter would have been able to watch his/her team on SBS are:- Wellington Phoenix----------------1 Central Coast Mariners----------- 2 Perth Glory---------------------------2 Newcastle Jets----------------------4 Melbourne City----------------------4 Sydney Football Club--------------5 West Sydney Wanderers---------5 Brisbane Roar-----------------------8 Melbourne Victory------------------8 Adelaide United---------------------8 I might have expected a reasonable number for MV & SFC or WSW,but 8 for Adelaide,& only 5 each for SFC & WSW?

Why the hell should the "Perth media" push the "A" League---they don't have the Broadcast rights,after all! The TVW7 sports segment after the News usually has quite a good coverage of sports which aren't broadcast by the 7 Network,with Cricket,"A" League & Basketball getting the lion's share of this. My point about packing the comp with NSW teams is a philosophical one:- As the "A" League was set up as a National competition from the outset,not as an expanded State league like the NRL & AFL,surely it should retain that distinction & not become "SOCKAH NSW"!!!

Back on my my points... Lifting those who play to watching from 19% to ????? Reduce Cost Women's game State associations... As I indicated when I wrote the thread I have no answers ... however a number of things are emerging I honestly believe if handled well on a FTA network both the % watching would increase and maybe multi watchers as well... The Women's WC starts soon .... gotta be good ... As for cost reduction and having the state associations vote themselves out I have no answers...

I doubt it, this is about all you seem to glean, which is just bunk.

Mo, I remember the article which I thoroughly enjoyed (and your others). "The Sportsman" paper had the quote you mentioned. Off I go to trove! MF, I get what you are saying and it's logical but I'm after the hard evidence. I've yet to read Hay's work (it's on that birthday wish list the mrs consistently ignores). What you've said below although interesting doesn't really back it up either. It's not an idealogical code war position I'm holding here I hope you know, just interested as I said.

In reading that I can now understand how and why Aussie Rules and Rugby are so paranoid of the sport, its everywhere all over the world played by everyone and then they converge on the land down under ... .

Brendo - nice post. 1) FFA needs to lower its coaching licence fees if they are to bring more qualified coaches to the lower tiers. Posted some time ago that the comparisons in numbers between say Germany and UK coaching levels and numbers of each showed a cheaper cost in Germany has increased the numbers compared to similar levels in the UK. Lower cost means less incentive for coaches to recuperate funds and get ROI; more coaches of higher level accreditation means charge less, and the better ones will prove themselves before moving up (and getting rewarded). Totally agree private academies need to go but they are just a symptom that there is demand (for coaching) and parents willing to part funds on a promise. Thought FFA years ago were going to bring a ratings system in for academies (in a similar way for clubs) and allow a system that shows who the better ones were. 2) A huge issue at grassroots. Much I have said before on schools but the FFA long term having schools program will have benefits. I think that the notion of "full sized field football" for juniors will need to give way somewhat to the smaller field version to fit numbers in. I'm surprised the FFA hasn't pushed their Football Fives5 game further like the new facility at Speers Point near Newcastle would allow more game time and touches and allow for more numbers to participate. Full field will be there for some clubs eg: NPL etc but full field for all clubs just may not be feasible imo. As Justin Mahon alludes in this thread FFA need to organise football at all levels to advocate and be heard for space allocation. A good point to start with schools - perhaps funding to upgrade or improve facilities that the community could use on weekends as a short term measure with long term benefits to convert participants into fans... 3) My experience here is that kids like the popular and the winners...so even having ManU 'stuff' in KMart or Target some years ago probably didn't help and for some that will always be the case. Messi and C.Ronaldo are the pinnacle of the sport, they just don't happen to be Aussies, and so get their global idolisation. But A-League shirts are rife and it is unusual to see kids get a cricket bat out as much in summer as it use to be - waiting for siblings in the playground sese the football come out and kicked and volleyed in a circle. A lot of football teams in PSSA and a lot of girls in those teams as well. Even on occasion ads will show the youth playing or kicking the football as the 'the default, sporting activity'. Football culture - that real, pervasive part of life - will be second nature for the kids of today and in many ways already is where it is not so much for their parents. Perhaps it will be one of those kids of today that becomes the Aussie football idol of the next generation not just here, but for kids globally.

Thomas Smith one of the founders and present when the original rules of Australian football were written played in the 1862 match, he was actually captain of the Melbourne football club team.

At its heart the stats are just numbers in a file - brilliant idea to regionalise the game; Your A-League team against the world. Tim Cahill might become a marquee in your team and score the winning goal at the club world cup :- P

Crouch was Tinklers answer but Crouch had already signed a 3-year deal IIRC...so no.

Knock me over with a feather, the 2 most prolific AFL posters on the football tab agreeing with each other. What is this world coming to??? Just who, would've have thought.

Poor people,Casper. Foxtel is not always a priority,especially for Perth people who have FTA coverage of Dockers & Eagles games. Foxtel is a much better deal for Glory supporters,as SBS only shows a handful of Glory games.. SBS isn't a real Network. It is a Sydney based setup with Delay centres in non EAST time zones. 7,9,10,& even the ABC, still have a real,if much reduced ,presence in each State.

I have read Roy Hay's book and there is no mention of participation numbers. It mentions that NSW preferred the more rugged games, even though soccer was played throughout the colony. Therefore I can only go by that. It was actually quite popular (I don't doubt that) however suffered mostly from not playing the British Empire enough. This was done mostly through cricket and rugby. In Melbourne the sport was mostly seen as being too slow, and the act of heading the ball was seen as a peculiar trait. Make of that what you will.

Let me give you a sweeping statement. Football is the greatest most skillful game on the planet. If you want give me your sweeping comment on what you consider the bestest, skillfullest sport then I will happily dismiss it :)

For those interested, here is an interview with Dr Roy Hay where he discusses the early history of soccer in Australia, right up to the period we refer to in a lengthy discussion above: http://leopoldmethod.com.au/radio-interview-with-roy-hay/ RH: Aye, you can blame the Scots for it all. What happened was they had the Highland Games in 1861-2, and put up a trophy for competition at football unspecified. And what happened was you had two teams drawn in Melbourne, one team from roughly the Melbourne Club, one team drawn from the University. And they played during the Caledonian Games, and that was a genuine ‘Challenge Cup’ in the sense that the team that won it then had to be challenged by somebody else, and put up the trophy for competition. And that’s how it ran for the first few years, so FA Cup, 1872 in England, we have a trophy for football but what eventually evolved, of course, was the domestic game in Victoria which we now know as Australian football or Australian Rules. RP: Yeah, so going back that early we hadn’t even settled the rules of what the game of football was? Now let’s talk about the national governing body for football as we know it was set up in 1911. They tried to set up an interstate competition similar to cricket’s Sheffield Shield. Why didn’t this work? RH: I think because the codes were very much state based. There was very little coming together of the game at a national level. Ok, we had that body, the Anglo-Australian body, but it never really got the competition going on a regular basis. Simply because the game was much more… remember in those days it’s primarily a participation game, it’s not a huge spectator sport. The costs of interstate matches is quite high, and people find it’s often difficult to get leave to play in interstate matches and so on. Even though we got a trophy from the FA when they sent out a professional team in 1925, they brought with them a trophy – and a very beautiful trophy it is – it’s still held by the Football Federation Victoria. As we’ve said, it never really became the equivalent of the Sheffield Shield. RP: Now after WW2, the Ampol Petroleum company sponsored a series of state-based Cups that were played as pre-season tournaments. This led to an inter-state Cup competition, what was the reason for the initial success of this competition? RH: Well, the Ampol Cups were as you say state-based, and that’s why, with the post-war migration of lots of people from the United Kingdom – the traditional source – but now drawing on a much wider soccer-aware community from Central and South East Europe. These competitions brought together the existing clubs and the new ones that were set up by the migrant communities. Following the pattern, actually, that Scots adopted way back in the turn of the 20th century. They played as a pre-season competition, sometimes or regularly played under floodlights and attracting very significant crowds. So that’s what existed in Victoria from 1939 and in most other states from the late 1950s early 60s. RP: Roy I’m interested, you said the earlier games or Cups, or football in Australia at the early stages was more a game of participation rather than a spectator sport, and yet as you mentioned then some of the great popularity of the game came with these new migrant clubs. Did these migrant communities bring a level of passion that the Australian footballing landscape hadn’t seen before? RH: In many ways it did. It wasn’t that there wasn’t passionate encounters prior to that, but that was a previous generation of migrants. For example people of a Scottish heritage played people with an English heritage, they were labelled Scotland-England games and they did draw quite significant crowds. But now you’ve got a much wider range of communities involved, many of them arriving in Australia, well often without language, without knowledge of Australia, often feeling that they were excluded, sometimes they tried to join existing clubs and weren’t welcomed. And so for a variety of reasons they formed their own clubs and these clubs very much became representative of the various communities. So when they got together to play football it was all on for men and boys. RP: In 1962, this turned into, or the Australia Cup was born. How did this come about? RH: Well, and this is a product of the huge split that occurred in the game really from 1957 through to 1962 with the formation of what started off as the New South Wales Federation of Soccer Clubs, and eventually became the Australian Soccer Federation. So we had a new body, which was very much under club control, and they wanted a competition that would allow the clubs in the various states to come together. It started off with a play-off series for the Ampol Cup between the various state champions – that happened in 1960. Then the Federation movement in 1962 initiated this new competition, obviously it didn’t cover the whole of Australia to begin with, it was very much the east coast clubs that got involved. But it was at least a first attempt to set up a competition that would involve the whole of Australia at least with an aspiration to reach the whole of Australia at club level.

and thats the truth...