Can the A-League learn from rugby league?

OK, I’ve become an avid consumer of The Roar over the past few months and I’ve finally decided that I need to add my thoughts on this promotion-relegation debate.

Hands up first, and I have to admit to being an escapee from the UK. For various reasons I’ve three English teams that I follow to a greater or lesser degree – Everton, Swansea City and Newport County.

Over the years, I’ve watched these teams at all levels of the English pyramid – Premier League, Championship, League One, League Two, Conference, and even below. There can be no better advertisement for promotion-relegation than Swansea City and Newport County.

Swansea have gone from the bottom of the League Two (fourth division) to the Premier League (first division) not once but twice over the last 40 years. Newport went bust and were kicked out of the football league and sent into exile, unable to play in their hometown. But were rebuilt at the bottom of the amateur leagues and finally won promotion back to League Two (that’s four promotions!).

After 11 years in Australia if I was going to follow an A-League team it would be Sydney FC, but the reasons I don’t are for another post. It may be blasphemy to many of you but give me a team in Sydney’s south and I’d be there with my kids every game. For now, I’m heading to watch the Sutherland Sharks in the NPL.

But what does all this have to do with promotion-relegation in the A-League? There are obviously two distinct but complimentary debates – expansion and promotion/relegation. My view is that we need to do both and the sooner the better.

I’ve been getting more and more into the A-League over the last few years and generally the standard is good and entertaining. This year especially with great competition at the top, and it’s good to see Sydney FC and Melbourne Victory doing well in the ACL too.

But the problem is at the bottom of the table. There sadly seems to be no incentive for clubs to improve, nothing to fight for except pride, with the exception of the Wellington Phoenix who know they only have four years to show improvements.

Expansion and promotion-relegation would at once broaden the base but also deepen the support, putting more bums on seats, viewers on TV and dollars in the bank accounts.

A national second division will broaden and deepen the game, exposing football to more people, in more places and strengthening peoples’ connection to the sport. The AFL and NRL are still reaping the benefits of this from being the dominant codes in Melbourne and Sydney. The only truly national football code is soccer but it won’t make the same connection with people without greater exposure and accessibility through more clubs that are closer to people.

Sadly football will go backwards if it doesn’t keep moving forwards and the gulf between the A-League and NPL will widen. When that happens the player pathways will stall and it will become harder for players to step up to A-League.

The ARU have recognised this in rugby union and are repeatedly trying to establish a national competition to bridge the gap between the state comps and Super Rugby. A national second division is essential to the future health of football.

As was noted in another post, people can be conservative and only look to what they know, so we keep regurgitating the standard up-down model and people keep throwing the same sticks at it. My suggestion is to look at the Super League – yes, that’s right, we might just learn something from rugby league!

Over the years, the RFL has had pro/rel, then the closed franchise system, and now returned to an innovative promotion-relegation system. Remember, rugby league in the UK is a minority sport played in a few heartland areas, but has managed to survive and thrive in the shadow of a much bigger code.

Sound familiar? They call it the Super 8s.

Here’s how it would work for the A-League:

• Add two more teams to the A-League making it 12 teams.

• Add a second division – A-League 2 – of 12 teams (there are enough ambitious NPL clubs to fill it).

• Each division plays a home-and-away season of 22 games.

• The two leagues then split into three divisions of eight teams (Division 1 the top eight from ‘A-League 1’, Division 2 the bottom four from ‘A-League 1’ and the top four from ‘A-League 2’, Division 3 the bottom eight from ‘A-League 2’).

• Division 1 and 3 carry their points over, Division 2 everybody starts from zero.

• The eight teams in each new division play each other once.

• Total regular season games for each club 29 (similar to now).

• The top four clubs in Division 2 are promoted to A-League 1 for the next season.

• Have a top four finals if you really need to.

This model has lots of potential advantages:

Firstly, it maintains interest and competitive edge through the season, and no club can afford to back off.

Second, it gives the A-League 2 clubs the opportunity to compete against better opposition which will improve their skills and attract more fans. The FFA Cup has shown the latent interest of seeing ‘small’ NPL clubs play A-League teams and this would build on that.

Finally, it provides a route for advancement and therefore investment.

I would expect that in the first few years it would be the A-League 1 clubs that stay up each year, but given time and the ability to improve, the A-League 2 clubs would be challenging.

No doubt there are lots of details to work out, but here’s a model that I think suits the Australian environment much better than the standard up-down model.

Whatever the answer the sooner a plan is put together the better. What do you think, Roarers?