The noises coming from Geelong fans to have their own A-League team has become deafening, however there has been barely a whisper from the group behind the scenes considering a bid.
The Geelong market mainly comprises long-term football people who have the sport in their blood. In order to support its own A-League team, the region needs so much more than these loyal and dedicated pioneers.
The signs are promising though, with football participation in 2016 seeing over 3700 registered players – a 30 per cent increase from 2014.
The best part of this statistic is the number of kids. While a private investor willing to sacrifice some money for a long term return on investment is vital, the only way to find them and convince them is to show them the potential Geelong has in the future. This is where the kids come in. If we can get kids to A-League games, then naturally their parents, relatives and school friends will follow. The numbers can swell if done correctly.
While it is entertaining, Australia’s top flight isn’t the best league in the world, and with all due respect to the participants – apart from the odd Tim Cahill or Besart Berisha – those playing in the league hardly inspire kids to get names on the back of their jerseys.
This is why community engagement is a crucial ingredient for any Geelong football team’s success.
To start with, all juniors registered to play football in the region should get a free season membership, including a cap or scarf. Straight away you will get a few thousand kids in Geelong feeling they are part of the club.
Parents won’t let their kids go to a game on their own, so they have to buy tickets themselves. All of a sudden we have more than a few thousand parents paying money to go.
To make it a day out, the grandparents now want to go, as well as cousins, school friends, work colleagues, neighbours and their families. Sounds good, doesn’t it?
But to realistically make sure they keep going back for more, we need to make it affordable. At the moment to go to an A-League game in Melbourne, the average family of two parents and two kids are looking at spending $120 (tickets, food and travel) and even more if you are travelling from Geelong. For 13 games a year this is over $1500.
To make memberships for adults and families affordable, the clubs must reduce costs. Stadium deals are one of the biggest costs facing any sporting club. This is where the parties involved need to come to the party by providing a deal that makes it profitable to operate and increase the number of people that actually go.
Surely the stadium rent a club pays can be a small base amount, plus a commission based on the number of people that attend. If stadium rental costs are linked to the number of people that attend – rather than a large, flat rate, which the club needs to recoup by charging higher ticket prices – it provides incentive to keep ticket prices down, because the more people that attend the higher the rental return for the COGG.
This will also mean more people will go and buy food from the outlets that operate within and around the ground. Therefore, not only will those within Kardinia Park itself benefit, but also the surrounding local businesses, a major boost to the local economy.
A single Geelong Cats game brings in more than $5 million to the Geelong economy, if A-League tickets and memberships are kept low and the stadium has a healthy attendance, there is no reason why an A-League team can’t one day get close to this figure.
No point in a stadium which has seen millions of dollars in investment sit gathering dust between October and February!
Depending on reducing these other costs, why not make an adult membership for a 13-game season cost $100 for general admission or $200 for a family (two adults and two kids)? Give discounts to other registered football players and increase the numbers.
The Big Bash, the A-league’s major competitor, gets huge crowds partly due to cheap memberships given to kids who play Milo cricket and cheap tickets for families. It looks fantastic on the small screen and hence large money is generated via TV revenue, meaning gate takings aren’t as important as they once were.
What about food costs? A bucket of chips or meat pie and a bottle of water costs over $10 at a Cats game. Reduce rent or again make it commission based and there will be more reasonable prices for food and drink.
Next, make public transport free to games. The Western Sydney Wanderers have a deal whereby all members and anyone who buys a ticket gets complimentary public transport and their attendance numbers are among the best in the league. This may not be as significant in Geelong, due to the fact most people would drive, but why not provide regular buses on match-day and encourage people to get local public transport.
Let’s not forget merchandise revenue. By reducing other costs, you will sell more merchandise, which again needs to be reasonably priced. $100 for an A-League jersey is too much for a sport trying to attract fans, due to poor deals (some clubs get as little as $6 per jersey sold).
A major advantage the A-League has is that it runs over summer, during school holidays, when a Geelong team could really make its mark. Make going to a Geelong game a fun outing for the family. There is always a hive of activity around the ground when Victory play their annual game at Kardinia Park. Throw in carnivals, kids’ gala tournaments, clinics – make it a day out for every game over summer!
Kick-off times should be reasonable – 7:50pm is way too late for young families even though TV dictates these times. Why not an hour earlier (and maybe get more TV fans then too)? Why not let kids in for free too? Families are always looking for cheap ways to keep kids entertained over the long summer months and the A-League could be it.
All of this sounds great in theory but is harder to put into practice. However, if all stakeholders engage and can see the bigger picture, then surely this is workable.
The only way for the A-League to be successful in Geelong is to link closely with the community. That is the one selling point that can break down all other barriers.
Janakan Seemampillai
Roar Guru
Geelong would be a great candidate...I hope the delays in A League expansion dont put the Victoria Patriots working party off...
Janakan
Guest
I see your point about 3700 registered players but there is more to it than that. Whilst geography alone isnt a reason to have a team in Geelong, the point is it is a big town and although the population and soccer supporters in the region probably isnt as big as it needs to be there is potential there. You can talk about NOrth West Rangers but the point is there is already 2 teams in Sydney and whilst i think SYdney can probably have another team or two you dont want to saturate the market and undercut other clubs. Geelong is its own region and has its own identity.
Martyn50
Roar Rookie
Do you want a system where the same clubs via an open cheque book where the same teams are on top all the time. IE EPL. How boring. Australia has basically 2 major football codes AFL and NRL. It's debatable weather A League is a major code as it.s not played in the football season,because of being noncompetitive with the AFL and NRL. So our football codes (2) are looking at around 10milion followers each. Compare that to soccer in the UK which apart from some competition from the rugby codes is the major interest for 60million. An open cheque book system takes the game away from the common man as was the original intention back in 1858. Higher player costs means higher ticket prices for the common punter. As in the UK the game can't survive on FTA so gets further from the common user ending up on Pay TV. Last year we saw protests from soccer fans in the UK about the high ticket prices. Why? BEcause players want and are being payed exorbitant amounts.
Truth Bomb
Guest
That's a very good post mark. I think American sports have explicit exemptions from anti trust laws...Australia would soon too (ie requisite trade practices / fair work changes) if someone did challenge it, say, in the afl In practice the "cycling" hasn't really happened to a great extent in the afl. Teams that have "stayed up there" have done so precisely through being well managed and developing a strong culture, the key being that superior finances provides minimal edge towards infield performance
Martyn50
Roar Rookie
The same must be asked as to why local and state governments in WA put in $95.14million for redevelopment of Perth Oval Not only helped but paid for all the up grade?. Now NIB No imput from Perth Glory
Mark
Guest
The analysis of your last paragraph is very shallow. The current models of European football leagues, the AFL and the NFL are a product of their respective long histories and, as you allude to, the legislative frameworks of the countries in which they are played. Promotion and relegation is the most important factor. With the VFL/AFL and NFL, which developed without systems of promotion and relegation, there is only a finite number of teams for the league and any teams that go out of business can't be quickly replaced. There is an incentive to ensure the ongoing viability of all teams for the overall good health of the league. European football leagues, on the other hand, developed with systems of promotion and relegation. Within these systems, there is constant flow in teams entering and leaving a league. There is no need to be concerned about teams going out of business because they can be easily replaced. An oddity is the way in which court systems have treated sports compared to other workplaces. For whatever reason, in Australia and the US, professional sports is only very loosely aligned with general workplace relations laws. Salary caps are anti-competitive - they limit the ability of players to obtain higher wages and the ability of clubs to compete against each other. They would not be accepted in any general Australian (or US) workplace, but are accepted for sports. In Europe, on the other hand, courts have generally decided that professional sports are to be treated in the same way as all other workplaces and anything that acts to limit wages is not accepted. It's hard to say with any certainty why this is the case. It may be because no-one in Australia or the US has gone to court to seriously challenge the salary cap system. That may be because in those countries salary cap systems benefit the overall health of the league and, often, players at the low wage end of the sport, and with those sports only played in a single country and closed player communities, no-one has been game to stand up and challenge a system that benefits the majority. Ultimately, the two systems are different and it's wrong to say one is better or worse than the other - it is a matter of taste. In football, the best run teams will always excel, and the worst run teams will always fail (and, with relegation, be cycled out of top leagues). Significant changes in table position over time are meaningful and supporters hope to see their team move up the table over the long-term, possibly reaching the top. For the AFL and NFL, by the very nature of the salary cap and draft system, teams will naturally cycle up and down the table almost regardless of how well they are run and supporters expect to see their team win the competition (or go close) at some point.
Mark
Guest
None of the Victorian expansion bids are compelling. Geelong has a decent stadium (at best) but questionable financial backing and support. Casey/Dandenong has questionable financial backing and support and no stadium. South Melbourne remains an ethnically aligned club with a more certain (albeit limited) level of support, but one of which has limited growth potential, and a stadium that needs a significant upgrade to be of A-League standard. With the lack of compelling bids within Victoria, plus the fact that City still struggle to pull in decent attendances despite all the assistance they have been provided from the CFG and the FFA, the FFA should be looking outside of Victoria for expansion.
Mark
Guest
SVB - that may be the case, but then again New York has over 20 million people. Stadia in Brooklyn, the Bronx and Newark are all still easily accessible to millions of people (also noting that Brooklyn and the Bronx are easy to access from Manhattan via the subway).
Mark
Guest
3 hour journey? From the CBD, Geelong is about an hour away in average traffic and the vast majority of Melbourne could get to Geelong within 90 minutes.
Truth Bomb
Guest
Because the AFL kicked in too and effectively contributed to an investment of 100s of millions into those areas? And the AFL generates economic activity in those areas in tourism etc that they don't capture? At the stadiums are shared with other uses (eg Royal show, cricket, commonwealth games?) http://www.metriconstadium.com.au/the-stadium/stadium-information/ So the AFL kicked in $13.3M into metricon and $12M into spotless. What is soccer contributing to the NSW governments $1.6 million rectangular stadium bonanza? What did it contribute to melbourne's RS?
Nemesis
Guest
14k people there that night, I didn't manage to count them all. In the sections around where I was sitting I'd estimate 90% of kids under the age of 15 had an MVFC shirt. I'd estimate 50% of adults over the age of 30 had an MVFC shirt. Teens & 20 somethings tend to be less likely to wear the shirt. I'd assume that's pretty similar to what you see at WSW matches? When I watch them on TV the stands are bathed in red & black home shirts
Janakan Seemampillai
Roar Guru
I go to a few Nemesis. Am a member of Western Sydney and Melbourne City. Been to about 7 games this year. I have also Been to every A league ground, even been to ACL games in Asia to follow the Wanderers. You say "nearly every kid" that had a shirt. How many had a shirt????
Martyn50
Roar Rookie
Was the pitch bumpy?
punter
Guest
Why then did the government pay for AFL type ovals in non AFL heartland like Sydney & Gold coast?
Leonard
Guest
About SVB’s “New York has their sporting infrastructure around places like Queens, the Bronx and New Jersey. London has all its infrastructure spread around the metropolitan. I would say those two cities know a thing or two about sporting infrastructure” (3 January 2017 @ 2:11pm ): ~ New York City’s population (to nearest ’000, from 2015 US census stats) is about 8,550,000, and the New York City + the Hudson Valley metro area is about 19,567,000 in NY/NJ/PA, with about 13,039,000 in NY state; ~ Greater London’s (ONS estimates June 2016) is about 8,764,000, and its metro area’s is 13,879,000. ‘Nuff said? As for “all [their sports] infrastructure spread around the metropolitan [areas]”, so are those in Sydney, Melbourne, Brisbane, Perth and Adelaide. It’s just that many playing fields are ovals from understandable historical circumstances (though less so N of the Murrumbidgee and E of the Darling). If Australian soccer authorities and fans, after having hissy fits about 21st century oval arenas such as Geelong’s Kardinia Park, the Adelaide Oval and Melbourne’s Docklands Stadium, want newbuild rectangular stadiums, then let them pay for them from their own pockets, or better still, from Big Boss FIFA’s bottomless vaults. On another point in other posts: about the hyper-inflation in European soccer (EU legislated, and capitalism in action) limiting premierships overwhelmingly to a small minority of “squillionaire-owned” clubs, it’s EU endorsed and legislated, and it’s capitalism in action. One big advantage which competitions such as our AFL and the US NFL have is that they, and they alone, set the rules (within their legal frameworks, of course) - you could say that they’ve ‘done a Brexit’ before having to ‘do a Brexit’. Which is why these competitions can be managed by drafts and salary caps to ensure that monopolies on premierships don’t happen. As for the mechanisms being “anti-competitive” (as is sometimes claimed), the economic competition for our AFL and for the NFL is with other sports, not between the constituent clubs. (Our NRL is somewhere in-between.) It’s like between DJs and Myers, not between DJ’s hardware and underwear departments.
Leonard
Guest
About SVB’s “New York has their sporting infrastructure around places like Queens, the Bronx and New Jersey. London has all its infrastructure spread around the metropolitan. I would say those two cities know a thing or two about sporting infrastructure” (3 January 2017 @ 2:11pm ): ~ New York City’s population (to nearest ’000, from 2015 US census stats) is about 8,550,000, and the New York City + the Hudson Valley metro area is about 19,567,000 in NY/NJ/PA, with about 13,039,000 in NY state; ~ Greater London’s (ONS estimates June 2016) is about 8,764,000, and its metro area’s is 13,879,000. ‘Nuff said? As for “all [their sports] infrastructure spread around the metropolitan [areas]”, so are those in Sydney, Melbourne, Brisbane, Perth and Adelaide. It’s just that many playing fields are ovals from understandable historical circumstances (though less so N of the Murrumbidgee and E of the Darling). If Australian soccer authorities and fans, after having hissy fits about 21st century oval arenas such as Geelong’s Kardinia Park, the Adelaide Oval and Melbourne’s Docklands Stadium, want newbuild rectangular stadiums, then let them pay for them from their own pockets, or better still, from Big Boss FIFA’s bottomless vaults. On another point in other posts: about the hyper-inflation in European soccer (EU legislated, and capitalism in action) which limiting premierships overwhelmingly to a small minority of “squillionaire-owned” clubs, it’s EU endorsed and legislated, and it’s capitalism in action. One big advantage which competitions such as our AFL and the US NFL have is that they, and they alone, set the rules (within their legal frameworks, of course) - you could say that they’ve ‘done a Brexit’ before having to ‘do a Brexit’. Which is why these competitions can be managed by drafts and salary caps to ensure that monopolies on premierships don’t happen. As for the mechanisms being “anti-competitive” (as is sometimes claimed), the economic competition for our AFL and for the NFL is with other sports, not between the constituent clubs. (Our NRL is somewhere in-between.) It’s like between DJs and Myers, not between DJ’s hardware and underwear departments.
steve
Guest
So now Nemisis gets to decide who is and isn't a part of the A league community. At least we know the criteria for your decision. Anyone that disagrees with you it s seems.
Post_hoc
Guest
In reply to one part of this 3700 registered players? If that is a criteria then I am happy to announce the formal bidding process for the Sydney North West Rangers??? Happy to take suggestions for the name. My association which has just formed, (as a sanctioned FNSW league) has 20 clubs committed, the likely number of registered players, is between 12,000 and 14,000. Sorry but 3,700 is not an argument for a team, I reckon there are clubs in the Sutherland area of Sydney with almost that many players in 1 club
Post_hoc
Guest
Once again Truth Bomb why are you here, you clearly have no interest in football? You clearly have no understanding. The model you are seem to be saying wont work is working rather well with the Wanderers, albeit they were playing out of an existing rectangular field and have been able to get that upgraded (by working with the local rugby league team. Parramatta Council hosts game days, (because they know how much money that brings in) Blacktown Council is the centre for the Wanderers training facility and academy (because the know that the resources will benefit their local residents) ie two very different outcomes for two very different cities from 1 team oh yea and the owners of the football team are investing over $19 million in the training facilities. If you understood a little about football you would know this. Now kindly bugger off, we don't need you constantly derailing discussions
Beny Iniesta
Guest
Newcastle is actually Australia's 7th largest city.