In what will come as no surprise to football fans across the nation, a recent study by Roy Morgan has found that the world game boasts the most regular participants of any sport in Australia.
The study analysed participation figures over a 15-year period between 2001 and 2016, eliciting that football participation has risen by 46 per cent.
While some may argue that such stats reflect little, if any, positivity worth analysing, it is worth noting that this rise contradicts a national downturn in regular sport participation, falling seven per cent over the fifteen years to just under four million people.
For a sporting nation, such information must be a cause for concern – although the positive trend in football is a light in the dark.
In terms of football’s key competitors, Australian rules football, in spite of recent efforts to raise the profile of the women’s game, suffered a minor decrease in players. Both rugby league and rugby union suffered massive declines of 27 per cent and 60-three per cent respectively.
Of course the question remains, as ever, how these figures are transposed from mere numbers on a spreadsheet to future supporters, crowds and, most importantly, the Socceroos and aspiring World Cup winners.
The A-League has endured some tough times in its brief tenure, however it is clear that football is doing better now than perhaps at any time throughout the game’s history in Australia.
The Socceroos’ current difficulties in World Cup qualifying are of course a worry, however it reflects well on the powers that be that World Cup qualification is now expected, rather than dreamed about as it had been for decades.
It is hoped by football fans everywhere that this news is not received by the powers at be with complacency and a sense of closure, but rather a platform that can be used to bring the game to the next level.
Paul
Guest
I signed up my boys (5 and 3) to our local football club. Not a big local club, astonishingly they had six hundred, yes six hundred kids sign on, producing enough cash to provide coaches, floodlights. kits the works. Forget recruiting women into the game, almost a third of the kids were girls....they love it! The game is really growing, the grass roots community is very very strong. Kids these days watch the games from Europe and the Socceroos and they get it, it’s a tough game to be good at, and they are up for it, now that’s a good place for our Aussie competitiveness to be, let’s engage with the world. I mean no body really cares about gridiron or baseball, let’s not go down that path.
STEVEN ELLIS
Guest
Mate...id suggest more likely hell will freeze if those two bloated suburban provincial pastimes AFL and NRL ever have the cojones to leave the sweet tit and protection of their local media mummies and venture out alone into the big bad world...
Perry Bridge
Guest
Interesting to contrast the 2016 figures to Roy Morgan's own 2015 numbers for 14+ (http://roymorgan.com/findings/6123-australian-sports-participation-rates-among-children-and-adults-december-2014-201503182151). (note the sample sizes 2001 : 26,198 ; 2015 : 15,944 ; 2016 : 14,330 - - so, a clear trend is as the Aust population grows the sampling is reducing). Based on Roy Morgan's own numbers, basketball trends thus: 422K, 340K and 438K. Interesting - they've done well clearly - arresting the 2001-2015 82K drop with a 98K rebound (pun in tended). RL is also trending better having nose dived from 175K to 110K but now back to 127K. Good work NRL HQ - turning it around. AFL done even better - Roy Morgan stats show 256K decline to 184K and in the space of 12 months back to 253K. And as argued on theRoar re RU - somehow dropped from 148K to 113K in 2015 and nosedived to 55K in 2016. Interesting. Anyone else taking all this in with a liberal dose of salt granules?
Perry Bridge
Guest
#josh I think you miss the point of Govt working with non Govt organisations in promotion of things like harmony day. Soccer doesn't need to promote itself to recent immigrants - it's a given. However - other Australian activities DO. This isn't an attack on soccer (although implicitly it is - if you agree with the Kevin Sheedy principle from a few years back about the immigration office and WSW) - it's a promotion of broader opportunities. I don't see how you feel this is not a good thing?? The A-League could be said to be skewed to over representation of non-core multicultural elements - however it's also got great 'internationals' representation than the other football codes outside of the Pacific Islanders who are a big part of the Rugby codes. The multi-cultural aspect of the AFL shouldn't be sneezed at and deserves celebrating too. Names such as Mzungu, Himmelberg, Poholke, Signorello, Montagna, Bastinac, Talia, Gallucci, Schache, Zorko, Boekhorst, Jaksch, LeBois, Nyhuis, Silvagni, Aliir, Daw, Chol - etc etc etc - would not look out of place on an A-League team sheet. Of course what is sadly lacking from the A-League is a decent representation of Australian indigenous players. So - I'm not sure what you high-horse position on multi-culturalism is actually based on??
clipper
Guest
pales into insignificance when you compare the amount put in for Homebush and Parramatta redevelopment - over 1billion after needlessly selling our poles and wires.
josh
Guest
Don't forget AFL conning 480k out of the NSW Government for GWS to promote it's Harmony round this season. GWS - the most embarrassing failure of a team in Australia's history. Every round in the A League is multicultural round, we have this edge.
Perry Bridge
Guest
#Punter do you tag team with #Nemesis?? #Nemesis makes inflammatory comments - then sits back whilst you get your back up and the responses to #Nemesis without consulting his original post for the context. I wasn't trying to compare AFL Japan to soccer in India at all. I was illustrating to #Nemesis that it's long gone that it was expats dominated - (they always help, hard to find a decent ruckman in Japan!!). Two different discussions going on.
Nemesis
Guest
Chinese TV audience for 2018 World Cup Qualifier against South Korea was 124 million. But, apparently, football isn't big in China. Will be interesting to see what TV audience watches the Chinese Basketball team's World Cup Qualifiers.
clipper
Guest
Punter - Football is bigger than league in NZ - they have 2 competitions there, league has none, they have far higher participation rates. Outside of South Auckland, there really isn't much interest in league at all. I would also say in Georgia Rugby is bigger, may be a close run thing.and also Madagascar.
punter
Guest
I'll say it again. Cricket - bigger than football in nations accounting for about 1/5th of the world’s population. Minuscule elsewhere, but football also is well know not as big as cricket, as mentioned before crowds of 80k to 100K for matches is not to be scoffed at. I talk to my Indian colleagues all the time, yes cricket, cricket, but they know their Beckams, Ronaldo, Messi, Real Madrid, Liverpool. But outside of the 10 or so countries, nada. Basketball - China, the China I know is all football, but in 10 years there will be no doubt. Not sure what other countries you talking about, but Basketball does have coverage all around the world, but outside US, Canada, football probably tops them in 199 countries. Baseball - hard to argue, but Japan, Korea & Latin countries, football only a touch behind. Baseball doesn't exist in Europe or Africa. This my point football in India & China, far bigger then you think.
northerner
Guest
Punter - I didn't mean to imply that you'd disrespected other sports, but this argument was really started by Nemesis, and he certainly does just that at every opportunity. Cricket - bigger than football in nations accounting for about 1/5th of the world's population. Minuscule elsewhere, but a figure of over one and a half billion is not to be sneezed at. Basketball - bigger than football in the US, Canada, arguably China, and certainly a few other parts of the world. Baseball - bigger in the US, Canada, Japan, Korea, and maybe a few of the Latin American countries. NFL - so far as I know, it's only big in one country. Not sure what the second one is, because CFL isn't the same game. And CFL is definitely only big in one country! AFL, big in one country. Etc etc. We're really arguing about not much. Is football the biggest global game? Yes. Is it the only global game? Certainly not. Are there non-global games that can rival football in support?. Possibly. You might find this interesting: http://www.rsvlts.com/2015/08/26/most-watched-sporting-events/ The point though goes back to the claim that football is the "only" global sport. It isn't, not by a long way. The biggest, yes, but certainly not the "only".
punter
Guest
Not once have I disrespected any other sport, not once. You mentioned India with 1.2bn, yes like I said, it's not as big as cricket. But I think football is a bit bigger in India then you make out. 'The Calcutta Derby in the I League (and other tournaments) played between Mohun Bagan and East Bengal is one of the most fierce rivalries of the world (featured in FIFA website) and one of the oldest derbies in the world (90 years). An average 80, 000 to 100, 000 supporters throng the stadium in this special fixture.' Football has a presence in all these countries where football is not the major sport, however, those sports like NFL, even AFL, RL don't have a presence in India or China despite having pop of 2.3bn combined, even tennis not that big in Africa, Basketball in India. If you think the ICC world cup comes close to the football World cup, then I think you are lost in a world of total delusion. Not disrespecting any other sport, love my Golf, Cricket, cycling, skiiing, Olympics, tennis, but no sport comes close to football. There are pockets in the world where other sports are bigger, but you cannot compare. NFL is only bigger then football in 2 countries. Cricket, there is maybe a few more bigger then football (India, Sri Lanka, Pakistan, Australia, NZ, Bangladesh). Basketball, US& maybe Canda only bigger then football Baseball again only US & maybe Japan Rugby, you have NZ, Wales (touch & go), pacific islands. AFL only Australia Rugby league Australia & NZ. tennis no-one Ice hockey Canada & US. Football is everywhere.
Sydneysider
Guest
Maybe Mickyo should direct some of his anger towards OzTam as well......
northerner
Guest
Punter - what I'm saying about India is that football may be the biggest "football" sport, but it is certainly not the biggest sport there at the moment. Furthermore, while I admit it's been quite a few years since I was in either India or Pakistan and things will have changed since then, neither country had much interest in football at all when I was there, so I'm frankly taking the stories about the high level of interest with a grain of salt. And I'm not sure how impressed I should be by a country of 1.2 billion people that has a 10 team professional league. Same definitely goes for Pakistan. And football is not necessarily the biggest sport in China either. I've read conflicting reports, but basketball still seems to be number 1 there. Sure, the big football tournaments are huge - the World Cup is the biggest event on the planet. But the ICC World Cup is not all that far behind, which is pretty good for a sport restricted to only about a dozen countries. Which is kind of my point. And while three football leagues are in there among the leagues with the highest attendance averages, so are two cricket leagues, two baseball leagues, the AFL, the NFL and American college football. In other words, there are a lot of sports vying for revenue, spectators and ratings, worldwide. Football is big, but it's not the biggest thing going everywhere, and there's no reason to disrespect the games that are as big as or bigger than football in some corners of the world.
punter
Guest
Japan has 8 AFL teams. You question before India, still not sure what you meant. However, India has 8 national football teams, representing their country in Asia & the world. They have thousands of teams, but it's not as big as cricket, I've give you that. Bangladesh, another huge cricket country, actually played Australia in a WC qualifier last year.
aladdin sane
Guest
awesome stuff mate!
Perry Bridge
Guest
#Nemesis Way to go way off on a tangent. But - "Of course, some of the 3rd world economies of the Pacific Islands don’t have a deep football culture. So what? They’ve got organised football competitions – not just expats & backbackers." However - you've just validated the AFL in places like Fiji, Vanuatu, Solomon Islands, Tonga where it is certainly NOT expats and backpackers and where over the last 5 years so much focus has been on delivering to the locals the skills to administer, umpire, coach as well as play. So - thanks for that. Your ignorance on one hand (with your dismissive assumptions) has allowed you to put forward a template of validity that applies to 'AFL' in such countries. And you've been told before - the reliance pretty well anywhere is far less on expat Aussies and this years 6th instalment of the AFL international cup whereupon no expats Australians are playing - will see again proof that the game can appeal to people on the other side of the world. That said - yes, in Asia there's a lot of expat Aussies, likewise in England - however in England/GB in particular there has been good local growth outside of the reach of the expats in London. The Asian focus on locals and game development took a bit longer than I would've liked however we've seen Indonesia in 2014 and East Timor in 2011 manage to get to Melbourne and it's no small effort to raise the funds and get all the personal documentation and travel permits organised. In Asia - for a long time it was as you describe - although not so in Japan - that's had a solid little league for coming up to 30 years. I invite you to review the AFL Japan home page and translate without googling.
punter
Guest
Firstly Northerner,The AFL analogy is, while AFL not as big as League in NSW & QLD, they have a fairly good presence, whereas there is little or no presence of RL in SA, WA or Tasmania. Now, no doubt football cannot reach the heights of Cricket in India or NFL in the US, there is a fairly strong presence of football in India & maybe not as strong, but still a vibrant professional football league in the US. But NFL does not exist in India nor does cricket exist in the US, hence the global reach. 'Is football’s global reach more significant than cricket’s huge number of supporters or NFL’s vast revenues? I don’t know the answer to those questions.' Is this a joke question, now I have already mentioned there is a presence of football in India, with a strong professional league that attracts big crowds at times, likewise but smaller presence of football in Pakistan. China matches India in Population, Russia, Brazil, Indonesia, Nigeria, Mexico that would easy cover the cricket population & I haven't looked at Europe & other Sth American countries. Cricket does not exist in China, Russia,Indonesia Nigeria & Mexico. I think the World Cup easily covers the NFL in terms of spectators, tv viewership and income, then you have the Euros, which would also go close, plus then you can add the Sth American, Nth American, African & Asian championships to all this. The Champions league would also surpass the NFL in tv viewership and income. Now while the NFL would surpass the EPL, solely within the boundaries of each country, I think once you include the income & TV viewership of those competitions outside of the country borders, this tells a different story. Then you have La Liga, Serie A, Ligue 1 & Bundesliga all also very strong.
northerner
Guest
Punter - I have no idea how you drew that conclusion from what I'm saying. You're saying that football is the biggest global game. I'm agreeing. I'm also saying, however, that being global is possibly not the only thing that matters. Cricket is only played in a few countries, but the population of those countries is massive. NFL is only played in one country but is the biggest league in terms of spectators, tv viewership and income, bar none. Is football's global reach more significant than cricket's huge number of supporters or NFL's vast revenues? I don't know the answer to those questions. I do know that in terms of professional sports in Australia, it's a line ball between AFL and League, and I wouldn't call one or the other a "national" sport in the sense of being popular across the nation, anymore than cricket is popular around the world - but cricket is still a massive sport because of the huge number of people who care about the game, and the same, I'd argue, applies within Australia to both Aussie rules and League.
Jake
Guest
I wouldn't be against it, but suspect it may generate plenty of comments but maybe not so much constructive discussion. I'll think about it!