A-League expansion delayed again by FFA

Where did you glean that from.

It would certainly help in determining the overall feasibility of each bid. If they can develop both their fan and financial bases during that period then super. They'd make valuable additions but if not they save everyone a lot of time and money.

It wouldn't be a bad way of going about it.

I say test the validity of their bids by sanctioning a national 2ND division with all of them featuring. All funded by the bids themselves. The end goal being finishing with enough depth for two 12 team division in 5 years time.

Revenues of $75-80m aren't that significant when faced with funding an entire sporting landscape. Even $100m isn't big money in reality. As for using the A-League and Dangerous as a cash cow. That's literally how every sporting organisation in the nation operates at a professional level.

"nobody got a choice about voting for Steven Lowy because his father rigged the whole selection and voting procedure" The fact of the matter is the 9 Member Federations & ALeague are the only organisations who have the power to nominate & vote for the FFA Board Members & FFA Chairman. The Member Federations are the only people to blame for the current FFA Board & Steven Lowy as Chairman. They had the power to make the decision, they chose the expedient option by choosing Steven Lowy.

Your analogy about voting for Turnbull is quite good however nobody got a choice about voting for Steven Lowy because his father rigged the whole selection and voting procedure. So if this guy had the business cred and the passion why would he not step forward amongst other candidates and why will he not listen to other peoples point of view in regard to the game and it's stewardship.

So how do you conclude that any of the Lowy men do not have a passion for the game? In fact if you could get a perfect fit it would be passion for game, established business cred and working knowledge of the history of the game. Do you not think Stevo went to local games, NSL games, Socceroos and club tours as a child? The NSL was run by people with passion and spirit but was a total business failure, mainly at it's own hands. Let me reiterate that TOTAL BUSINESS FAILURE and they were running a sausage sizzle and lamington drive kinda economy. Under the old school we won nothing that mattered. Modest overseas club sides would play the national team, now HAL clubs play massive star studded clubs drawn from global stock. The Matildas may deserve more money but it wasn't that long ago they got their kit off to raise money for new kit. Like the coming of Jesus we are told to be wary of false prophets. If you vote coalition you get the sane and reasonable Turnbull but you also get the ultra conservatives and Nationals nut jobs. The FFA is like that too. It's not Lowy and Gallop that scare me, it's the guys on the subs bench.

"The only reason 2018/19 won’t be the start of an expanded ALeague will be because the new operating model will have the ALeague season starting in February 2019 to align with the rest of football." Good point. Maybe FFA should try saying it louder.

agreed Jeff, we have at least 15 clubs with excellent claims to enter the A-League, but no one is willing to open the door

Agreed. If the A league goes into a massive decline as it did in 08/09 (?) and crowds fall off big time and TV interest and corporate dollars follow then the whole game is screwed. It feels like the ffa is playing Russian Roulette with the games future.

Agreed. Stakeholders should be able to see what the FFAs $100m+ revenue and expenditure looks like. The professional game though cannot be expected to sustain the grassroots, the Socceroos, the administration costs of the ffa etc .... if the number is $75m then 89% should go to clubs leaving $60m for the clubs which would be $5m/club with 12 teams, more if they can walk their talk and increase commercial revenues as they say they can.

Given all we know about what's occurring with FFA & Aleague over the past few months, I'm not too fussed about anything O'Rourke says. First: it's highly likely the FFA Board will be turfed out within a few months & the strategy for expansion favoured by the current Board will be turfed out with them Second: the ALeague operating model will be significantly transformed - hopefully before the end of 2017 - and, an ALeague operating model will be chosen that maximises the potential growth of the ALeague competition. The only reason 2018/19 won't be the start of an expanded ALeague will be because the new operating model will have the ALeague season starting in February 2019 to align with the rest of football. We will have the ALeague & 2nd Division playing from February until the week-end before Christmas with a 2 month mid season break in June & July.

Exactly Waz, football is unsustainable in it's present form because there are too many hands in the till. Take the A League away from FFA and the corporate structure there is unsustainable. They are like our federal and state governments the more money you give them the more they want. It is not unrealistic for the clubs to get $4m each out of the $65m pot from Fox. The FFA needs to cut it's cloth according to it's revenues.

Really? Is $80M enough? At $4 per club plus administration costs plus a dividend to FFA for grassroots and growth of football I am not so sure. Sure if the full $80 goes to the A_league that should be plenty for them to run 12 -14 teams. It really comes down on how much dividend should FFA receive to run the game at the grassroots and national team level. This is one of the frustrating issues with arguments in this space, without knowing where all of the FFA money is spent its hard to make sense of what is really a realistic figure to make the A_league self-sustaining entity. I am all for patience in this space but it is obvious the stumbling block is the owners want a certain amount ($4M per year) but the FFA are adamant they cannot afford that even now. When you add another 2-4 teams joining that adds a further $8-16M that have to be funded from current revenue. FFA should just release a breakdown of their costs, if they cannot afford it lets have a argument based around visibility

The big question is, what is unsustainable - the A League model or the FFAs cost structure? With $75-$80m in revenues it looks like the A league, and expansion, are sustainable but the ffa are treating the competition as a cash cow which is unsustainable.

Yep, meant to be released in Feb, then July, now next year! Maybe all these bids, makes it hard to devise a criteria that suits the the teams they want to include?

This is very disappointing. Nine Australian clubs is simply not enough.

Me neither. But delay.... delay....... delay.......

Expansion criteria was meant to be released on Feb, then it was July, now another 6 months away! They close down the COE, stop support for futsal, get an increase in TV money - am I missing something, where is the growth and progression? Why won't they open their books, they are starting to look more dodgy and incompetent as the months go by? Thank god there are various idiots supplying distraction, talking about how youth development would be better if everyone signed up for their programs, otherwise they would really be in the spotlight! South Melbourne is playing tonight in the FFA cup and will be televised. Their club president says it will be a good advertisement for getting into the HAL, let's see if their fans think the same. Otherwise there are better bids out there, what crowd size should be expected, for an aspiring HAL club?