A-League to expand in 2019

FIFA World Cup this year. Every 4 years (especially since Aus qualified) there is a huge boost in attendance, TV deals, player participation in the 2 years following. If they don't expand now then when. A South East Melbourne, Canberra region, South Coast bids would be my personal choice to consider. Tasmania, Geelong, Gold Coast would be a shock. Including another North Queensland franchise which was barely given much chance. I think it would be a wrong decisions for a second Brisbane team, as the roar are struggling on thier own. Sydney South, is a real good chance.

True there is a rail link but it would not be a problem to build an effecient bus terminal like Suncorp. The other this is, and I'm not 100% sure, but isn't Perry Park part of some trust set up by the former mayor Clem Jones. The Strikers have a few million in trust and have never shown any interest in parting with any of the money and the strangle hold on Perry Park. Ballymore is the only way to go and we need a 50/50 sharing agreement with the ARU. Time for Gallop to start playing hard politics like what the ARU are doing. The ARU clearly outlined the juicy deals for netball, league and AFL and they are now demanding equal treatment. Time for the jellyfish Gallop to stand up for football and show he has got a pair.

Needs to expand quicker.

I think the A-League tried to bite off a bit more than they could chew. They went too big too early. If they had more teams at the start and then slowly built it up it might have been the better way to go. Played in a mix of bigger and smaller stadiums still with the live Foxtel coverage and support. You could of had Melbourne Victory playing out of AAMI like now and South Melbourne playing out of their ground at lakeside. Manly United and Woolongong Wolves as well. Using these already established clubs in the A-League. Of course the only problem with this might be regular traveling expenses and the License fee. Imagine if the FFA Cup eventually become the A-League in itself. The best of those FFA Cup teams in the A-League on a permanent basis. One week we'd have a big club against a smaller club, big against big in another game...etc. I think that's what most people would prefer. I sure would.

Wrong Chris....."About BLOODY time"

As a Tasmanian I believe you underestimate our passion for our own state and sport in general. We have a strong bid and its well financed. In fact our bid was on the table well before the other aspiring clubs The AFL don't want a bar of us so the A League is an opportunity we would grab with both hands. How boring to have more teams in Sydney or Melbourne. Tasmania United would bring a bit of romance to the league like a Bournemouth or a Leicester or a Huddersfield. We are ready to go.

If Southern Sydney gets in it is probably the death of Wollongong in the national league for 20 years. Southern Sydney intend to play games in Wollongong and are factoring in that market into their numbers.

AT one point there were 24 teams in the old NSL, (and both the NBL and NRL reached 20 teams at one point), so history tells us that there is such a thing as too much expansion. We certainly need to get to 16 teams and a 30 round competition, a lot more difficult to do it without stretching the resources of the league, which are already being stretched with 10 teams. We all want the same thing, unfortunately, there does not appear to be a magic bullet.

I doubt the A-League clubs want expansion. Why would they want to share the pie around more competitors when there is little proof of more cash for them (or a bigger pie if you you will). This is an area where an independent administration can act in the best interests of the game inspite of their clubs dragging their heels.

Expansion and decline are two words that dont go together .If nothing else more teams will mean more opportunities for young players and unearthing new fresh talent if these teams come from new markets more new talent equals better prospects for the national team .Also the fact that a ten team comp is getting stale with the same teams playing each other over and over and over again .I personally think 4 new teams are needed.

Chris its been awake for a while now. Over 1.2 million active participants in the game. Thats probably 4-5million people actively involved with the game in some shape or form every week. Now go back to sleep.

Mr AFL are you disappointed that AFLX was a dud? And are you concerned that the northern media just wont play ball like your compliant southern media? You really need to read what they are saying about the experiment up here...http://www.abc.net.au/news/2018-02-16/aflx-not-an-exciting-new-format-of-a-beloved-sport-richard-hinds/9452570

chris if you want to talk alf, go to the alf tab. I'm trying to educate here on why we shouldn't get overly excited about 138k unique online viewers (across a 5 hour session), and why average A-League ratings for a full match of 31k is still more valuable to advertisers and sponsors.

Everything you say is geared towards stifling the A-League and the game in general in Australia. Thankfully they are not listening to people like you and hence we have serious investors pouring serious money into our game. The potential for football is bigger than any other sport in this country. Rugby has the potential as well but doesn't (and never will) have the player base to really grow in Aus.

Rolly I agree. The 'gong just want their own team and have no identity with the Shire. I suspect though it will have more to do with the catchment area of juniors etc rather than getting fans travelling up the freeway.

Rellum which part seems rushed?

Check out the numbers in Sydney and Brisbane. Wow, AFLX took the northern states by storm. They are very similar to the numbers that watch AFL in the winter months on 7's main channel.

Where would you base the club, if you were deciding? Does Brisbane have any specific areas of tribalism, or civic pride, or is there a different dynamic? I’m genuinely interested in how the social and demographic dynamics work in the city.

Wollongong and south coast fans want their own team we will never support a Sydney based team there is great rivalry between Sutherland shire and the south coast .it won't work sharing one team south coast fans won't have a bar of it . It's Wollongong wolves or nothing as far a short i am concerned the Dragons and steelers joint merger is a huge failure down here with Wollongong fans have never taken to the merged team

I don't have any interest in any E-formats of any kind, and wish all those who do have an interest the very best of luck. More generally, do you think those E-League numbers are comparable to TV ratings? You do understand they represent completely different metrics, right? Do you and waz need a lesson on what average TV ratings mean as opposed to unique online viewers? You do understand that right now, an advertiser would find the A-League's average game rating of 31k far, far more attractive than 138k unique online viewers (at this point, perhaps Nemisis can enlighten us all again about his coupon idea) unless those 138k unique online viewers are watching for more than 20 minutes on average - and almost certainly they are nowhere near that 20 min average.