How does the A-League really compare to Europe?

Sorry but Australian football has gone backwards with the Advent of the A League and money making (for Australian FA) NPL, what does it cost to play? in what is, compared to England a very short Season? Over $2K? My sons played 3 years in England at a good standard, it’s cost nothing! Everything, kit etc is supplied, we don’t even wash it. I doubt there’s an A League team today that could beat a good side from the National League North/South, effectively Division six here. 2006 almost every member of Australia’s World Cup squad was playing the highest level somewhere in Europe! Where are the players of today?

Well said. Our league and football in general has come a long way since the 90s. I can't wait to see what the A-league is like in 10 years time.

@ AR Re the TV Rights belng worth now (as the deadline for expansion has been missed) about $44 million cash pa, you said Davutovic mentioned "bonuses for ratings". Were there any clauses that provided for the Rights to be lowered if the Ratings fell precipitously?

Good read, Anthony.

The clubs have never asked for $50M from the TV deal. That's utter nonsense. Rather, the clubs have demanded they receive a fair share of total ALeague's centralised revenue. Steven Lowy & David Gallop agreed the clubs need more. The distributions to the clubs has increased from under 15% in the early years, to around 40% of the total revenue under the last Salary Cap. $2.6M distribution per club + $0.4M away travel expenses = $3M total distribution per club = 42% of Total ALeague revenue of $70M. Under the new TV deal, total central ALeague Revenue will now rise to around $90M and clubs want 70% of this figure which works out to about $6M per club for 10 clubs.

I'll check em out Kanga, always admire your work, although I can't agree that the Mariners are ewoks

Waz reading the Davutich and Mersiades articles, quite clearly all the provisos and qualifiers are all contained within the headline figure of $346 million - there are no extras and overs, in fact, once you start accounting for the qualifiers and provisos, that headline figure starts heading south very quickly. This is why, when the clubs asked for $5 mill as their annual dividend, or a total dividend of $50 mill per annumm, the FFA gasped because what they are getting out of the TV deal, in cash terms, is well short of $50 mill per annum.

Further up I equate the A-League as being very close to the Eerstedivisie in terms of player salaries, revenue and even standard of football, so it makes sense that you would equate SFC, currently the top A-League team, with the bottom of the Eredivisie. We will occasionally get player movement between the A-League and the lower Eredivisie clubs, but very rarely does it happen between the A-League and the bigger Eredivisie clubs.

Waz, you are right on the money with all this & have forensically eviscerated the AR poser. The poser always conveniently removes the contra element of the deal when he discusses the ALeague deal, but he never ever does that for the AFL deal. That deal is always mentioned with contra included and, for some bizarre reason, that deal is always mentioned as a lump sum over the term of the contract rather than the proper PER ANNUM basis. Bottom line is ALeague will receive $346M over 6 years for content. Contra just means that, instead of the broadcasting companies sending the ALeague an invoice for promotions & David Gallop having to write a cheque to pay the invoice, the promotional fees are netted off against the TV rights fees. But, in the FFA's annual reports, the REVENUE figure will include the full annual portion of the $346M fee and the EXPENSES will include the full annual portion of the contra fee.

Grobbelar - As someone who was involved in most NSL areas of operation I would like you to elaborate on the huge "advances" made "in the NSL's 27 year history". For the life of me I cannot remember too much in the way of 'advancement", while on the other hand the "backward steps" to a great idea, occurred almost on an annual basis. Here are a few for your consideration. The early years of the NSL saw the game itself dominated on the field of play by a team out of Bondi, Hakoah. This team, put together at considerable expense, lasted 10 years before the financial pressure of playing in front of an average 1000 people forced the sponsors to "pull the pin". Not to worry everyone declared, and the endless offerings by management began to drag the game into a downward spiral. Overnight it was decided the competition was stagnating and another 10 or so teams were introduced into a split league.a move that was to prove disasterous lasting only 3 or 4 seasons ,and sending some of the "new" hopefuls almost to financial ruin before sanity prevailed and again the NSL returned to it's more normal 12/14 team format.. Even then. the almost endless desire to "get a team into the NSL" went on almost unabated and we saw teams like Carlton,and Northern Spirit come ----- and go ,in tremendous fanfare. Meanwhile long established teams in places, clubs like Apia, Brisbane City,and Blacktown, dipped their toes in the water and quickly withdrew when the financial realities hit home. Now there is an over-riding factor in all of these situations that has to be considered and that was on HOW the NSL was being run. The emergence of "ethnic" clubs,with their undoubted influences ,saw a situation develop where certain factors came into play,.clubs with Greek,Italian and Croation backgrounds began to influence the selection of people into the management echelons running of the game ,and, add to that, the ever present "rivalry" between Sydney and Melbourne saw constant changes being made at the top level, trying to keep a lid on the "political" situation. It was then the inevitable began to show itself to the interested parties. The man who had "ruled" football for years ,the political but very astute lawyer , Sir Arthur George, who, despite the English sounding name, was a man of some standing in his "native" community, that of the Greek migrant hordes, resident in Melbourne, announced his pending retirement. and it was then that literally, all hell broke loose,ending of course. after many, many personnel changes, and changing of names etc, the league fInding itself on the verge of bankruptcy. Enter the government of the country, who in their wisdom, turned to a man who had walked away from the game in 1984, after having been soundly thrashed in his attempt to get a vacant vice -presidency position at an Australian AGM ,due probably to the first ever attempt in football of active lobbying during an actual meeting. That man,Frank Lowy, was to become the "father" of our HAL today so it could be said the game had been on a roundabout from 1984 to 2004, 20 years of total mismanagement in all sectors of the game We have to be very careful we don't jump on the same bandwagon again in coming years, Cheers jb.

No it’s not “as reported” I agree, and that’s a failure of the FFA - tell everyone it’s a great deal worth $57.6m then have to deal with the stakeholders with a significantly lower deal. From memory I think it was something like: $57m plus Fox had to buy the rights to the one FTA game if it couldn’t get sold. So the FTA game was sold and the $57m figures goes up (it was reported as “Fox Sports would then have on-sold the FTA rights to Ten in a deal likely to be worth significantly less cash for FFA than what incumbent FTA partner SBS has been paying”). The figure assigned privately is $2m/year but I’ve never seen it reported but that would make the headline figure $59m. An extra $3m/year for a new team (presumably capped at two). The question is does the $57m go up or down with this bit ie is it already factored in (no one knows for sure but when announcing the deal they said expansion would occur at the end of the 6 year tv deal so it’s hard to see how it’s factored in). There was a contra component in there (let’s say $3m/year) and a bonus based on metrics ($3m?). So starting at $59.6m it could rise as high as $65m less $6m for contra/metrics = $59m, which would be the optimistic view. The pesemist would say $57m less $6m for expansion, less contra of $3m, less $3m for metrics making $45m. My personal view is the number sits between the two and is around $50m. The FFA announced expansion would occur at the end of this tv deal not during it causing much angst in the football community so it’s hard to see how that’s factored in, quite frankly any suggestion that expansion is factored in is fanciful - it’s not, Gallop thought he had killed that idea with this new tv deal. The other factor that commentators seeking to reduce this number (to be honest, in some cases just out of shear devilment) is the increased revenues the ffa get for Socceroos games. The new tv deal excluded Socceroos games which are now sold centrally by AFC with the ffa receiving $1m per game from a central pot for WC games plus $12m for appearing at the WC (that’s around $24m over 4 years or another $6m/year on top of the domestic deal). Any article on the soccer tv deal that neglects to mention this factor is just not credible. Again the source of confusion is the ffa and their lack of transparency. They set expectations too high ($80m) and ended up putting lipstick on the pig once the deal was signed, and while we can all speculate on a value all we know is it’s $57.6m plus something for FTA and two new teams, but less something for contra and metrics. Then add on $6m/year for WC games. Hopefully the ffa accounts at the end of the year shed some light.

yeah but nah, crowds will return to their Paramatta stadium levels; about 13-14k

Someone asks for a source. So I give one. A credible article from the leading soccer writer at NewsCorp - the company that almost funds the 100% the ALeague. Then Fuss runs with “Yeah but I met a guy once at an airport and he told me........” This, from the guy who bangs on about verifiable data, reliable sources, informed opinion blah blah blah. You couldn’t make this stuff up.

According to Transfermarkt, Sydney FC players have a market value of 11 million. That's a tenth of PSV Eindhoven, Benfica, Anderlecht, Zenit St Petersburg or Besiktas; a fifth of Corinthians or Boca Juniors; and about the same as an average Austrian, Scottish or Greek team, or a bottom Eredivisie team.

I had the chance to meet an FFA Official in the Qantas Lounge & we had a good chat. The deal in the 1st year is around $55M for Aleague, with contra a bit under 10%. Waz is right on the money. The Crash & Bash posers should focus more analysis on The Bare Assi Line. A vital part of Imaginary Straya Geography.

I’ll take the win, but that was a pretty ordinary game of football. Meanwhile Gus mentioned the ‘Bermuda Triangle’ around 345 times.

That’s right. Like I said, if you add the contra it is closer to $50M. But the real cash value is about $44M per year. It is not, and never has been, as this article suggests, $57M.

I’ll take the win, but that was a pretty ordinary game of football. Meanwhile Gus mentioned the ‘Bermuda Triangle’ around 345 times.

The problem is NOt the A-League it is the continued mismanagement by the FFA. They are killing the game in Australia for their own selfish reason of maintaining control. The Dictatorship MUST end. We need a new inclusive management, prepared to promote the game rather than just sulk about the problems faced. Preferably Football people who have some idea about how to operate the sport.

West Brom and Stoke went down the path of having very heavily specialised squads (big, strong, physical, direct). When it stopped working the new managers didn’t really have too many other reins to pull. Now we just need SBS to stop putting Manchester teams on the telly every week for a title chase that is already over. Huddersfield v Palace will be very tense this weeken