So, once again there’s no joy for Tasmania in its quest for AFL inclusion. Not that Tuesday’s anti-climactic announcement in Hobart came as a surprise.
The official release made reference to an AFL link only in a commitment to provide “opportunity for Tasmanian’s (sic) participating in the game to have the best possible chance to be drafted into the AFL and AFLW”.
Ignoring the errant apostrophe for a moment, this merely promises more of the state’s players to the AFL: the competition from which Tassie is excluded.
As for the apostrophe, it’s a Freudian slip which speaks eloquently of a parent body that never had enough time for the smallest member of its family. Seems picky? Well, if this was a release considered genuinely important, it would have been sub-edited to within an inch of its life.
In expanding to 18 teams almost a decade ago, the AFL painted itself into a corner and Tassie out of the script. And there’s no immediate way out, or in.
As a result, the league continues to obfuscate, hoping the Tasmanian problem will go away as it always has done in the past. This time, though, there’s no certainty it will. The anger of Tasmanians has been building, and now their hopes have been deflated.
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One notable change brought about by their long-time football isolation is that Tasmanians have begun asserting themselves. No longer are they accepting of their treatment, or of the sense that they don’t really belong, or that they aren’t good enough.
They’re finding voice, to the point where even the state’s two major ‘dailies’, Hobart’s Mercury and Launceston’s Examiner, are discovering common ground.
While the journal of the north will continue to champion Hawthorn’s involvement at their end of the state – a point of community pride given the Hawks’ achievements of recent years – there’s now recognition that Tasmanians are entitled to aspire to a higher form a football life.
The Mercury, meanwhile, has been campaigning hard on behalf of the state’s AFL aspiration. Despite these being tough times for newspapers, words on paper still pack punch in shaping public opinion. Particularly on emotive issues like football. And like a state feeling overlooked and rejected. And like the people being treated with disregard.
In offering a renewal of Tasmania’s involvement in the TAC Cup and the VFL, the AFL has merely thrown crumbs. It is selling its new blueprint on the basis that it invites unity from the state’s footy fans. Yet, clearly, it will have no such impact. There is nothing in this package for Tasmanian football fans.
It could even be argued that it reduces the game’s value for those in Tasmania who want to go to well-attended games or follow a local team’s fortunes each week.
With the very best of the state’s talent being drafted, the best juniors being placed in a re-born TAC Cup Mariners team, and the best seniors playing VFL, the state league will function without the top three layers of talent. The idea that this could make for a better local football environment, one sufficiently vibrant to carry the state into the AFL, defies logic.
So, if the state league doesn’t do it for fans, might possible inclusion of a state team in the VFL sprinkle the magic dust? Well, ask yourself this: is the chance of seeing your state demeaned to the point of playing in Victoria’s state league, effectively AFL seconds, likely to be a source of uplift and unity?
In a practical sense, only half the games would be played in Tasmania and to have any unifying effect these would need to be shared between north, south, and perhaps even north west. So, who would regularly drive 2-3 hours to watch second-tier games? The likelihood of this sparking the critical mass of interest to somehow re-invigorate Tasmanian football is perilously close to zero.
What the AFL turns a convenient blind eye to in delivering such a blueprint is that it’s the thrill of being part of big crowds, whether unified or divided in their loyalties, that makes spectator sport what it is. Only a Tasmanian AFL team can provide this for the state. The people instinctively know it. And they know when they’re being conned.
Tuesday’s package is quintessential AFL. It does nothing that challenges itself. It seeks to make itself appear as a benefactor. And it does it all under the cover of a committee composed of names designed to buffer its findings from criticism.
Nick Riewoldt, Chris Fagan, and Brendon Bolton have all spoken passionately of their belief that Tasmania should have a team in the AFL. Yet, now they’ve had their authority put to a plan which offers little or nothing. What’s more, it’s setting up their state to fail.
While wanting to resist the temptation to be instinctively negative, the only unity I see coming from this is that it will galvanise Tasmanians to even greater anger.
Pelican
Guest
Or they could bring in the Tassy Devils to make 19 teams and split the Crows license into Norwood and Glenelg. ;)
Bee bee
Guest
Capatalist dictators in a socialist land. Is this why playing games in China makes sense.
Aligee
Roar Rookie
I think you are wrong, GWS with womens footy, junior growth, increased membership every year matched by increased crowd averages ( not sure on this year) and also a netball team is actually an eventual winner. The AFL/VFL could easily have culled the Swans back when - but didnt - they wont here either. Pretty sure the membership department does deals with the RAS (Sydney show) 20/20 cricket and no doubt netball .What i would be interested to know is what is the break even for a GWS crowd ?.
Lroy
Guest
10 million each for ten years. All on public record.
johno
Guest
The decision was too hard for poor Gil to make. he wants the easy choices where he is surrounded by weird circus folk like AFLX. Tasmania is too hard for Gil. That is not why he is paid millions each year, to make hard decisions that require thinking. he'd get lines on his forehead and what would his polo mates think of that Tassie should have its own AFL side. Rest assured the VFL team will pull a few hundred to the games, the TAC cup team will do little to improve on what is currently happening in the local game. The carrot Gil has dangled is dry, mangled and smelling a bit off Nothing will come of it, except it means poor Gil doesn't have to make the hard decision in his tenure. He'll bunk off in 2021 / 2022 to the board of a casino or two and leave it for the next suit, who will look at the result of the VFL / TAC cup and decide Tassie didn't support them well enough. He'll (it won't be a she ... this is the AFL) ask the Tassie government to continue to pump millions into Norths and the Hawks and tut tut that Tassie can't support its own AFL team Gil is weak. This was a weak call
Bill
Guest
What the collation of above comments strongly illustrates as Tim Lane suggests is the existence of anger but more than ever a genuine enthusiasm and passion for a Tassie team. On the other-hand I was once told by a colleague who for a time worked for the GWS that the only visitors who EVER turned up at the club Monday to Friday were tourists looking for a game of golf on a course which had once been located near GWS headquarters but no longer existed. My colleague also mentioned on another occasion GWS handed out approximately 10,000 complimentary tickets for an upcoming home game, which subsequently drew a crowd of just less than that figure! Adam's call for a business case has merit but ultimately business case or no business case, it's the AFL which controls the game albeit stubbornly and makes all off-field decisions. When Tassie appeared to be somewhat in favour just a few years ago, a study was undertaken by GEMBA, which had the latter stages of Andrew Demetriou's administration whispering words to the effect that Tasmania financially ticked the boxes but with 18 existing teams, the code had no room to move. It's also no secret that in the early 80s, Michael Kent's Hobart showgrounds proposal nearly won VFL approval. The VFL saw merit in the idea. In other words, at times, Tasmania has been close and it's fair to claim now at AFL headquarters, there’s an awareness – although not necessarily articulated - that a Tassie team would work. But at the same time what is appallingly frustrating is that its ill-considered implementation of an expansion policy in concert with repeated Tasmanian governments willingness to accommodate and pay big cheques to Hawthorn and North Melbourne shuts the door on Tasmania. On the latter it's time for our State government to say 'no' to Kennett and reject North Melbourne as well. It would then provide a landscape for the AFL to show its bona fides and express a real interest in our state – the first step would be to fixture some decent games involving a variety of clubs, which appeal to all Tasmanian AFL followers, but at no cost to taxpayers. If the pattern continues, the Gold Coast or GWS will in time become unsustainable. Even the AFL with all its capacities to draw revenue won’t be able to endure the haemorrhaging forever. Personally, while GWS is currently a solid playing unit, I'd predict that in a decade or so, the claim that it will be the 'AFL's Vietnam' will prove to be true. Mick Malthouse has in the past fortnight or so expressed that the Gold Coast’s issues are already terminal. While Tassie deserve its team now - if not 20 years ago - if we can maintain the rage, I’m sure our time will come but for many of us, alas, it'll probably arrive too late to derive too much long-term enjoyment.
Kris
Guest
Would the cost be smaller? Football Department spend alone in the AFL is at $24-$28m, Collingwood's revenue was $77m down to Gold Coast at $40m. Tasmania getting 7/11s of a team for under $20m is a bargain.
Kris
Guest
And Hobart and Launceston for god's sake!!
Aligee
Roar Rookie
Yes i would agree with that, what we/you need is a balance, a balance that actually delivers jobs, a balance that allows traditional Tassie industries to compete and employ.
Don Freo
Roar Rookie
Isn't it funny when people pounce on a buzz word. "Metrics" doesn't apply to the AFL. Most of us know they are an imperial organization.
Adam
Roar Guru
The AFL will have certain metrics to measure the likelihood of success. What do you think they will look at? They have to look at current crowd numbers because it is a metric that is observable. Do you want them to just measure former SFL, NTFL and NWFA crowds and use that to gauge support? Or use the current player numbers, that are down. I read in the Mercury that there is on average two less junior boys team a year in Tasmania over the past 10 years.
Don Freo
Roar Rookie
Gee, that would have been good. Buddy on tap forever!
Cat
Roar Guru
Swampy - Tom Stewart wasn't 'hidden'. He was there for anyone to find. Matty Scarlett found him, coached him, brought him to Steven Wells attention and convinced the club to sign him to the VFL side. From there the rest was Tom proving himself. Slane - While the bid is being labelled as something for the entire state, the entire state is the relevant metric. The bid isn't being driven by a single city so one cannot isolate a city centre as the driving metric.
Cat
Roar Guru
WOW!!!! A whole whopping $3m more than a 141-year-old club. Multiply that by their 6 years in existence and that a mind-boggling whole $18m extra!!!!!!!!! For the dense people on this forum that was laced with a heavy dose of sarcasm.
concerned supporter
Guest
A very witty post relating to the recent ''sell out; game in Shanghai. ''A “sell out” crowd from a “sell out” organisation who would sell their own grandmothers, if it made them money or look better. As a taxpayer, I greatly protest the waste of time and money. Can’t wait to see how much credit the Victorian Rules marketing department will take every time we sell something to China now. Victorian Rules, “the game that made the world.” Can’t wait for the AFLX game in the grounds of Buckingham Palace next.'' Tasmania is an AFL State, NSW & Queensland are NRL + RU States. GWS crowds, the AFL say 7,100, spectators who attended, sat 3,000 tops. Other Roar comments were, ''I ate pies said | May 20th 2018 @ 10:20am | ! Report 10,689? Hahaha, good old AFL and their propaganda. The count must’ve been done by the people who count the GWS and AFLW crowds." Kangajets said | May 19th 2018 @ 8:09pm | ! Report 4000 at best , still bigger then a Gws crowd '' Even with all the above faults of the AFL, the ARU administration {Rugby Union, for you Victorians} is far worse.
concerned supporter
Guest
2016 PAYMENTS TO CLUBS 1. GWS Giants $21,548,374 2. St Kilda $18,566,589 3. Western Bulldogs $17,610,181 4. Brisbane Lions $17,532,922 5. Gold Coast Suns $17,194,594 6. North Melbourne $15,022,303 7. Melbourne $14,799,452 8. Port Adelaide $13,206,665 9. Sydney Swans $12,488,957 10. Richmond $12,358,925 11. Essendon $11,914,715 12. West Coast Eagles $11,703,240 13. Hawthorn $11,614,683 14. Carlton $11,607,942 15. Collingwood $11,304,689 16. Geelong Cats $10,787,483 17. Fremantle Dockers $10,563,307 18. Adelaide Crows $10,553,565 *All clubs received an $8.188 million base payment and a $1.2 million bonus payment.
Slane
Guest
It'd be hard to make a less accurate statement. Hobart is a city of 200 thousand people. They aren't geographically diverse. They all live in the same city. You have absolutely no evidence that Tasmanians wouldn't get behind their team and all past incedents of introducing a new team into a heartland area would suggest the exact opposite. People will readily get behind a newly introduced state team.
Dalgety Carrington
Roar Guru
Hey I'm more than happy for Tasweigans to stridently put their case forward, I'm just not at all convinced there's the population or growth to sustain it. Oh and I would never regularly bag the commission for a Vic sense of entitlement, I do however think having such a huge proportion of teams centred in one location isn't great for the outlook of the game. Maybe there could be a solution to both issues there?
George Apps
Roar Rookie
I'm extremely disappointed with the AFL over the decision to treat Tasmania like an outcast! I mean they're playing matches in Darwin and f---ing Shanghai, for god's sake! I say disband the Suns and let their players go to Tassie if they choose or be absorbed into Victorian clubs. Half of them want to leave anyway!
Fairsuckofthesav
Guest
Agree Tim. The AFL is far too East Coast Centric. There has too be less Melbourne teams. Why are we still propping up a Melbourne centric competition when its supposed to be national? No more handouts. Relocation to Tassie if you can't make ends meet in a saturated market.