Should the Matildas wrestle their way past England in Wednesday night’s World Cup semi-final, Prime Minister Anthony Albanese’s proposed public holiday for the 21st of August following an Australian win in the final could become close to reality.
Many are against the idea, with small business not keen on taking on a significant financial hit thanks to the necessity to pay penalty rates on the day and the Nationals and Liberals are predictably falling on the side of the employers.
It would be a monumental move and a decision should be reached just hours before the match on Wednesday, when Federal Cabinet meets and formally determines its course of action.
Whilst symbolic in nature and no doubt something that everyone would remember for the rest of their lives, governments have far more pressing issues to deal with when it come to football in Australia.
As fun as a lunch-time BBQ on the day following a glorious win in the final might be, I would prefer to see the powers at be rethink the way Australia’s most participated-in team sport is funded.
Frankly, the financial support given to football when considered alongside other sports and the sheer volume of people who play and participate in the game across the country is utterly criminal.
It also reeks of a traditional and ingrained bias that has never dissipated, despite numerous efforts made by those at the helm of the game over the last 50 years.
Football has tried just about everything and perhaps that has been the biggest flaw in its approach; tweaking, constant structural change, re-inventing itself in so many superficial ways and never really just backing that the game was good enough as a spectacle when played in its pure form to eventually turn the tide of public opinion.
Off the back of that opinion, funding has remained at absurd levels when compared to that granted the country’s traditional and colonial endeavours.
Sam Kerr. (Photo by Andy Cheung/Getty Images)
The 2022 Ausplay survey estimated that football had 1,139,466 participants in Australia, easily the highest amongst formalised sports and beaten only by leisure activities such as bushwalking, cycling and yoga.
Yet sailing, hockey and cycling were just three of a number of sports to receive a higher amount of total funding than football during 2021/22.
Whilst not to disparage those involved in any of those endeavours, the figures seem well out of step when compared to the number of people involved in football, the price tag associated with it and what it brings to the general public.
The Matildas run has made the latter as clear as the proverbial nose on your face, with people of all walks of life and sporting backgrounds united in a way that no other sport claim to be able to achieve.
Just as the Socceroos managed in Qatar late in 2022, there is simply nothing that builds a nationalistic sense of pride than seeing our representative football teams take on the world in a truly global activity, something the Matildas have done with aplomb over the last three weeks.
(Photo by Richard Callis/Eurasia Sport Images/Getty Images)
If the money was there at the grassroots level to encourage and allow more and more kids to engage with the beautiful game, what could be possible is simply mind-boggling. However, state funding also still fails to give football what it deserves.
Alarming numbers were made public in 2021 by Football Queensland, citing the unjust funding model in the state, something that is mirrored in others around Australia.
With a little over 180,000 participants in the state, the Queensland government’s per participant spend was just $47.97, compared with the $655.27 given to each of the state’s circa 20,000 rugby union players.
If that does not make a football fan cringe, I’m not sure what will and given that Aussie rules and rugby league players in Queensland were funded seven and three times as generously, the reasons for exorbitant costs and the manner in which the game has been held back in Australia are clear.
How ironic it was then, to see Queensland Premier Annastacia Palaszczuk accept a role as a Legacy ’23 ambassador; the level of hypocrisy seemingly unrivalled.
The $207.7 million state and federal funding package to support the Legacy ’23 initiative, one that hopefully brings long-term infrastructure improvements to Australian football after the World Cup, was certainly a step in the right direction.
However, almost $150 million of that was slated for Women’s World Cup infrastructure and unlikely to directly impact the most important players in the game, the kids.
The majority of the remainder will head towards community facilities, certainly needed, yet once again, doing little to make the game more accessible to most hard-working Australian families.
Good luck with your efforts, Albo. It would be a ripping day, post a World Cup triumph. However, might I suggest governments avoid the pile on that always comes with great success and think more about levelling up the playing field?
If they did, what we are currently experiencing might well become the norm.
Football is Life
Roar Rookie
you obviously have a knowledge acquisition issue, read it again, think, try to analyse, really try, and then read it again.
RT
Roar Rookie
Really? Do you have any facts to share or just emotion? The author plucked out some figures of Qld govt spend from last financial year. That hardly proves a case. Someone else shared a 4 year old report from the Australian Sports Commission which showed soccer was receiving more than its fair share of funding. It is 4 years old, but it is more useful than this article. I would suggest funding varies year by year and there is going to be a big variation as you include or exclude stadia. You are telling me that I am ignoring all the data, but no one has presented it here. The closest thing so far is the report I mentioned which is contrary to what you claim.
Jack Russell
Roar Guru
Sounds like your gripe is with FA. Playing numbers aren't a problem, especially in Sydney, which I believe has the highest participation rates in the country. If you think the development structures are poor, take it up with the organisation tasked with that responsibility.
chris1
Roar Rookie
Sheff no doubt they will try. But as can be seen in NSW (and probably Qld) the game is virtually invisible except to the ex pats living up here.
chris1
Roar Rookie
RT you don't have a clue. If you think that there is equitable funding for football and ignore all the data that suggests anything but, then your comments are useless.
Football is Life
Roar Rookie
it's not about the top end, it's about the average Jill, and the very average Jack playing for their local clubs. Without kids playing the game, we have no development system, without a development pathway we have no NPL players, 2nd Div Players and ultimately, A-League and National team players. The fact that girls change in cars, that there are bugger all facilities, and yet as LH stated in this thread, the Cross-Country Volleyball over the road have paved carparks, flood lighting and his and hers change rooms. You can respond as much as you like to this comment, but note the optics suggest you are bereft of strategic or analytical thinking so I'm not going to bother.
Jack Russell
Roar Guru
WTF are you talking about? Both major soccer teams are playing out of brand new government funded stadiums.
Kangas
Roar Rookie
We aren’t really a nation that punches above our weight, that’s media spin , Australia and the USA ruled tennis when it was only played by a handful of countries. Australia rules swimming because we are hot country with beaches and community pools and backyard pools with some great coaches, but swimming is not a true world sport . It has limited appeal and opportunities for most people in the world Sports like running jumping athletics boxing soccer basketball are competed for worldwide . Australia is competitive in soccer and basketball.. Maybe a few others but rarely wins medals in other global sports.
Rowdy
Roar Rookie
I've lived in a number of regions and you only have to see the weeds growing up thru the old courts to know this happens. Tru about the rise of East Europeans and Asians but there has been a noticeable drop off. I went yo a high school of about 500 and we had 20 players in the teams. At my last permanent appointment we'd struggle to get 4 and that school was similar size but was co-ed
Nick
Roar Rookie
We have good players. They just exist in an era where there are a lot of good players from everywhere now. Kyrgios would have won a slam 20 years ago. Tennis has exploded everywhere. In 20-30 years time, the Asian nations will start to absolutely dominate it, and golf. They are the fastest tickets to riches.
Grem
Roar Rookie
Participation numbers? I thought they didn’t matter! I understand your points. There are more players from European and other nations who are able to make their mark, but we seem to have no one anymore. We still should be able to produce a player or two more often than we do. We only seem to produce a one off like Ash Barty, maybe once a decade. I still wonder why we aren’t more competitive in international tennis. We’re supposed to be the nation that punches above its weight in sport and if we have the facilities and numbers as you have indicated then we should at least have top 20 players in male and female tennis who could seriously challenge in tournaments.
Lionheart
Roar Rookie
I'm excited about the executive management changes. Success on the field will come if the club is managed professionally and well, which is the stated aim of the new CEO and COO. I like all I hear from these two guys.
Football is Life
Roar Rookie
what I am saying is that some things blatantly, and deliberately not right. This morning's news shows that governance bodies are affording a 7 million dollar funding package for a RL tournament to be held here with the participation of the Pacific Islands. The NSW Government has just pulled in somewhere around 8 billion dollars from the Football World Cup, but funding in return, not bloody likely. There are terms for this sort of behaviour in governance positions but I'm not going there.
RT
Roar Rookie
I can tell you that in my area kids netball, footy and soccer all charge roughly the same for a season on council owned facilities. I think people just want to jump on a "proper funding" bandwagon as fast as a political leader jumping on an unlikely PH.
Sheffield WesDay
Roar Rookie
They'll find a way to hi-jack Footballs success. Remember when Man U and a few other of the Prem teams came......AFL was pretty quick to make sure they got a snap of those fellas standing on an AFL field with a shiny new Sherrin in their hands.
Sheffield WesDay
Roar Rookie
Roar definitely look liked they have strengthened the "rank and file" with a couple of underperforming mid-level players leaving and some potential in the ones that were brought in. And they did look an organised, more attacking team vs Newcastle. But organisation was never the issue. We know they could match any A League team, and keep goals out, but hitting the net has been an ongoing problem for a couple of seasons. I am not hugely excited about their prospects this year, but that may change if we can secure the right No.9.
RT
Roar Rookie
That's rubbish. If there is a surplus of ovals they can set up a couple of soccer pitches. Kids don't have to have a rectangular stadium. Plus they use various sizes depending on kids ages. My local park fits in 3 full size pitches in 2.5 ovals, but this increases to 9 pitches with younger kids comps. In my area there has been a shortage of ovals ever since AFLW was launched. The number of female participants in footy exploded. There was already good participation in girls soccer. Then come summer, everyone is kicked off for cricket. The footy clubs seem okay with that but soccer would like to play year round.
Jack Russell
Roar Guru
Are you saying soccer doesn't get more pitches than rugby league in NSW? I call bollocks.
Football is Life
Roar Rookie
hmmm, parents want their kids to play a sport that doesn't bring a list of negatives a mile long both on and off the pitch. Yet they have to pay a motza because the government doesn't give a rat's. They afford funding to sports that can reach numbers that are 1/10th that of football.
Football is Life
Roar Rookie
for a sport with a grassroots participation of comfortably less than 300,000 nationally……in 2020 the following was written by Adam Proszenkco – The NRL will slash its operating costs by more than half after it emerged it spends almost $500,000 a day to run its competition. The administration and operating costs of the game have blown out to $181 million, according to the NRL’s latest financial report. That equates to about $493,000 every day to run a 25-round competition, a finals series and three State of Origin matches.. With the awareness of head trauma and off-field apalling behaviour, I would propose that the numbers of RL participants will decrease. With approximately 1.8 million registered participants, how can you validate that short of expenditure on a sport that just doesn’t have the supply and demand.