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The bombshell revelation that the A-Leagues could reverse its decision to host grand finals in Sydney is the first step the APL needs to take to repair its shattered relationship with fans.
Vince Rugari’s reporting in yesterday’s Sydney Morning Herald that Destination NSW has proposed changes to the remainder of the $12 million, three-year deal was the news football fans needed to hear heading into the new A-Leagues season.
After years of haemorrhaging both money and goodwill, the Australian Professional Leagues can hardly afford to kick off another campaign with the vast majority of supporters incensed by their decision-making.
Much as the Central Coast Mariners’ victory in last year’s A-League Men’s decider was the stuff of fairy tales, it’s also a title win that deserves to go into the history books alongside an asterisk.
Having ostensibly voted to give up grand final hosting rights, Melbourne City were subsequently humiliated 6-1 by the Mariners in front of more than 20,000 travelling fans from Gosford.
The City Football Group might consider themselves masters of global football administration, but that grand final defeat will have embarrassed them from Melbourne all the way to the corridors of power in Manchester.
And it was a decision that made APL chief executive Danny Townsend’s position untenable the minute a handful of Melbourne Victory-supporting thugs took it upon themselves to storm the pitch in last December’s shameful Melbourne derby.
Townsend is reputed to be mulling over a move to the Middle East, having overseen what can only be described as one of the most tumultuous periods in Australian football history.
There’s no doubt the COVID-19 pandemic did a number on the A-Leagues’ finances – and had the APL simply been honest with fans about why they needed to sell grand final hosting rights in the first place, fans might have reacted differently.
But to do so would have highlighted the fact that certain performance metrics with the new Paramount broadcast deal hadn’t been met – and underscored just how poorly organised much of the A-Leagues have been under the APL’s leadership.
It’s been a recurring theme ever since the clubs took charge of the competition – with Adelaide United legend Craig Goodwin refusing to answer a question about “why he supported the grand final decision” in a promotional video shot by the APL last December.
Goodwin has since departed for Saudi Arabia – and the A-League Men’s best player over the past few seasons fired a parting shot at the Reds on the way out.
Budgets are being slashed across the league, yet supporters are still expected to shell out for tickets and memberships despite being treated with utter contempt by the clubs themselves.
No doubt Destination NSW has considered the reputational damage the botched grand final decision has done to their brand, and decided it was time to suggest an alternative.
A potential ‘Magic Round’ in Sydney – as suggested by Rugari in the SMH – is neither an original idea, nor a terribly appetising one for interstate fans.
But it’s a whole lot better than the ham-fisted alternative that turned rusted-on supporters off the game.
It’s hard to believe that with all the marketing degrees and corporate experience the APL is supposed to have, the game’s decision-makers could have so little understanding of what it is that makes football fans tick.
If it’s too difficult to create a simple home-and-away league, then a Sydney-centric competition that disproportionately favours clubs from New South Wales above all else is not the answer.
The APL should take any opportunity it has to back out of their disastrous decision to sell grand final hosting rights and use the rest of the off-season to start mending relationships with fans.
The game’s administrators have droned on for too long now about the importance of ‘stakeholders’ – without ever once remembering to include fans.
They shouldn’t have to be reminded every season that football without fans is nothing.
But the APL might just have finally been taught a lesson. Let’s hope they heed it.