With so much festive football to celebrate, will anyone turn up?

1) You may not need to provide rebuttal, but when it suits you to. I merely made note of the fact that when I presented you with an explanation of how broadcast contracts work in terms of compensation, you responded with insults rather either rebuttal or thanks. 2) You misused the word “articulately”, and you question my education & intelligence ? My advice, use simple words. 3) I have enormous respect & understanding of football. I have never said anything for you to assume otherwise. I have highlighted your delusions regarding the A League & domestic football in general, which are unquestionably accurate. 4) I don’t disrespect anybody, I voice my opinion just as you do. Disagreeing with you does not equate to disrespect. And yes, any number of soccer contributors comment on the rugby league blogs. 5) I don't know your 10 year old nephew, he sounds like he’s a very bright boy. You might learn a thing or two from him. 6) I’ve not said anything that reflects on my level of education. You’re the one making assumptions. 7) I already have respect from the people that matter to me, I couldn’t care less whether you do or not. I don’t come here for respect, I come here to engage in debate about a wide variety of sports and other topics as they come up. 8) Merry Christmas to you as well.

Firstly I don’t need to provide rebuttal. You articulately demonstrate zero respect, interest or understanding of football. You persistently annoy and show zero respect for those that come to this forum to talk about the game they love. Do you see any of the core contributors here making a nuisance of themselves on the NRL forum. Your persistent disrespect for this forum i.e. a forum specifically for those that enjoy football and not self-inflicted brain damage is astounding. My 10yr old nephew demonstrates more advanced strategic thinking than a grown man. You continually, habitually, and pathogically assume. You know nothing about me. The bottom line is that you are not demonstrating the education you have had according to your previous post. If you want respect earn it.. If your enemy is thirsty give him something to drink, if he is hungry give him something to eat, for by doing so you will heap burning coals upon his head. I wish you and your family a safe, happy and peaceful christmas. I hope you have to time to think and reassess, Respectully FIL

do you need a thesauraus?

It’s amazing how poor concentration skills are becoming. Test cricket may be 5 days of watching and that’s too much for many. T20 - is it already starting to be considered too long a format? T10 and 100 ball cricket may be what grows in the future as concentration skills further diminish.

The Bulls had 5000 and the cricket had 4 days of low crowds.

First of all, what’s wrong with woodwork, metalwork & home economics ? That you sneer at those highly practical & extremely useful manual skills says more about you than me or anybody who’s trained in those skills. You’re like that guy in Good Will Hunting who tried to impress the girl at the bar with his superficial knowledge of economic theory. I was going to reveal the extent of my education, but why should I lower myself to your standard ? And in all of your self indulgent tripe, not once did you mount anything remotely resembling a coherent rebuttal of my previous post. Maybe it’s your comparative education level that should be called into question.

@Football is Life Consider putting away the thesaurus. It doesn't make you look intelligent.

So when you went to school Brett, the evidence suggests that your core high school subjects were woodwork, metalwork, tech drawing, home economics etc. I am thinking you weren't attracted to a demographics case study in 3 Unit/Advanced Geography? Were you asleep in the maths periods that covered probability and the law of odds? Were you sick when strategy and strategic thinking were covered in history? I am going to suggest that you consider running for federal parliament, because at this point you are demonstrating the same cerebral capacity, disconnection, and pocketed ideological thinking, as the anachronistic cohort who call themselves Parliamentarians

mate, Rome as a whole stopped me in my tracks. Red hot tip. Think about Scotland. My wife and I went there in September a few years back. Scottish autumn. We did a 10 day lap staying at some outstanding B and Bs. We made the effort to get off the highways and take every back road, country lane and goat track we could get the Ford Fiesta they gave us, onto. We still talk about that trip. Happy to give you the track we took and the B and Bs. Unbelievable holiday.

It’s huge in the US. Three NFL games on Thanksgiving, five NBA games on Christmas Day, NHL Winter Classic on New Years Day, 14 MLB games on July 4th, and they’re all sellouts, including the hockey game usually played in a college football stadium. I once spent Thanksgiving in the US, and the football aspect is HUGE. But so is the NBA on Christmas Day. All the games sellouts and huge TV ratings.

#matth Re the NBL.....pretty well all comes down to Larry Kestelman.

#matth I always assert - - that Australia is arguably unique in the world - as at very least the worlds most competitive domestic football market. Let alone the broader sports landscape. What it means is each code tends to have its own 'sweet spot' and it's really difficult to gain traction outside of that sweet spot. As far as the AFL goes - - I feel they largely recognised this back in the '90s and have benefitted greatly from that (i.e. gave up on the SofO). Soccer in Australia.......will always struggle as a Domestic 'elite' club comp for a couple of reasons. 1. the national teams gain the superficial attention; not the clubs; 2. competition - - from the international clubs/leagues to which any decent local player gets attracted to; 3. comes from a long way behind NRL and AFL in the consciousness. If Australia were a sporting vacuum......who knows. But it's very much the opposite. Cricket is always a funny game - - when playing I couldn't wait but often just hoped for a wash out.

I hear what you're saying James584 and there are clearly positives and negatives either way but the two main issues that won't be resolved anytime soon are: 1) The TV networks will not pay anywhere near the same amount if the Aleague scheduled their season in winter. In fact, I recall reading that the APL explored a winter season scenario with the commercial tv networks in their last tv deal negotiations and none were interested in bidding at all. So the bottom line is, without money there is no pro football competition. 2) We need our own football stadia to play in winter, shared stadia with League and Union will result in ongoing complaints about the pitch standard being unsuitable for football not to mention venue availability on key nights like Fri/Sat. For example, do we expect WSW to play at Commbank on Sat night after the Eels play on it on Friday night or Sat afternoon? Obviously that's not possible. Some clubs like Adelaide United (and soon WU) will not have this issue but what about all the eastern states clubs and even Glory? We need to have a long term plan to acquire our own football only stadia.

And not piss off Gina Reinhart

I kept it as concise as I could. If you don’t want to read it, that’s fine, don’t read it. Besides, I b was responding to an equally verbose statement.

I guess it’s for people who are away from their families or don;t have much? Regarding your Christmas, you missed the being forced to go to the grandparents who don’t have air conditioning, the uncle who gets drunk and makes inappropriate comments and the realization on Boxing Day that you have two month’s worth of ham left over to eat in 4 days. :stoked:

Cricket in Australia in a generation's time may be surviving on the sub-continent immigration population, which is pretty much the largest one now. The BBL is an attempt to shore up cricket and bring youngsters back, because they recognized this issue a while back. I can see a future where test cricket is just played between Australia, England and India (sort of the same as it was up until the 1950's) and T20 competitions all around the world overshadow our local game (like football funnily enough, obviously with a smaller number of leagues). Cricket and football in Australia (and rugby as well in fact) have a similar problem - how to migrate from a primarily national team sport in the greater consciousness, to a weekly club based cash cow like the NRL/AFL.

And they are the two largest segments for Australian betting companies. Basketball first by a country mile apparently.

The NBL nearly went to the wall a few years back. their current administration seems to have got the balance right and is living within it's means. something netball, for example, needs to learn.

It’s validated purely by eyeballs on TV sets. And you are right that at some point in the future, the eyeballs equation may shift the other way. right now though League (for example) get’s those eyeballs week in week out, whereas football gets them a few times year for marquee events (sort of like cricket now actually, although apparently the BBL is rating pretty well).