The problem with Australian sporting codes having effective 'second tier' divisions for its major football leagues

Div 2 should work for Football but will probably never work for the dodo codes. Dodo codes? Remind me, which organisation is circling the financial drain?

He never said anything that you have just suggested, BT. Read the post again.

I’m surprised AFL hasn’t done this, probably the one code that can afford it. Mainly because VFL/SANFL/WAFL crowds are awful and half the teams in the VFL are feeder teams for the AFL. Even some of the "independent" teams in the VFL are still aligned with and on the financial teat of a senior AFL partner.

I'm no fan or pro-/rel in Australia mainly because it's unworkably silly. But that issue is the easiest one to solve. As in Europe, most players have clauses in their contracts that allows them to start talking if the team they play for gets relegated.

Our population’s increasing rapidly so at some point in the future (not in my lifetime), we’d have the people numbers & arguably the wealth to seriously consider what you’re suggesting. Actually our population growth rate is slowing down and slowing down quickly. We're about 20 years away from entering "post-development" status and seeing the population taper downwards. Australia hasn't been able to independently replace deaths with births for some time. The birth rate is 1.63, which is below the needed 2.1. We rely on immigration to fill the gap. And most of the immigrants coming to Australia are not children. They are adults who then come to a country and face the same problems that those who are born in Australia face: raising multiple children is too damn expensive. And when the immigrants don't have kids, it then relies on even more immigration to plug the gap - and name a political party that has won an election by saying we need even more immigrants? Granted our problems are nowhere as severe and as existential as Korea, Japan or even NZ, but the days of unabated population growth in Australia are over.

Maybe, but there are plenty of countries with football leagues around the world, bigger than the AFL, that would disagree. You are focusing on the culture of one sport and trying to transplant it to many. There are also plenty of closed leagues who would disagree.

Why? It's only a thing in Europe. It's not a part of the Australian sporting culture at all. If you enjoy P/R, enjoy it as a European thing. We can't have everything. They have P/R and no finals series. We have no P/R and finals series.

But with NRL, perhaps playoff between NSW and QLD comps alone could create relegation/promotion for one team. But they are feeder teams for the NRL clubs? It would be ridiculous. What would happen if Wests in the reserve grade win, while the Tigers in the NRL finish in last?

I'd go further and ask why is discussion around second tiers even necessary? Hardcore support of lower league teams is exclusively a European thing. We simply just don't have that culture. The US sports don't have credible second leagues. Minor league baseball and minor league hockey leagues are just feeder competitions for the extended lists of the MLB teams. No one goes to them...much like reserve grade for NRL or the state AFL leagues. No kid grows up saying "I'm an Sandringham fan!" And there aren't 200000 North Sydney fans out there either.

Do not understand the obsession with "bigger is better" or "more is better" The NRL is the top tier, and I do get to a couple of games in Townsville or Suncorp each season. But the state com, QRL is a different experience. Intense rivalries, Mackay & Rocky, Cairns & Townsville, Burleigh and Redcliffe, Devils and anyone. At the grounds, no need to book, just roll up, lean on the fence at the can bar, or lay back on the struggle rug spread out on the hill. Doubles, junior raffles, pies & chips, kids everywhere. Hate to see it lost in the chase for $$

That’s an interesting article. Both the NRL and AFL could easily start national second division competitions taking the strongest clubs from the state leagues and perhaps adding a couple from “foreign” regions. The costs would not be prohibitive given the revenues of these two leagues and I think there would be huge benefits. Just looking at the NRL, there are almost a dozen bids/cities putting their hand up to join the NRL, more than it could ever accommodate. PNG Hunters, Ipswich Jets, Brisbane Tigers, Central Queensland Capras, Perth Reds, North Sydney Bears, Newtown Jets, Wellington and others have all expressed interest. So why not accommodate them all in a second division? In time look to promote one or two or the clubs that prove themselves into the top division. As for automatic promotion/relegation like European leagues, I think it could only happen if there was an established fullly professional second division that had been around for some time, and even then it’s a long shot.

Adelaide and Perth have both less teams in the AFL and a much higher percentage of the population who would have had a former club in the state competition. So they would actually form the core of a second division. In the case of the NRL the second division would have most teams from Brisbane. Both these competitions have plenty of money to spare for a second division. It doesn't need to involve promotion and relegation either but if it did the main effect of promotion and relegation financially would be for the drug dealers as the bottom teams start pre season early.

In your imaginaton its astronomically higher, why is it there is such a big difference between the top and bottom in these leagues. If the bottom teams are being thrashed it suggests that other factors are in play. They are all supposed to be on the same money so something is happening.

James Johnson comments about transfer fees are ridiculous. Look at Europe second division clubs never get much in the way of transfers. The situation in Australia though is the NPL clubs prefer the steady income from the rich parents to spotting talent, apart from Adelaide where the shortage of rich parents mean they uncover a lot more talent. Australia has about 300 semi professional clubs funded by the rego fees and who only earn a bit here and there from developmental compensation and dont get transfer fees.

Western United crowds would struggle to fund a second division team. South Melbourne the big question is they might get some crowds at the start, but there ground isnt ideal compared to their old rectangular ground for viewing so will they come back. The APL is desperate for money, with massive loss of money seen through Danny Townsend crazy overspending and what involvement City had in that they will now be prepared to do anything. So the previous issue they didnt want more than two clubs to be centrally base in Melbourne and Citys opposition to that will now be overlooked. It does mean however that there wont be any giving an A-league spot given away for free with promotion and relegation. What it will probably mean is they will want a large fee to join the A-league even with promotion and relegation. So you might have the case if the second division is ever up and running , the team that comes first refuses to pay the fee and the next team that pays it gets promoted. I think you could end up with promotion and promotion as well, or even they wont wait for a second division and just offer entry for money.

Eventually the Victorian clubs would dominate the SANFL & WAFL clubs.

Not to mention most of their roster wouldn’t want to play in a second division.

Essentially you’re suggesting a semi professional club could suddenly overnight become a professional environment, without any guarantee of staying in a professional environment beyond one year.

Yes, the Dolphins are in no danger of being relegated. The Dolphins have two licenses, an NRL licence and a Q Cup licence. The two have very different demands and requirements. A club with just a Q Cup licence cannot compete with a club with an NRL licence.