Mr Football,
Your figures seem pretty spot to what I can remember from the last deal.
From memory SBS pays $6m per year for 27 Friday night live games, and all finals on a 1 hour delay.

I don’t think we’ll get those numbers to be honest. But I’d love to be proved wrong.
If we get a decent increase, say at least 50% more, plus a good deal with a commercial FTA partner, that can help promote and grow the game. Even on a secondary channel like 7TWO, 7mate, GO, Gem etc, I think that would be a good deal.
One thing is for sure, David Gallop will be judged by the football fraternity by how much he gets for the game in these next TV rights, both in terms of money and exposure.

Mid,
A good read as always.
My take on the recent Dave Davutovic article in the Herald Sun, is that the current rights are worth $40m, but in fact $15m of that is for the Socceroos component, which means the A-league TV rights are currently only worth $25m, which is the entire league’s salary cap at the moment. I’m sure they’re worth a lot more today, not because TV ratings have gone through the roof, but because sport content in general in the last 5 years (both NRL & AFL) have doubled, and their TV ratings have only marginally increased 10-20%.
So I think we’re onto a good thing, I don’t think we’ll get a double up of our TV rights $$, but we should get at bare minimum a 50% increase, which will be enough. Also, the exposure is very important, so we want to be on a commercial FTA station to help grow the game. I think we’ll get both.
If we look back 12 months, the game has gone through the worst year off the field in A-league history, with pay disputes, 2-3 clubs with huge ownership issues, huge fan issues which ended in very publicised boycotts and walk outs, and the FFA just not getting e fan base with dubious decisions like ridiculous FFA Cup final pricing etc. So we’ve had major issues in the last year, and the doom merchants would’ve been rubbing their hands together thinking the game was gone again. But the sport withstood that, and after all those issues, we’ve HD the best season on field, with the highest quality of football being played to date, great imports, a fantastic final series and Grand Final, and the season has finished off being the 3rd best in 11 years in terms of attendance.
Upwards and onwards I say. The game has always had great resilience, and it will keep going from here.

EPL does not give a toss mate, just want the most coin to broadcast their games from anywhere in the world.
Even people that live in the UK only get 2-3 games per week on normal TV.
If they want to watch every EPL game live they need cable TV.

Guys, I wrote this post in another recent article, but I think these points are very valid to this discussion also.
Tanking about foreigners, salary caps, length of the A-league season;

It’s very easy for a foreigner to price himself out of the A-league. He has 1 good season, his stocks rise, but the salary cap only rises $50k per year. China, the Middle East or lower tiers in Europe come calling and the A-league simply just can’t match any of those leagues. There’s only 2 marquee players per team allowed.
There’s 2 major points still holding back this league IMO, and they are;
– the salary cap
Sure we need to have one, especially at this stage of the league, but it needs to be tweaked. Maybe by removing all 5 Visa spots salary outside the cap, or by raising the cap substantially, by at least $1m. The problem with that is, that the homegrown players will also demand more money, when the majority of them don’t deserve it, and just by paying them more will not raise the standard of the competition.
– the length of the season
A 6 month season is just not good enough by football’s standards, simple as that. We can talk till we’re blue in the face about cut-through, media exposure, clear air vs AFL/NRL blah blah blah. 6 months is just not good enough. It’s not good for our homegrown players, who’s development stagnates for 4-5 months of the year, it’s not good for the sport in general, which needs a big restart every year, as it feels like the previous season finished a year ago. And it’s just not good to keep your best players, either Australian or foreigners. The homegrown players want to keep progressing their careers and developing. And the foreigners are used to playing most of the year, they’d rather be playing than sitting around doing nothing.
Football is a 9-10 month a year sport worldwide. That’s maybe too much to ask for in Australia just yet, but we should be looking at every opportunity to extend the season, not condense it. I think at the moment, we should be trying to extend the season to at least 7 months plus finals and not 6.

It’s very easy for a foreigner to price himself out of the A-league. He has 1 good season, his stocks rise, but the salary cap only rises $50k per year. China, the Middle East or lower tiers in Europe come calling and the A-league simply just can’t match any of those leagues. There’s only 2 marquee players per team allowed.
There’s 2 major points still holding back this league IMO, and they are;
– the salary cap
Sure we need to have one, especially at this stage of the league, but it needs to be tweaked. Maybe by removing all 5 Visa spots salary outside the cap, or by raising the cap substantially, by at least $1m. The problem with that is, that the homegrown players will also demand more money, when the majority of them don’t deserve it, and just by paying them more will not raise the standard of the competition.
– the length of the seaon
A 6 month season is just not good enough by football’s standards, simple as that. We can talk till we’re blue in the face about cut-through, media exposure, clear air vs AFL/NRL blah blah blah. 6 months is just not good enough. It’s not good for our homegrown players, who’s development stagnates for 4-5 months of the year, it’s not good for the sport in general, which needs a big restart every year, as it feels like the previous season finished a year ago. And it’s just not good to keep your best players, either Australian or foreigners. The homegrown players want to keep progressing their careers and developing. And the foreigners are used to playing most of the year, they’d rather be playing than sitting around doing nothing.
Football is a 9-10 month a year sport worldwide. That’s maybe too much to ask for in Australia just yet, but we should be looking at every opportunity to extend the season, not condense it. I think at the moment, we should be trying to extend the season to at least 7 months plus finals and not 6.

Mid,
Expansion is great, but it’s not the panacea. I think the FFA should be doing a lot more to make the 10 team competition much more stable before we start thinking about 12-14 teams. I’d love more teams, which in turn means more games and a longer season, but when you’ve got the Mariners going how they’re going, and ownership issues at the Roar, and the Jets still without any owners, the FFA needs to sort that our first.
The dont market the game, they don’t market the competition or its marquee players. Top players like Fornaroli, Castro and others should be bigger names than what they are in Australia, but the FFA hasn’t marketed them anywhere near enough.
IMO the game is doing fantastically well when you consider all things that it has against it.
Image if we had a lot more money to market and grow the game, and a fair and non-biased media, the game would be huge.

anon,

The game needs to secure the safety of its fans?? Really??

How many A-league games have you been to??

I think the next TV deal should fix the majority of the existing financial issues, regardless on wether we can get the so called magical figure of $80m PA or not. I think if we get better FTA exposure on either 7TWO, 7mate, GO or GEM, and we can get a decent increase on the last deal, then we’re on a winner.
Even if we could get a $60m combined deal with good FTA coverage, I think that’s a step forward for the game. It’s unfortunate for the multiple club owners that have already pumped their money in, lost a shitload and left the game as a result, but the league was eventually always gonna get to a stage where enough TV money starts coming in where owners won’t be losing much money if any, some will even start making small profits every year, and the ownership/financial issues of some of the clubs in the past will become the exception not the rule.
I believe we’re almost at that point right now, the salary cap is about right, with small increases every year which are accounted for by TV money, and every year more and more clubs are becoming more prudent with their money, and their recruiting, running their clubs like football clubs and not like fish and chip shops like many have in the past.
$60m per year would be enough for the FFA to spend $3m-$5m every year on advertising the league, while obviously covering all player salaries and having some money left over for either contingencies (clubs falling over/ownership issues) or to invest in football infrastructure which this country badly needs.

Costa – a good read.
On the field, we’ve had the worst season in 11 years, with countless issues and infighting within the game, but on the field this year has easily been the best of the lot. But we are still building and hopefully that continues.
I think the clubs’ recruiting is at its highest level ever, the on field quality is at its best, and hopefully that continues.
But our game needs to stop worrying about the other codes, it needs to stop worrying about the media driven bias and start running our league like a proper football league. The A-league needs to run for at least 8 months plus finals, so prob from the start of September to the end of April with 3 more weeks of finals in May, or something like that.
This needs to happen for a number of reasons, like for the development of our own homegrown players, and to actually be able to attract better overseas players at a better age, and not just at a retirement age. And we can’t afford to have a 5 month offseason, as it’s almost impossible to retain your better foreign players, when you’re only playing 7 months of the year.
I understand the whole media thing, being that we won’t get much media space while the other codes are in season, but we’ve had poor media coverage for the majority of the 11 seasons, so there’s nothing new there IMO. The code has been battling that from day 1. The FFA is better off getting going their own way, and slowly building the A-league and getting it to a certain level, where one day in perhaps 5-10 years we have a product that all the FTA networks are all fighting over and offering huge sums of money for.
Just takes a longer term view, but this is the way we need to go if we want to grow as a football nation overall.

Tully,

Not the first time that this topic has come up. People generally think that we should just pack up the summer season, and play it in winter. I actually think that this just isn’t possible in Australia, and there’s only one reason for this, facilities and stadia.
Yes, there may be a slight drop in media coverage and overall sports fan interest in the A-league if it was played at the same time as the NRL & AFL, but IMO that’s not what shuts the entire idea down.

We just don’t have the stadia to cope. And thenAFL doesn’t hurt us in this regard, as 99% of our games are played in rectangular stadiums. But both the NRL and the Super15 are in full swing, and those roll and tumble sports just destroy the pitches, and make them unplayable for our game. IMO our sport needs at least a 3 day turnaround between an NRL or a Super15 game and an A-league game, and with the amount of games that need to be played, and the small number of stadiums available, that just not gonna happen. So yes a winter league isn’t the worst idea, but it’s just not possible in Oz for at least the next 20 years.

Kaks,
The biggest difference there, and what actually brings in the most viewers is cross promotion. Channels like ABC and SBS just can’t buy that. If you put anything eg A-league on 7TWO or 7mate, and you cross promote the games at 7:30 primetime on the main Channel 7, when MKR is on, which is one of the highest watched shows in Oz, with close to 1m viewers every night of the week, that’s where and how you get the viewers. That’s what other stations can’t buy.
And that’s what something like the A-league needs. Let’s see what happens.

My mail is that Mooy has already signed a contract to go to Ajax at the end of this season.
Not sure on transfer fees, but this is what I’ve heard.
If this is the case, it’s a good move for Aaron. IMO the EPL is not the panacea, he’s a very technical player, much more suited to a Holland, Germany, Spain or Italy. Good luck to him.

Not a great striker, but I reckon at a better and more settled team, he’d score more goals.
I think if a club like Wellington took a punt on him for next season, with a settled side now, their future somewhat settled, and both Finkler and Barbarouses to come in, he might actually surprise a few people. He’d score more goals than Blake Powell for sure.

Good article Mike, and it’s spot on.
I actually think the last decade of the A-league has slowly helped fight against that cultural cringe, but there’s so much more to do.
The FFA needs to actually have a marketing budget for every season, as this is a must in such a crowded sports market. The other major factor to help battle this cultural cringe is all about education, and if we get the A-league on FTA that’ll go a long way. Not only would it give the competition max exposure in Oz, but it’d help to educate the masses that the A-league actually isn’t, in many cases an inferior product. No other football leagues in the world have the quality of the La Liga, EPL, Bundesliga etc, except got those actual competitions.

Onto the upcoming FTA deal, I’m hearing that the FFA actually has a proposal from Foxtel for an $80m per year TV deal on the table, but this is for 100% exclusivity for both TV and digital platforms. Hopefully some FTA channels are interested enough to bid for a few games, lets see what happens. The FFA needs to get this deal right, obviously the money has to be right, as the league and the clubs desperately need it, but also the max exposure, preferably on a FTA channel is a must.

Hi guys,
Thanks for all your comments.
As the new 4-year strategic plan was announced today by the FFA, it looks like a couple of my points will be implemented straight away, being the FFA actually helping to invest in marquee players, and it also looks like they’re going to start advertising the league from next season. This is all being done now as a knee jerk reaction, to make sure that season 12 is a great season for the league, and that in turn will help the FFA to get a good TV deal for season 13 on onwards. As I’ve said in my article, both helping to fund marquee players and advertising the league should be done year in year out, and not as a last ditch measure.
Now I know many people on this forum have mentioned some or all of these points before, but I think they all need to be implemented, not just 1 or 2. And we’re at a critical juncture of the league’s existence, where I believe either some of the these get at least looked at or implemented very soon, or the league runs the risk or going backwards. I know some say that the league has started going backwards already, but I don’t buy that. We have a very close league this year, most of the top 6 clubs can still win the title, and there’s some very good players playing in the A-league this season. I just think we need to celebrate our strong points better and sing and dance about them more to the general public. The marketing of the league and it’s players just needs to be reinvigorated and ramped up, as the game has many great stories to tell, the FFA just isn’t getting that message across well enough. Sure finances come into it, but that must improve.
There’s also been a few comments on here about my wording, and it’s very simple with me, I’ve never called the sport soccer, others do and that’s fine, no issues there. But I’ve grown up calling the game football and to me it’ll always be football, I’ll always call it that. Obviously I understand there’s other codes in Australia, but they all call themselves football, no sport actually owns the word exclusively, so not sure what the big deal is. Clearly some people have nothing better to do!
Cheers guys.

Good article.
I think on one hand we need to listen to his concerns on the status and future of the league, but that about it.
Everything else he said was more about himself than anything else. I love Timmy, the man is a national icon, and he’s been our code’s flag bearer in this country, since the 06 WC in Germany.
But let’s take all the emotion out of it, and forget that he’s Australia’s best ever player. The facts are that he’s now 36 years old, asking for way too much money, and he actually doesn’t just fit into any team’s structure very well these days, unless he plays up front.
The A-league is a tougher league than the CSL, the J-League and K-League in the areas that Cahill excels at, which is in the air, with a tough and strong style. He’s also a smart player, but IMO I dont think Cahill would come here and be a sensation, not at this age.
Our defenders are tough, they’re strong, they’re very good in the air, and the level of expectation that would be put on Tim by the sports fans in Oz would be bery high, perhaps even unrealistic. If he didn’t come home and score almost a goal a game he’d be branded a failure.
Deep down I think he knows that, which is probably another reason why he’s continuously priced himself out.
The code does have its issues at all levels, and while I think Cahill would be great for the A-league, I think they’d need to bring in more high profile players, for a few different clubs, and not just him.

IMO, we need to allow player movement, as it creates a football economy, but while not allowing the smaller clubs to bottom out as a result.
As we can see from this season, we’re already starting to see who the haves and the have nots are in the A-league.
Why not allow the bigger clubs who have the money to virtually pump cash into the smaller clubs by acquiring talent, and in turn help out the smaller clubs survive and even thrive. This is how many tiny clubs in Europe stay afloat and sometimes even grow.
This is how I would do it;
Caceres is contracted for another 18 months at CCM but Melbourne City wants to buy him. The 2 clubs agree a buyout fee of $300k.
On top of this, City have to pay an equalisation levy or tax of an extra 30% to CCM on top of the purchase price.
However, this levy must be added into CCM’s salary cap floor for that season, so the Mariners virtually have another $90k to spend on player salaries that season. So it’s a win-win in my view. City gets their player, they pay the fee plus the tax. CCM gets their $300k fee, which will no doubt help to balance the books for that season, plus an additional $90k to add onto their salary cap for that year to help with player wages, to perhaps help out in attracting a few replacement players. It doesn’t sound like much but it will help the smaller clubs.

I agree with this headline to some extent, but football needs to master it’s own domain before it starts worrying about media treatment. I’ve avidly followed the game for decades in Oz, and around the world, and there’s definitely people in positions of power, media and otherwise that don’t want football to grow and succeed, that’s just a fact. And I don’t think much of it is prejudice, it’s just people and organisations protecting their patch. Sports and sports media are a business these days. But things like the constant media beat ups, to the massive disproportionate police presence at many games, and the huge gap in funding that exists, particularly at the grassroots level where our game flounders in comparison to other sports, when 3 to 4 times more kids (boys and girls) play the round ball game, tells me that our game has a long way to go on many levels.

However, besides all that, the game and its administrators need to help themselves. I believe the FFA has really dropped the ball yet again these last couple of seasons, and needs to wake up and smell the roses. The product is decent, and is getting better every year, crowds are good but they could be better and TV ratings are in decline. Having said this, the Fox ratings this season are approx 8% down, so I wouldn’t say it’s panic stations just yet. But it’s definitely a time to reflect on what the game is doing well and also not so well.
I would argue that the FFA have had as much of an impact on the A-league’s overall interest, crowds and TV ratings this season, than the BBL has. The sheer plethora of negative issues, which started all the way in the offseason, which the FFA has either incompetently botched, not sorted out, or left alone and allowed to fester have been simply embarrassing.

We’ve had the on again-off again sale of the Newcastle Jets, which has completely wrecked their season. The ongoings at the Brisbane Roar and their ownership issues, which almost derailed their entire club and this season, had it not been for them doing so well on the pitch. However they did lose about 7000 members from last season to this one, which are massive numbers and big dollars lost by the Roar this season.
The FFA haven’t advertised or marketed the league anywhere near enough this season. The complete lack of media and advertising strategy this season has been a big balls up. We should be advertising heavily every season without fail, especially in this market.
The ridiculous and public stoush between the FFA and the PFA, over the collective bargaining agreement, which ended up also getting the Matildas in the papers for all the wrong reasons, and also got the Socceroos offside with some people out in the west, pulling out of engagement opportunities with the fans because of the PFA, was a huge PR disaster. Need I mention that the Socceroos are Asian Cup champions, have qualified for the last 3 World Cups and don’t yet have a major sponsor. Anyways I digress, but you get the drift! That was an absolute farce, where the PFA actually put themselves in front of the game itself.
And I’m sure the FFA didn’t win any admirers during this time either.

And who can forget the article by Rebecca Wilson, and the boycotts by the fan groups. That was a massive low point this season. I think that may well become a turning point in the years to come. The FFA should’ve backed the 99% of fans that do the right thing every week, but stayed silent, and literally paid the price, when thousands of fans either didn’t turn up or left early in protest.
All these issues, together with other smaller details added in, like steep FFA Cup Final ticket prices and ridiculous kick off times in extreme heat in North Queensland and in Western Australia, have all either been directly or indirectly the fault of the FFA. They have had a stinker, particularly in the last 12 months. In other corporations, heads would’ve rolled for this incompetence. But David Gallop and Damien de Bohun have kept their jobs for now, so let’s see what they can come up with and do for the game.
So people can talk about the BBL, or the lack of hype this season supposedly due to missing big name marquee players and the like, but you need to get the foundations right first, and the FFA simply hasn’t done that, they’ve actually gone backwards this season, and this is showing in the crowds, the ratings and the overall hype this season. Del Piero or the Wanderers can’t come around every year.
They need to pull their finger out…

This has been hot topic in the last couple of weeks but it’s plain and simple, the A-league cannot afford the majority of these players, and quite frankly half those players are too old, they may give the league the media attention but they won’t necessarily improve the standard of football or take the league by storm. Now let me give you 3 names;

– Richard Quaresma
– Franco Di Santo
– Claudio Pizarro

Now do they fit the category of well known footballers? To the non-football public, absolutely not!
But IMO these 3 would light up the league on the park, and real football people will at least know these names. IMO they’re the fans that we should be trying to scout first. They’re the low hanging fruit that’s still yet to take up the A-league for whatever reason. They don’t need to be taught either the rules or the nuances of the game, and they already love the game, just not the A-league.
The A-league needs to work out what it wants to be, a reactive league at the whim of our local, predominantly football illiterate mainstream media, or an organic, fair dinkum football league that wants to keep growing and improving, but not by having cheerleaders, monster trucks or fireworks.

Mister,

My point is, whether these stadiums, or upgrades, rebates, discounts or deals are for the AFL or not, the AFL are the single biggest beneficiary of these deals. That fact is indisputable! $3 billion dollars in funding, predominantly for 1 code is ludicrous!
And you’re quite right, the Metricon stadium build was given $10m by the AFL, which is a fair bit if coin. But out of that, they’ve secured a really long lease (have heard 99 years), and an almost rent free deal. The new stadium at the Sydney Showgrounds isn’t only for AFL use, but it would never have been built without the Giants signing up to play there. GWS was also given grants and government money to build a state of the training facility, reportedly costing $20m. Mainly if not 100% tax payer funded.
I don’t begrudge the AFL for getting all this, they’re using their financial muscle, but most importantly their contacts in both the top end of the corporate ladder and in Governemnt to get stuff done. Football needs to get its act together on this front, it has the biggest player base, more kids playing the round ball than all the other football codes combined, and yet many community clubs still turn away kids today, because of a lack of funds, but most commonly a lack of facilities. There simply aren’t enough football pitches for these kids to train, play and enjoy the game. This is a huge issue for me.
I’ll give you a real life example, got a mate in politics who’s in Canberra every 2 weeks. He says he can count on 1 hand how many times he’s either seen or heard of FFA or any other Football officials visit Canberra each year, to talk to government about facilities, funding etc for the code. And when they do visit, it’s always a few different people pretty high up at FFA.
On the flipside he says that every month without fail, he either sees or hears of AFL or AFL club officials visiting government to discuss AFL related matters, be it facilities, funding etc. and he says that every single club sends delegates up there, not just the AFL themselves. As I said, they aren’t doing anything wrong, on the contrary, they’re doing the right thing for themselves and for their business, but that shows me the level of contacts and connections they have in Canberra.
Football has a long way to go in this respect, but it needs to have confidence to ask for more, as the numbers don’t lie, their case would be compelling.

Thanks guys for your comments.

I’m well aware that money doesn’t just grow on trees, and I’m also not suggesting that cash would solve all our problems.
But I’ve been told that the advert for season 1 with Scribe the rapper from NZ cost around $600k to produce. People still remember that, so for me that’s $600k well spent. No need to spend squillions, but spend it wisely and where it’s needed most. Bang for buck.
I also realise that the FFA is probably spending their advertising budget right now on keeping the Newcastle Jets afloat. But my point is, if that’s the case, what is the FFA doing about the ownership structures of A-league clubs? Clearly something’s not working. We’ve had 10 years of the same ownership issues. Surely there’s a better way…

With infrastructure, I know it’s a slow burn, but surely the FFA and the clubs can really lobby local and state governments hard for more funding for the game, especially when they come out with huge participation numbers year on year and they’re still growing. I feel our game doesn’t do enough on this front, either at A-league level but even less so at community level. And no reason why they couldn’t combine the 2, where developing smaller suburban grounds that could actually host A-league teams. Perry Park in Brisbane comes to mind. Sure some serious cash would be needed, but not as much as building a brand new stadium. And stadium deals done between other codes and state governments also come to mind, like the deals the AFL was able to do for Metricon stadium, for Spotless Stadium, and St Kilda getting another $6m or so to relocate back to their old training base after getting an initial $3m to move in the first place. Other codes coax a lot of cash from governments. What role is the FFA playing with governments for grants, better stadium rental deals for clubs and funding??

I just question many of the decision from FFA HQ lately, things like FFA Cup Final ticket pricing, putting a game on in Cairns in summer at 4pm on a Saturday, and many more.

But at the same time, I think the league is still getting better, apart from a bit of bad publicity this season. It has a lot to offer if governed properly. Once again, the next TV deal is so important for the game, not exactly a make or break, but a huge result could mean the game grows even more and very quickly. I think the game can get $70m-$80m per year.

Mister,

Don’t underestimate what the bad publicity during both the entire off season, and at the start of the season, has done to A-league TV audiences this season. There’s been so many issues that the FFA has just been bombarded with, and they’ve had no answer for, like the PFA saga, the Roar and Jets ownership issues, and other things like no big marquee names, no proper big-bang season launch and no big advertising campaign for Season 11 of the A-league.

All these factors put together, have had an effect on TV ratings, especially on SBS. Plus the fact that SBS relegated the content back to SBS2, and don’t even send its commentators out to the grounds on Friday nights anymore, instead calling the game from their sydney studio, says a lot about their relationship with the game now. They want to get out of the contract, and are no longer treating the game with respect. FFA really needs to get out of that deal now, and the rumours are that they could get out by Finals time this season, but if not, then definitely for next season.

But back onto the to audiences, and there’s many misconceptions out there, SBS hasn’t sent the A-league back to SBS2 because it didn’t rate, as A-league to audiences were up 23% last year compared to the year before, but because of the massive funding cuts by the government towards SBS. So they felt they had to spread their money around. This season on Foxtel, sure the big games haven’t rated as well as sessons gone by, but cumulatively the viewers that Fox hasn’t had for the Saturday night games, they’ve actually picked up on Sundays.

Nearly every match on a Sunday so far has rated 60-75k, which is the league’s average range. Last year, ratings for Sunday games were between 35-50k. Overall Fox ratings are currently down under 10%, prob about 8% at the moment.

Not so sure that the sky is falling in just yet for the A-league. And Optus entering the market is surely good news.
I think a 100% uplift in the next rights for A-league, with some FTA content is very achievable.

Guys,

The A-league definitely rates higher than EPL, on the vast majority of weekends of the football calendar. But that’s only on a head to head basis. When you look at the overall cumulative TV audiences, the EPL outrages HAL because we’re talking about a 380 game season, 95% of those games live on Fox, compared to a HAL season of 140 games. So in that respect its not an apples v apples comparison. And nor is people saying ‘well if the EPL was in the prime time time slot it would kill the HAL ratings’. That’s like saying that if my Aunty had balls, she’d be my uncle!
In other words, that’s never gonna happen, that’s just how it is, so let’s just deal with the facts.

Losing the EPL is a massive kick in the guts for Fox, and as the other main summer sport, Cricket is with Channel 9 for the Tests & ODI’s and the Big Bash is 100% tied up on Channel 10, I think this is great news for the A-league.

I think the NRL is now sitting pretty with a massive windfall to come from Fox, as it fights to stay relevant in the market, but I reckon the A-league is also about to benefit massively. Fox will have to think outside the square now, as they’re starting to run out of quality content. Now I’m not saying that this would happen, but they could really back the A-league, just as they did 10 years ago, by taking a massive risk financially, and thus not only helping to grow the competition but massively supercharging it!

IMO, things like more clubs, a longer season, financing marquee player wages all spring to mind as things that could all be done to improve the competition, and in turn would lead to more eyeballs on Fox, which is the endgame here.

Let’s just see how this all plays out, but I think the FFA will be doing well out of this news, with Foxtel or without.

I think a 3rd Melbourne side is a sure bet down the track, just not sure if South Melbourne or Heidleberg are the answer. The team coming in will need to have a geographical difference IMO. I think a team either in the western suburbs or in the south east for me is the best way to go. That’s 2 areas in Melbourne where there’s heaps of registered players and some massive suburban clubs.
Melbourne Victory is based in the CBD and City are based in the northern suburbs.
I also think a 4th Victorian side could come in from Geelong after the 3rd Melbourne side.