Expansion 20th AFL team location

[Sherrinator]

Perth makes most sense. Fish where the fish are and we know that when WCE are flying, they will have 30k odd missing out on a ticket.

Canberra is the next best but surely the ACT government will have to commit some $ to a facility upgrade.

 

[11kgm]

Wouldn't mind

Canberra team but should just move GWS there
Queensland is graveyard
Shouldn't go overseas

Realistically we don't have enough talents at the moment to have 20 teams

 

[Strapping Young Lad]

Perth or Norwood makes the most sense.

If Tasmania “has nothing going for it” then Canberra is doomed.

 

[Magpie Since 1986]

So Hobart is getting a team.

It will have to be Darwin, Canberra or Perth ... It has been prophesied for decades :

 

[Cubs2Lions]

So Hobart is getting a team.

It will have to be Darwin, Canberra or Perth ... It has been prophesied for decades :
View attachment 1672107

 

[Engimal v3]

No need for a 20th team. Canberra is a GWS secondary market, and a 3rd WA side would just be doing it for the sake of doing it. The NT hasn't got a hope in hell after the fight Tassie has had to put up.

 

[CharacterFirst]

Canberra or WA.

 

[Eastern Rangers]

Merge two Victorian sides.

Then Canberra and Perth 3 come into existence around 2035 & 2037.


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[Engimal v3]

Merge two Victorian sides.

Then Canberra and Perth 3 come into existence around 2035 & 2037.


Sent from my Pixel 6 using Tapatalk

Turns out Victorian sides don't want to merged. Any other ideas?

 

[McIvor]

Could the Mandurah / Bunbury region of WA be big enough to host a team - was sort of thinking the equivalent of like a regional Geelong, but in WA?

 

[kranger]

Let’s consider some things. First off, population sizes for places:

List of cities in Australia by population - Wikipedia

en.m.wikipedia.org

Melbourne is an Aussie Rules mad city which has 9 teams which is roughly 500,000 people per team. Some will often suggest this is too many teams, with the lower supported teams only able to survive by AFL handouts like GC and GWS.

Sydney is not crazy about Aussie Rules with 2 teams which is roughly 2,400,000 people per team, where GWS as a new team is still struggling to find its feet (something a new team in a new market is also likely to face).

Brisbane likewise is not crazy about Aussie Rules and with 1 team for the population of 2,400,000.

Perth is fonder of the sport and with 2 teams has 1,000,000 people per team. If it were to have a third team it would be 700,000 people per team.

Adelaide again is keen for Aussie Rules and with 2 teams has roughly 700,000 people per team. If it were to have a third team it would be 450,000 per team (perhaps a bit of a struggle).

Gold Coast is not fond of any sport and with 1 team for 700,000 people (which also as a new team is also struggling to thrive).

Geelong might be special with its 1 team for 300,000 people. Though it is right next to Melbourne and has over 150 years of history to have already established a massive supporter base of people who don’t live in Geelong (a new team would not have this luxury of getting supporters who aren’t in the host city).

And then Tasmania. Hobart only has 230,000. But as a state has 540,000 people. Which is all within a 4hr drive of each other. ‘Home’ games in Launceston are still only a 2.5hr drive from players houses and training grounds in Hobart. But the TAS government is throwing a lot of money at the team to make them viable (resources a team elsewhere is unlikely to enjoy).

I’ll jump down the population table a bit, and if we consider a scenario of an NT team, with games in Darwin and Alice Springs, or a northern Queensland team with games in Cairns and Townsville. The QLD team would still only have a population base between the two cities of less than 400,000 where Aussie Rules is not supreme. Whilst in the NT you have less than 200,000. Even if NT is keen on Aussie Rules, the people are poor and the territory government is poor. And look at how much funding the TAS State Government needs to put towards their new team, some thing QLD or NT governments are unlikely to do, especially to build up an oval in two cities.

Also with the NT or north QLD teams they end up playing ‘Home’ games where you have to fly to another city which is not likely to be viable for players who also then have to fly for away games. It means players spend more time on the road then they do at home.

Places like Newcastle, Sunshine Coast, Central Coast and Wollongong have never hosted an AFL game and don’t have a suitable field. If people think Gold Coast is failing, how would these cities fare when they have half the population, or compared to GWS with only a fifth of their share of Sydney’s population.

Anywhere smaller than Hobart just has no chance at all.

The one place I’ve left out is Canberra/ACT. It’s been hosting AFL games for many years. It’s got a lot of people who like Aussie Rules, but rugby league is pretty on par. In terms of the general population support for Aussie Rules it would need a larger population base than TAS or the share in Adelaide, Perth and Melbourne where Aussie Rules is king. But probably doesn’t really need as big of a population as Gold Coast, Brisbane and Sydney where Aussie Rules is not the dominant sport.

At 500,000 people around Canberra, it might just be too small to suggest it can viably support a team. Perhaps Geelong suggests Canberra can. You might say “but Canberra is growing, it will become big enough”, but in that time the other cities will also grow, meaning the existing AFL teams population share in their host cities will also be growing and likely be further getting away from Canberra.

The Canberra team would likely also need a new stadium (like Hobart), which the ACT government don’t really seem to be interested in funding a new oval stadium when they are already baulking at a new rectangle stadium for two existing teams. And there just doesn’t seem to be any political calls or will for a team like there was with the push from TAS.

In summary, I think Canberra or Perth3 (not WA3 as there is no legitimate option outside of Perth). As there is an Adelaide, Brisbane, Melbourne and Sydney team, call the Perth3 team ‘Perth’. This has the greatest chance to draw supporters from the entire city, rather than one small suburb/area like ‘Joondalup’ etc. Use the existing AFL facilities with Perth Stadium, and co-locate the training grounds with a WAFL team. But even then, none of these are great options, and no one is really putting their hand up to say they are willing to work hard to get team 20.

So instead we stick to 19 teams. Use the bye to keep the AFLPA happy for more rest weekends, and allow for Thursday fixtures for the entire season. And with Hawthorn and Kangaroos likely to stop playing homes games in Tas, they could look to other markets that will never have an AFL team (like Newcastle).

 

[Altum Volantes]

Anyone who knows Perth knows ‘North of Perth’ makes no real sense - Joondalup is still Perth Metro and the further north you go the less there is. This isn’t 1994 with some shiny hope of a 2nd city - the northern suburbs are what they are - rank suburbia at the end of the freeway (and beyond, shudder.)

South makes more sense if they do look at it one day - Rockingham/Mandurah into the SW - it actually exists as its own ‘thing’ and could realistically continue to grow and develop as an area that isn’t just 20 minutes outside the city.

That said, a 3rd team is really not needed (or particularly wanted) here.

Everyone knows the best solution is to have 18 teams….Tasmania included or otherwise…

 

[btdg]

In an era where we routinely play Thursday games there is absolutely.no reason that a 19th team needs to require a bye.

Just abolish 'rounds' altogether, include more regular Thursday games and you can use 5 and 10 day breaks to just run out a rolling fixture that spreads 23 matches over 26 weeks with everyone getting a good rest.

The only thing that really matters is who starts the year with a 'bye" and we are heading to a rolling opening anyway. I would think you could even go as far as to start with:

Match 1 = grand fianl replay on Labor Day Monday (3 days earlier than Carlton v Richmond) as a stand alone game.

Then double up one of the grand finallists on Sunday, while the other has an 11 day break to the following Thursday.

Add in some Monday night games too if you like - i would love to see this become a regular slot for GC or GWS to host prime time instead of getting locked into the graveyard 4:40 Sunday. Then teams can go from Monday-Thursday as needed

It seems absurd to me that anyone thinks it is easier to add a 20th team rather than just have a fixture that is spread out a la the Premier league

 

[Kreuuuzeurns]

Move North Melbourne to Cape York

Bring in West Brunswick Ammos

 

[revo333]

Will have to not have Gather round. A bit embarrassing to leave out 1 team.

I believe the NRL does it.

 

[Billy ray]

Labor Day Monday (

Not everywhere

 

[Seedsfan]

Who ever builds a new stadium for the AFL, be it Cairns, Newcastle, Canberra, Darwin or Auckland

 

[Rotayjay]

I think the drain on human and financial resources of a club that no one really wants is worse than having an odd number of clubs and a bye. The fact that we're scratching our heads trying to figure out where this team should be speaks to how much it's wanted.

 

[Grand Uncle Horace]

Where is the option for a team to fold before another is added?

We are struggling to find the talent to fill 18 teams, let alone 20. We are also failing to to build a truly national competition when half the teams are in the overly saturated Melbourne market.

gung-ho is correct and the op should add in the team to fold option.

I strongly support the overdue entry of Tassy and believe their State will really get behind the new team but am opposed to 19 teams and 20 for that matter.

Tasmania wants its own team and not a transplanted one. The cynicism the locals have for North and to a lesser extent the Hawks are reflected in crowd sizes. Sicily did nothing this week to dispel the view both Clubs are there only for money. Meanwhile local footy has suffered as the AFL has stuffed up in that area.

It will take a decade but I am confident TAS will again have a production line of absolute champion footballers. Laurie Nash, the Richos, Hudson, Ian Stewart, Baldock and others are HOFs and out and out champions of our game.

in an ideal world Tas would have had its own team ages ago and North would have taken the massive package to move to the GoCo with a deal to incorporate Southport.

This is not the thread to discuss why North Melbourne should be the team to go, but it is clear they are the first cab off the rank in a move to a national comp, preserve what quality talent we have in a 18 team comp and fix fixturing.

 

[RAPPA]

And now a further dilution of the talent pool. Oh well, a lot more average players will be getting AFL gigs.

 

[Bojan KantKick]

Move North Melbourne to Cape York

Bring in West Brunswick Ammos

We've already got Port fans melting all over bigfooty about Prison Bars and now you want to add West Brunswick?

 

[bird_man]

I like the idea of 19 teams

Means clubs can have a bye without shutting down the season like they do mid year

Also means we can be a lot more flexible with when we play games

 

[BF Tiger]

19 teams is perfect. Weekly bye means Thursday night football all season long. AFL and 7 network will be hard and throbbing

19 teams means nothing to the AFL finances. They need the extra team to get a a tenth game happening each round, that can then be sold off for TV rights. A 10 game round locks in Thursday nights as well, whereas we have seen that a nine game round does not.

With 20 teams I think the bye will change quite a bit, possibly something like 4 teams resting each week for five weeks. Still allows eight games to be played. One of the games lost can be the boring Sunday afternoon encounter, the other can be a Thursday night or a Saturday arvo.

Given the bleeding of dollars that is still happening at GWS and GCS, and that the Tassie team will have teething issues I think the AFL will look towards a safe market. Canberra is tied too closely to GWS and is a small market. Darwin and Cairns do not have the population or the climate, with concerns about infrastructure as well. Newcastle is "too NSW", strongly rugby and completely virgin territory. Auckland, not sure if serious. So it has to be Perth or Adelaide, the centre of strong, traditional footballing states. Perth has a million more people than Adelaide and possibly more in the way of sponsor support options with the resources and farming industries, so it gets my vote.

 

[JyeDye]

19 teams is already too much, we can't afford to go to 20. There's some absolute plodders out there every weekend already.

 

[Seedsfan]

19 teams is already too much, we can't afford to go to 20. There's some absolute plodders out there every weekend already.

Maybe try watching non Carlton games