20th AFL Team

[RedV3x]

Definitely. Canberra keeps getting called a "rugby town", and it's a title the NRL would be keen to promote.

Canberra is called a "rugby town" due to rugby union. Is it called a "league town"?
An AFL Canberra team is going depend on the AFL community NOT anything any other code does.
IMO vulgar comments directed at Australian Football by certain types only inhibits their own code.

 

[Badger17]

Definitely. Canberra keeps getting called a "rugby town", and it's a title the NRL would be keen to promote.

I believe the Raiders are also playing a home game away in Vegas (as well as the Wagga game I believe). Might be less keen to sell home games if there's a full-time AFL team in town.



Canberra might finally get some special treatment from the NRL. Might get an NRLW Magic Round or more women's State of Origin matches.



I never do. I love reading through all sports industry type forums, but LU is just such a slog to get through. Pages of insults between the occasional bits of content.

The Raiders deal to play games in Wagga finished last year. It's unlikely that it'll be renewed as it wasn't made because of a profit motive but in exchange for infrastructure funding from the NSW government. It only happened because the NSW government needed to be seen to be getting something in return for helping fund the Raiders COE in Braddon.

This year the NRL forced the Raiders to play their home game against the Bulldogs in Magic Round in Brisbane...

For those that are unaware it's the 30th anniversary of the 94 grand final between the Raiders and Dogs and the rematch was probably the only bankable 20k+ match the Raiders had this season. In other words the NRL forced the Raiders to take what would have almost certainly been their highest drawing game of the season away from Canberra. That's exactly the sort of behaviour I'm talking about when I say the ACT is a blind spot for the NRL.

The Raiders are only being included in the Vegas games next year because their stadium deal allows them to take one of their home games away on short notice. Basically the Raiders are just there to make up the numbers and were only considered because the NRL exhausted all their preferred options. There's also strong word that they want the Raiders to be a home side during Magic again next year as well.

 

[Badger17]

Canberra is called a "rugby town" due to rugby union. Is it called a "league town"?
An AFL Canberra team is going depend on the AFL community NOT anything any other code does.
IMO vulgar comments directed at Australian Football by certain types only inhibits their own code.

People on this side of the Murray River don't use the term "rugby town" at all.

Canberra is called a rugby town by people from the south and west of the Barassi line because they either don't see the need to delineate between the two codes of rugby or don't understand the distinction at all.

If a person from the northeast was trying to call a place a rugby town they'd say that that city is an NRL or League heartland.

Nobody refers to anywhere as a Union town because such a place doesn't exist in Australia lol.

 

[Seedsfan]

Definitely. Canberra keeps getting called a "rugby town", and it's a title the NRL would be keen to promote.

I believe the Raiders are also playing a home game away in Vegas (as well as the Wagga game I believe). Might be less keen to sell home games if there's a full-time AFL team in town.



Canberra might finally get some special treatment from the NRL. Might get an NRLW Magic Round or more women's State of Origin matches.



I never do. I love reading through all sports industry type forums, but LU is just such a slog to get through. Pages of insults between the occasional bits of content.

Magic round will never go to the ACT

 

[Canberra Pear]

Magic round will never go to the ACT

Did you read the W part?

 

[RedV3x]

Nobody refers to anywhere as a Union town because such a place doesn't exist in Australia.

Just like nobody refers to the Barrassi Line or league heartland any more.

 

[RedV3x]

It's amazing how quickly options change.
No talk of a Northern team playing out of various locations.
No talk of N.Z. despite it being a strong contender pre-Covid.
Not as much talk as you'd think for Canberra compared to the strong proposals pre-Raiders.
Though not many people's favourite in W.A. a W.A.3 has gained some traction because of recent projections on Perth outsizing Brisbane and funnily enough due to Sturt proposing S.A.3

 

[_007_]

Rate my fantasy

West Coast
Fremantle
East Fremantle

Adelaide
Port Adelaide
Norwood

Brisbane
Southport (Gold Coast)

Sydney
Canberra (GWS)

Collingwood
Essendon
Carlton
Richmond
Geelong

Tasmania (Hawthorn)

 

[Walshawk]

Rate my fantasy

West Coast
Fremantle
East Fremantle

Adelaide
Port Adelaide
Norwood

Brisbane
Southport (Gold Coast)

Sydney
Canberra (GWS)

Collingwood
Essendon
Carlton
Richmond
Geelong

Tasmania (Hawthorn)

Horrible. Melbourne has four times the population of Adelaide and you want it to have just one more team?

 

[Coolangatta]

My fantasy would be:

1980s comp: Carlton, Collingwood, Essendon, Richmond, Hawthorn, Geelong, Melbourne, St Kilda, Canberra (Kangaroos), Sydney, Brisbane (Lions), West Perth, East Perth, Port Adelaide. 14 teams.

1990s: Fremantle and Norwood (expansion to 16 teams)

2010s: Bulldogs (relocation to Western Sydney), Tasmania, Gold Coast Sharks (18 teams)

So Fitzroy still in the comp as a relocation, two less teams in Vic (Roos, Dogs out), a 3rd team in WA (with a strong foundation from day dot), teams in Tassie and ACT already. Plus Southport rebranded.

All Vic clubs retained, just some moved.

Western Sydney Bulldogs would've been the only struggling club IMO but with that brand/name/colours and 11 home games in Sydney I reckon they'd be doing better than the Giants are atm.

 

[blackducks]

Rate my fantasy

West Coast
Fremantle
East Fremantle

Adelaide
Port Adelaide
Norwood

Brisbane
Southport (Gold Coast)

Sydney
Canberra (GWS)

Collingwood
Essendon
Carlton
Richmond
Geelong

Tasmania (Hawthorn)

Swannies replace east freo, an additional vic team replaces Southport and Tasmania has its own team.

 

[sdfc]

 

[Coolangatta]

East Perth’s songs better imo

 

[sdfc]

East Perth’s songs better imo

Not enough disco.

 

[Canberra Pear]

It's amazing how quickly options change.
No talk of a Northern team playing out of various locations.
No talk of N.Z. despite it being a strong contender pre-Covid.
Not as much talk as you'd think for Canberra compared to the strong proposals pre-Raiders.
Though not many people's favourite in W.A. a W.A.3 has gained some traction because of recent projections on Perth outsizing Brisbane and funnily enough due to Sturt proposing S.A.3

Did you mean Norwood or am I out of the loop? I haven't heard anything about Sturt. Can you pop in a link?

 

[Badger17]

Just like nobody refers to the Barrassi Line or league heartland any more.

Hmmm

IMO vulgar comments directed at Australian Football by certain types only inhibits their own code.

 

[glengowan]

My fantasy would be:

1980s comp: Carlton, Collingwood, Essendon, Richmond, Hawthorn, Geelong, Melbourne, St Kilda, Canberra (Kangaroos), Sydney, Brisbane (Lions), West Perth, East Perth, Port Adelaide. 14 teams.

1990s: Fremantle and Norwood (expansion to 16 teams)

2010s: Bulldogs (relocation to Western Sydney), Tasmania, Gold Coast Sharks (18 teams)

So Fitzroy still in the comp as a relocation, two less teams in Vic (Roos, Dogs out), a 3rd team in WA (with a strong foundation from day dot), teams in Tassie and ACT already. Plus Southport rebranded.

All Vic clubs retained, just some moved.

Western Sydney Bulldogs would've been the only struggling club IMO but with that brand/name/colours and 11 home games in Sydney I reckon they'd be doing better than the Giants are atm.

You'd have over half of SA that hate both Port and Norwood without a team.

 

[Coolangatta]

You'd have over half of SA that hate both Port and Norwood without a team.

You’d have had a great rivalry, though, but I see your point - same problem as having the Royals and Falcons in the AFL, ya piss off all the other WAFL clubs. That was the logic behind the Suns I think but it's not like the QAFL had WAFL like following.

In reality, no Vic club could be forced to go anywhere, so if I wanted to do a realistic revision, then when the Roys wanted to move to Canberra in the 90s, they could've let them. The AFL didn't want 17 teams at the time, yet Tassie was a no brainer to make it 18 teams. So Tassie and ACT could've had teams in the 90s.

Then I think maybe North Sydney Kangaroos would've had a chance of getting up. Doubt the Saints or Dogs would've moved to GC but what they could've done is promote and rebrand Southport and then add WA3 back in the 2010s. By now their Optus crowds would be pretty decent, you'd think.

But if North wouldn't have moved to Sydney then I guess they could've added GC and Sydney 2 and made it 20 teams, without WA3. Either way, if I could go back and change one thing about the way this comp has expanded, that Roys move to Canberra doesn't get blocked and then Tassie gets the 18th licence.

We'd have had Tassie and ACT teams for over two decades by now, but as it stands neither of them have teams... yet. But the AFL has a chance to course correct with Tassie and Canberra. Can we trust them to get 20 right? We'll see.