Bendigo FL discussion 2025

[ROOTA#6]

Yet here we are with Kyneton departed, Maryborough gone, Castlemaine potentially going down swinging. Surely you can see a trend here? If you can’t see bias you need to open your eyes wider, albeit that’s likely difficult given your club allegiance.
You’re right that the points system was created by the administration…. yet the seasonal points allocation is in their control, and it’s impossible to argue they haven’t used that as a support lever - through nothing but fear of backlash from certain clubs if it was to make life even a tiny bit tougher for them.

I have no affiliation to any club these days. I did have the privilege of being involved at a club in Bendigo and saw just how hard people worked and the professionalism shown to try to put the club in the best possible position to succeed.

I come from a club in the mallee that faces great challenges every season to operate. The club went winless for 2 straight seasons and almost folded or merged a couple of times. Not once did anyone at that club whinge or sook about league admin…they just worked hard, innovated and found different ways of doing things to hopefully continue to survive and compete.

 

[localfootyguru]

I have no affiliation to any club these days. I did have the privilege of being involved at a club in Bendigo and saw just how hard people worked and the professionalism shown to try to put the club in the best possible position to succeed.

I come from a club in the mallee that faces great challenges every season to operate. The club went winless for 2 straight seasons and almost folded or merged a couple of times. Not once did anyone at that club whinge or sook about league admin…they just worked hard, innovated and found different ways of doing things to hopefully continue to survive and compete.

Roota, I see your point although in my experience, administrators have done nothing to support non Bendigo based clubs and strategically look at football in the region. They have known there were problems for many years with clubs struggling to survive and poaching players from fellow clubs using various incentives in order to keep their club going. This along with a points and salary cap system that has more holes in them than swiss cheese was supposed to correct all the issues - what absolute rubbish. Both AFL Victoria and previous members of the AFL Central Victoria board and the BFNL were told numerous times of the issues my club and other clubs both in the BFNL and other leagues faced and nothing was ever done to support us. The agendas from so called ‘influential’ clubs were seen as far more important than the survival of clubs like mine (Maryborough FNC). The best example in recent times of where the BFNL is at and being out of touch was the admission of Broadford FNC, a topic that has been done to death here.

Whilst I agree as a club we need to evolve, work hard and try a range of initiatives/ practices to stay afloat, those in charge play a key role in the future of the game in the region. Unfortunately on many occasions despite our approaches, we received ‘radio silence’. My club has unfortunately and sadly gone into recess and perhaps when a few more occur (which is likely), someone may wake up and think there is a problem we need to address. At this time I feel those in charge just shrug their shoulders, put out some corporate speak statement and quickly move on. There seems to be little to no accountability for those in charge and we at club land often pay the price.

All very frustrating and sad from my perspective.

 

[JP Ollards]

I'd love to know when was the last time an afl club went to maryborough and ran some clinics. There seems very little connection from the problems in afl victoria and the afl.

We have 10 afl clubs in Victoria, they all hold community camps, I'm yet to see one in corowa, maryborough, etc where there are problems with footy. They don't seem to care.

Even a club like kangaroo flat needs help, even sit down with the club and help them with a 5 year plan and ways of getting there. Junior numbers outside of under 12s are dwindling, we have powerful clubs monopolising junior systems, state wide.

You can't just say get a good coach and problem solved. Look at maryborough, Andrews, Brennan, Abraham, Lavers all good coaches, zero impact.

I really think in 10 years time footy outside the afl will be stuffed and I think that's their plan. As more people will go and watch the afl.

 

[beesknees22]

I'd love to know when was the last time an afl club went to maryborough and ran some clinics. There seems very little connection from the problems in afl victoria and the afl.

We have 10 afl clubs in Victoria, they all hold community camps, I'm yet to see one in corowa, maryborough, etc where there are problems with footy. They don't seem to care.

Even a club like kangaroo flat needs help, even sit down with the club and help them with a 5 year plan and ways of getting there. Junior numbers outside of under 12s are dwindling, we have powerful clubs monopolising junior systems, state wide.

You can't just say get a good coach and problem solved. Look at maryborough, Andrews, Brennan, Abraham, Lavers all good coaches, zero impact.

I really think in 10 years time footy outside the afl will be stuffed and I think that's their plan. As more people will go and watch the afl.

Why would AFL Vic go to Corowa?

 

[ringo1]

Roota I do see your point although in my experience, administrators have done nothing to support non Bendigo based clubs and look at football in the region for a long time. They have known there were problems for many years with clubs struggling to survive and poaching players from fellow clubs in order to keep their club going. This along with a points and salary cap system that has more holes in them than Swiss cheese was supposed to correct all the issues - what absolute rubbish. Both AFL Victoria and previous members of the AFL Central Victoria board and the BFNL were told numerous times of the issues my club and other clubs both in the BFNL and other leagues faced and nothing was ever done to support us. The agendas from more so called ‘influential’ clubs were seen as far more important than the survival of clubs like mine (Maryborough FNC). The best example in recent times of where the BFNL is at and being out of touch was the admission of Broadford FNC, a topic that has been done to death here.

Whilst I agree as a club we need to evolve, work hard and try a range of initiatives/ practices to stay afloat, those in charge play a key role in the future of the game in the region. Unfortunately on many occasions despite our approaches, we received ‘radio silence’. My club has unfortunately and sadly gone into recess and perhaps when a few more occur (which is highly likely), someone may wake up and think there is a problem that we need to address. At this time I feel those in charge shrug their shoulders, put out some corporate speak statement and move on. There seems to be little to no accountability for those in charge and we at club land often pay the price.

All very frustrating and sad from my perspective.

Roota, I see your point although in my experience, administrators have done nothing to support non Bendigo based clubs and strategically look at football in the region. They have known there were problems for many years with clubs struggling to survive and poaching players from fellow clubs using various incentives in order to keep their club going. This along with a points and salary cap system that has more holes in them than swiss cheese was supposed to correct all the issues - what absolute rubbish. Both AFL Victoria and previous members of the AFL Central Victoria board and the BFNL were told numerous times of the issues my club and other clubs both in the BFNL and other leagues faced and nothing was ever done to support us. The agendas from so called ‘influential’ clubs were seen as far more important than the survival of clubs like mine (Maryborough FNC). The best example in recent times of where the BFNL is at and being out of touch was the admission of Broadford FNC, a topic that has been done to death here.

Whilst I agree as a club we need to evolve, work hard and try a range of initiatives/ practices to stay afloat, those in charge play a key role in the future of the game in the region. Unfortunately on many occasions despite our approaches, we received ‘radio silence’. My club has unfortunately and sadly gone into recess and perhaps when a few more occur (which is likely), someone may wake up and think there is a problem we need to address. At this time I feel those in charge just shrug their shoulders, put out some corporate speak statement and quickly move on. There seems to be little to no accountability for those in charge and we at club land often pay the price.

All very frustrating and sad from my perspective.

Question: When are we going to get some of the past greats into admin positions? Males or females who have played the game and been in the trenches at Club Land? Time to up the pay scale and get 'Football' people involved.

 

[Truck]

Why would AFL Vic go to Corowa?

He asked why AFL clubs aren’t holding their community camps in communities that local afl clubs are struggling. Eg Corowa and Maryborough.

Get the hawks or tigers into Maryborough for a week and hold clinics with all the schools to get kids excited about footy.

 

[MortlockWatcher]

I agree that it would be nice to see community camps in areas where football is experiencing a downturn. Unfortunately, the closest that some clubs get to receiving assistance from higher up while in a dire state is a gig in Fox Footy's Carlton Draft.

I know that some clubs like Campbell's Creek are not going to get much more than a financial sugar hit and 15 minutes of publicity out the Carlton Draft, but for clubs like Longwood it has helped play a role in turning their situation around as they jumped a few spots up the ladder a year or two after Cam Mooney went there and their future is a lot brighter.

 

[localfootyguru]

I'd love to know when was the last time an afl club went to maryborough and ran some clinics. There seems very little connection from the problems in afl victoria and the afl.

We have 10 afl clubs in Victoria, they all hold community camps, I'm yet to see one in corowa, maryborough, etc where there are problems with footy. They don't seem to care.

Even a club like kangaroo flat needs help, even sit down with the club and help them with a 5 year plan and ways of getting there. Junior numbers outside of under 12s are dwindling, we have powerful clubs monopolising junior systems, state wide.

You can't just say get a good coach and problem solved. Look at maryborough, Andrews, Brennan, Abraham, Lavers all good coaches, zero impact.

I really think in 10 years time footy outside the afl will be stuffed and I think that's their plan. As more people will go and watch the afl.

I couldn’t answer that question about when an AFL club came to Maryborough. We as a town don’t exist in the football landscape. AFL community camps are just a box ticking exercise generally and they go to the bigger centres and miss smaller football mad communities.

Another good example of this and the lack of understanding of regional areas is the playing of an AFL practice game at North Ballarat, a venue that already hosts AFL fixtures. Why can’t this be played at say Ararat who have a fantastic venue or even here in Maryborough. That’s right, our grounds apparently don’t meet AFL standards - what rubbish.

As for coaches here at Maryborough we have had some good ones, one of the issues is none of the guys you listed lived in town and travelled. Lavars was a terrific coach but moved back to Geelong and the others came from Ballarat. Coby Perry was outstanding as a coach and with an improved list of players would have done very well. We were keen for him to continue as his work with our young players was exemplary.

The AFL are just happy to see players drafted and have completely disconnected from country footy. This is even seen by the allowing of private schools to poach country players to move to Melbourne and be drafted from their programs along with a metropolitan Under 18 club who receive all the plaudits. Minimal recognition of the home club of the player and what they did for them to get there.

I could go on and on but what has happened at my club is a good example of the ineptness of many trying to support country football of which there really isn’t too much being done that can leave positive legacies for the future.

 

[harsh. but fair]

At an absolute minimum if the BFNL doesn’t announce changes to its finals format and start playing games away from QEO in the first couple of weeks they have not learnt a thing from the last two years. It could be revealed at the agm as a positive reset that it’s not all about the Bendigo based clubs. As a matter of interest what dividend if any do clubs get at end of year taking into account a big whack of revenue comes from finals?

 

[Forest St End]

As a matter of interest what dividend if any do clubs get at end of year taking into account a big whack of revenue comes from finals?

As far as I’m aware dividends died out after the hub came in. They took over running finals and tendered operations rather than clubs being rostered on.