News North might be done in Ballarat

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Zondor said:
Now Horace. Yah know I luvs yah mate but seriously how can yah trust Jame?

Yep it would be nice to be able to cap our games played on the Map at 3 but Jame didn't want that did he?

Listen to the link. He wanted us to play 7 home games on the Map in the past. If that was to happen you'd be along side me burning effigies of Wonder Woman. :stern look

http://www.abc.net.au/news/2010-11-11/james-brayshaw-says-any-deal-needs-to-be-a-long/2333266

And yes in the context of our club playing home games in Tasmania. **** Tasmania! Yah can't trust Brayshaws! :stern look
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I'm not sure about whether we can trust him or not. Certainly back when the talk was of 7 home games to be played in Tasmania, I was as alarmed as anyone was and you are absolutely right I'd also be burning effigies although not necessarily of Wonder Woman.

But that was 2010 and in my opinion a lot of things have changed since then from both an on and off field point of view.

The most important change, which I think makes us far less susceptible to co/relocation, is the reduction of the debt and that's where I think Tasmania has been beneficial.

Irrespective of the fact that the motion put by WANM that the club could not be relocated without a vote by members, failed to get the required 75% majority support when it was put up a couple of AGM's ago, in my opinion any move to increase the number of games to seven will only ever occur if the club's financial position moves in the wrong direction. And that is less likely to happen if we all keep buying our memberships and supporting the club financially to the best of our ability, and of course the club continues to be successful on field.

In other words, if we never want to get into a situation where we are again susceptible to a board agreeing to 7 games in Tasmania, then we have to keep buying our memberships and doing whatever we can individually support.

But, I'm prepared to also say here that I may well be very wrong (I more often than not am wrong) and so when I receive and then send back my completed membership form for the 2015 season, I am going to write on it in big red writing.

Please note that I will continue to support the NMFC through my membership, providing any future proposal to play more than 3 home games in a location outside Victoria, is firstly put to a vote of all club members.
 
Just as a follow on from my previous post, Zondor's post stirred me into some action. I have just drafted up the following letter to send Carl Dilena. If anyone can see any factual errors in it please let me know.

Mr. Carl Dilena,
Chief Executive Officer,
North Melbourne Football Club,
PO Box 514,
North Melbourne, Vic. 3051

Dear Mr. Dilena,

I am writing to you to seek some clarification and reassurance in relation to the recent shift in AFL strategy that has seen Ballarat repositioned from a North Melbourne Football Club development zone to Western Bulldogs' territory.

I am aware from a number of discussions with several members and supporters of the NMFC, that there is quite a level of unease about this development and in particular the unease is centred around the fear that this change may weaken the club’s position as a Victorian based AFL Club.

As you are aware there has been in the past, mention at board level and indeed by the Club’s Chairman, Mr. James Brayshaw, that the club might at some stage entertain increasing the number of home games played in Tasmania, from the current three games to be played in Hobart in 2015 (up from 2 games this year) to 7 home games a year.

As you will also be aware a motion was defeated at a recent AGM, which if passed would have required the Board to have any decision to increase the number of games played in Hobart (or any other interstate venue) to be first voted on by the members of the club.

As a member of the NMFC since 1997, having previously been a long standing member and , shareholder in the Fitzroy Football Club and investor in the Fitzroy Club Hotel, you will appreciate that I am very apprehensive when it comes to the issue of the football club that I support, in particular the possibility of playing more home games out of the heartland and so reducing the number of home games played in Victoria. Please note that Replacement games never provide the same spectator experience that genuine home games provide.

Just as I did after the ill-fated takeover of Fitzroy by the Brisbane Bears in 1996, I will not follow or be a member of a club, any club, which substantially reduces the number of home games played in its home state. I would view 7 games in that category and I believe that many NMFC people would also have the same view.

I add that I am comfortable enough with the new arrangement of 3 home games to be played in Hobart, because in my eyes at least, the Tasmanian partnership so far has been very beneficial in helping to stabilise the clubs financial position, as well as fill some sort of a need for the good people of Tasmania to see and feel a part of Australian Football at the highest level.

I am of course just one member, and my role in determining the club’s future is basically meaningless. However, as I said earlier I am acutely aware that there are many other club members who have heard the same alarm bells ringing, as a consequence of the Ballarat announcement and I know that many of these will more than likely also cease being members of the club

This is a real shame as I think we can all agree that the club has made major strides, both on and off field, over the last couple of years. This year has been, in my view the most rewarding season for supporters since the 1999 Premiership.

I would therefore appreciate if you would be able to provide me with some reassurance that the loss of Ballarat will not create any impetus for playing more home games in Tasmania (or elsewhere interstate).

Thank-you.

Yours faithfully,

Horace Archibald Fortescue-Thistlethwaite

 

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scooby1279 said:
i don't entirely blame the AFL, i blame the NMFC also.
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You are correct in a way.

mind you if we had not played games in Tassie over the last few years we would likely not have Tudor, Walsh or Dal Santo on board, nor made a prelim this year, nor have made strides off field. We would still need to wait for a stadium to be built so could expect another t years of scraping the barrel to make ends meet.
 
Horace said:
Just as a follow on from my previous post, Zondor's post stirred me into some action. I have just drafted up the following letter to send Carl Dilena. If anyone can see any factual errors in it please let me know.

<snip>
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Top letter mate.

As a Tassie member I'll be happy to send a letter to that affect also.

I don't want to see the clubs heritage thrown away, even if it would mean I got to watch more NMFC games in my town.
 
I would be very surprised if the economics of a new stadium in Ballarat can be underwritten by 4 Footscray games vs interstate opposition per year. This was always going to be the case even if we were in pole position, some other club would have played games there too. Nevertheless, it is an act of bastardry that the AFL has set up this Footscray alignment behind our backs, and at least for the time being, squeezed us out. Hate to say it, but I feel this is all down to the fact that our club is run by a nice guy CEO in Funky Carl. I understand he has achieved a great many things through his conciliatory approach with the AFL. He is, as I have said before, the Tom Hagen of CEOs. But if matters were to escalate, then we would need a war time consigliere, like the last bloke.
 
Confirmed: announcement by Daniel Andrews/Footscray in Ballarat at 10:45.
 
B Tron said:
You are correct in a way.

mind you if we had not played games in Tassie over the last few years we would likely not have Tudor, Walsh or Dal Santo on board, nor made a prelim this year, nor have made strides off field. We would still need to wait for a stadium to be built so could expect another t years of scraping the barrel to make ends meet.
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The problem was the relationship between Ballarat and our admin was obviously not strong enough for anyone on a leaky council to pick the phone up and call them about the political shift in advance. Blaming Tasmania for that is just deflection. We could never play in Ballarat because they didn't have the facilities or the financial incentive to play there.

If you have strong relationships this just doesn't happen.

I'm not sure about this scraping of the barrel stuff either. We were turning over about $22m in the bad years, it was $32m last year and we reduced the cost of running the club, a lot of that was the good work of Euge and our CFO the ex-Storm guy I forgot his name, who also did a good job as fill in CEO.

We were winning flags turning over $10-15m or so per annum. Huge wads of money hasn't made Essendon a successful team, isn't helping Collingwood or Carlton now either. Most of the increase in football department spending has gone to the players and it is not like we have been paying 50% TPP or 60%, the lowest the minimum has ever been is 92.5%, and has been 95% in recent times.

If we didn't have the money to pay 100% in 2015 the AFL would have increased our Future Fund distribution so we did, it was part of an agreement between the AFL and AFLPA.
 
Once the AFL signalled their intent to Ballarat that the Dogs be the team they want I doubt we stood a chance regardless if our Ballarat contacts advised us as such or not. Wouldn't surprise me one bit if the AFL asked them to keep discussions on the downlow until some point at which an announcement was to be made.

Your points about our spend is somewhat fanciful. Remove the Tassie income over the last few years and our overall revenue drops to last in the comp. We wouldn't have any of the off field signings we currently have and in that environment we struggle to sing any FA's. Yes, we won flags on a shoestring in the 90's but those days are long gone. Our staff are excellent but without the resources to back them and the extra coin for the other additions to the back room team we would at best be fighting to remain in the discussion around competitive teams.

The way i see it the Tassie deal has enabled us to adequately support this push for a flag whilst we have a decent group of older players. Without that support we would be a team on the cusp of finals and on the verge of losing number of older players who we would be replacing with mid range draft picks, consigning the guys like Ziebell and Cunners to potential careers in a perrenial middling team. We needed to make the jump from mid/high $20mil revenue to low/mid $30mil revenue over the last few years. Ballarat was not going to do that (and potentially wouldn't for another 5 years) and pokies wouldn't do it without a significant debt burden. As a wise business strategy that provides the club with the best chance for success both on and off field now and in to the future Tasmania is by far the best option. That is not to say that i am comfortable with the 7 game option. I'm not. It is a risk that must be managed. But to turn our backs on Tasmania over the promise of Ballarat would have done far more damage to our club on and off field over the last 3 years. We would likely be seen as a boring, dull team with little hope of attracting new sponsors or members and certainly not have the momentum in the public psyche that we currently do.
 
Tas said:
The problem was the relationship between Ballarat and our admin was obviously not strong enough for anyone on a leaky council to pick the phone up and call them about the political shift in advance. Blaming Tasmania for that is just deflection. We could never play in Ballarat because they didn't have the facilities or the financial incentive to play there.

If you have strong relationships this just doesn't happen.
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That seems contradictory. No matter how strong the relationships, they don't change the basic issues of Ballarat's facilities and the economics of playing AFL games there. No-one needed a secret tipoff to know that Labour would be coming home strongly towards this election and that Ballarat promises might be disinterred.

But even if Labour win, and even if they go ahead with whatever is being promised (smallish if, followed by a larger one), that is a bloody long way from offering anything like the financial and membership benefits North is getting right now from playing in Hobart. By the time Ballarat is ready for a single game, North can have wiped its debt, added 8K Tasmanian members and - if it's on top of continued growth at home with strong onfield performance - become pretty much bullet proof. There's a lurking fantasy that Ballarat, if paid attention, could be some club's Kardinia Park money-making machine. Will never happen, and by the time it even ground into gear as an AFL venue, North will have left the Dogs in our dust.
 
We should sever our ties to Nth Ballarat asap, let them run on their own 2 feet.
 

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Flawed Genius said:
Confirmed: announcement by Daniel Andrews/Footscray in Ballarat at 10:45.
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If this is an announcement that the new Stadium will be built for the the Western Bulldogs then I will be far from impressed, given that the carcass of our relationship with Ballarat is not even cold yet. My letter may need to have something extra added to it on this development.
 
Hearts to hearts said:
That seems contradictory. No matter how strong the relationships, they don't change the basic issues of Ballarat's facilities and the economics of playing AFL games there. No-one needed a secret tipoff to know that Labour would be coming home strongly towards this election and that Ballarat promises might be disinterred.

But even if Labour win, and even if they go ahead with whatever is being promised (smallish if, followed by a larger one), that is a bloody long way from offering anything like the financial and membership benefits North is getting right now from playing in Hobart. By the time Ballarat is ready for a single game, North can have wiped its debt, added 8K Tasmanian members and - if it's on top of continued growth at home with strong onfield performance - become pretty much bullet proof. There's a lurking fantasy that Ballarat, if paid attention, could be some club's Kardinia Park money-making machine. Will never happen, and by the time it even ground into gear as an AFL venue, North will have left the Dogs in our dust.
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Could go further and hope that when North is debt cleared in the next 5 years, consistently strong on field and a very wanted commodity - we can return the favour to Ballarat.
 
Just by the way, why can't there be more than one club, use a new stadium like this? Surely it makes no sense to spend a lot of money for just one club to use it to its capacity, a very few times a year.

Already Governments have thrown (and continue to throw) huge amounts of money to develop Kardinia Park yet the Cats get to host games there just 7 or 8 times a year. As I understand it, because the GFC control the stadium, it is too expensive/not lucrative enough for other clubs to consider using Simonds for games against low drawing and interstate clubs.
 
Hearts to hearts said:
That seems contradictory. No matter how strong the relationships, they don't change the basic issues of Ballarat's facilities and the economics of playing AFL games there. No-one needed a secret tipoff to know that Labour would be coming home strongly towards this election and that Ballarat promises might be disinterred.

But even if Labour win, and even if they go ahead with whatever is being promised (smallish if, followed by a larger one), that is a bloody long way from offering anything like the financial and membership benefits North is getting right now from playing in Hobart. By the time Ballarat is ready for a single game, North can have wiped its debt, added 8K Tasmanian members and - if it's on top of continued growth at home with strong onfield performance - become pretty much bullet proof. There's a lurking fantasy that Ballarat, if paid attention, could be some club's Kardinia Park money-making machine. Will never happen, and by the time it even ground into gear as an AFL venue, North will have left the Dogs in our dust.
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This is in my view the key factor. We could not have afforded to just hold off on exploring alternative markets back in 2010, when Labor lost that election, because any new stadium had to be too far into the distance.

Firstly back in 2010 no-one could have forecast how the political fortunes might swing over the next 4 years. The coalition might well have performed so well in government in their first term that any chance of a new stadium might not even be on the agenda now.

As things stand today and assuming that the Coalition do not match any promise Labor puts on the table in a few minutes time, we are all just expecting that Labor will win this election and go ahead with the construction of the stadium.

For sure Labor is in front in the Polls at the present, but things can change very quickly. We all thought that we had the Cats on toast in the SF when we were comfortably in front halfway through the last quarter. Then some bloke called Grevi Leenbush, I think it was, missed a relatively easy shot that would have been the sealer. Thereafter it was heart in the mouth stuff and the same could happen here.
 
I wonder how likely the below scenario would have been:

2011 and North reject playing games in Tasmania, pledging their commitment to Ballarat in the long term. As a consequence North Melbourne are unable to generate enough funds to attract members of staff such as Geoff Walsh, Leigh Tudor and Gavin Brown. Without this new growth North are unable to attract significant interest in free agents. On field the team stays in the 8-12th range, not generating significant interest in the club and its brand and as a consequence memberships stay around 35K and sponsorship stagnates.

In 2014 Labour, the AFL, Ballarat and North Melbourne announce commitment to play AFL games in the Ballarat region by 2018. Smiles all round and handshakes everywhere.

In 2016 the Hawks end their agreement with the Tasmanian government and the AFL refuse to sanction another deal for the club, proposing to schedule all Hawks home games in Melbourne for the following year. At the same time the AFL announce that the Bulldogs are to now be the preferred team in the Ballarat region, expanding their influence in the 'Western Corridor'. North are pissed as ****, but what can they do?

After leaving North with no hope of taking part in the Ballarat deal, the AFL dangle a Tasmanian carrot in front of the club. 7 home games in Tasmania, split between Hobart and Launceston with a guaranteed $5 million up front each year and a slice of signage, gate taking and pourage rights, as well as increased memberships. A North board in flux, in charge of a club with 35K members, an average team with no more Harvey, Petrie, Firitto, Wells and his last legs, a significant debt and the least revenue of all Vic clubs are now left with a perilous decision. Knock back this deal or be marginalised further.

TBH I see the scenario of a North with no existing secondary market as a much greater threat than North in Hobart as it currently stands.
 
We had a fling with the country girl Ballarat, who one day noticed we'd been seen out and about with the floozy from down South with the cashed up daddy after us not taking her calls and always having the "I'm stuck at work" excuse to avoid seeing her, and nek minnit Ballarat's going public with the bogan loser up the road. It hurts initially but you soon realise it's for the better. F*** Ballarat..........she's dead to me!
 
.@DanielAndrewsMP has pledged $31.5 million to a redevelopment of Eureka Stadium to bring it up to AFL standard.
 
"If you build it, we will come..." Peter Gordon has committed to playing AFL Premiership games in Ballarat if the redevelopment occurs.
 
Peter Gordon says bringing AFL football to Ballarat would extend the Club's commitment to Melbourne & Victoria's west http://t.co/S8pfKIFeow
 
Bulldogs say they would look to play 2-3 games a year at a redeveloped Eureka Stadium in Ballarat @9NewsMelb #springst
 
LOL

Gordon: This is an enormous opportunity to take a great step forward as a Club, to build a fan base and contribute to the community here.
 

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News North might be done in Ballarat

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