You guys need to be hammering Gil over his selective use of fairness with training - does fairness get a thought when the AFL controls your stadium deal? You appear certain its not, get on the wave to expose the duplicity of Gils AFL.
TAS Will a team go to Tassie
- Thread starter Sir Skid
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You guys need to be hammering Gil over his selective use of fairness with training - does fairness get a thought when the AFL controls your stadium deal? You appear certain its not, get on the wave to expose the duplicity of Gils AFL.
- Apr 24, 2018
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why did Fitzroy even want to merge with anyone if there financial position was not that bad you said they were making profits did they try to raise money to prevent the administrator being appointed I don’t understand why they couldn’t buy some time to raise the cash was there an option to take the afl to court similar to south Sydney and the nrl and try to get re admitted in there own right to the afl wasn’t one of you guys main supporters a prominent Melbourne qc barrister ? Sorry you probably have answered this question before in other threads
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They didn't want to merge, but when the AFL was looking to remove them, the directors felt they had little choice but try and preserve some of Fitzroy identity (preferably in Melbourne).
Fitzroy could have survived and prospered with a bit of AFL aid that has been extended to other Melbourne based clubs, trough their "Competitive Balance Fund" such as the Western Bulldogs, Melbourne and North Melbourne.
Fitzroy in 1992-93 was a very competitive side. Crowds of 50,000 and above for some Fitzroy games in 1992 and 1993, as well as crowds of above 25,000 for pre-season games showed that the club could attract spectators, if competitive. The club actually made a profit in 1993, they'd finally got a social club that was making money through the Fitzroy Club Hotel (purchased in March 1992) and were making plans to return to the Brunswick Street Oval (just up the road from the Fitzroy Club Hotel) as a training and administration base. The club had actually gained approval from the Council in 1992 to do just that, but just couldn't find the spare $250,000 to renovate the old heritage grandstand and build a modern gymnasium over the existing community rooms.
As I said Fitzroy made a small annual profit from 1993-95, courtesy of their social club just up from the BSO. However they felt that couldnt compete on an on-going basis with some of the other clubs. For example the ANZAC Day game alone netted Essendon and Collingwood more revenue than Fitzroy would reeive in a season. By 1994 Essendon, Carlton and Collingwood were running on a turnover of 11-12 million compared to Fitzroy's $5 million. The large clubs received $1 million in gate receipts compared to Fitzroy's $300,000 and obviously due to their far larger membership were making at least a million dollars more from membership. Given these ineqiuities and the AFL inducment of $6 million to two clubs who were prepared to merge smaller Melboune clubs began looking at mergers. In August 1994, Fitzroy approached Melbourne to form the 'Melbourne Lions' and then in late August 1994, in fact a day apart, both Hawthorn and North Mebourne independently approached Fitzroy about the possibility of the 'Hawthorn Lions' and the 'North Melbourne Lions'.
After the Melbourne merger proposal fell over in August 1994, Fitzroy in August 1995 looked at a possible relocation to Canberra by offering to play up to seven home games in Canberra in the 1996 season. They were guaranteed a minimum of an extra $350,000 per year, irrespective of crowd sizes. The Club's application to play in Canberra had the support of 'AFL for Canberra' organisation, the Canberra Raiders, the Ainslee Football Club and the ACT chief minister who had offered for the ACT government to upgrade Bruce Stadium if there were two national teams playing out of the stadium. Bruce Stadium would therefore have served as the home-ground of Fitzroy and the Raiders.
The initiative was knocked back by the AFL.
Fitzroy would have never sought a merger if they could have secured an extra $1 million in funding - $0.5 million to return to the Brunswick Street Oval and upgrade the faciliites (agreed deal already successfully negotiated with the existing Fitzroy local council) and $0.5 million to attract players to make the club more competitive onfield. Nauru had agreed to lend a further $500,000 but when the government of Nauru was changed at the end of November 1995, the offer was withdrawn. When Bruno Grollo decided not to lend Fitzroy another $500,000, the directors of Fitzroy in May 1996 entered merger discussions with North Melbourne who since September 1995 had an open offer to Fitzroy to discuss a merger.
Fitzroy was $2.7 million in debt, of which $1.25 million was to one secured creditor. (Nauru)
In the end Nauru only appointed an administrator to Fitzroy when the AFL schemed not to settle Nauru's debt out of the $6 million merger monies going to the proposed North-Fitzroy merger. The Fitzroy debt of $1.25 million to the Nauru Insurance Company wasn't due to be paid back until 2001 and Fitzroy were meeting the repayments.
So $1 million was the requirement to keep Fitzroy in the competition and yet the same year the AFL was prepared to shell out $12 million for two mergers (North-Fitzroy and Melb/Haw). Even then the AFL actively worked against what Fitzroy's preferred merger deal was.
See above.
On what grounds?
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Therein lies the problem & the AFL have run away from the problem that were apparent to the VFL when South was sent to Sydney & here we are STILL almost 40 years on.
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- #305
The AFL didn't give aid to Fitzroy. All they could do is encourage them to merge or get them to surrender their licence. In the end they couldnt force Fitzroy to merge (and luckily for the AFL, the administrator surrendered Fitzroy's licence).
South wasn't "sent" to Sydney. They went there of their own volition.
Fine, they both left Melbourne & there are still too many games in Melbourne despite efforts to get someone else (NT, Tas, NQ, not to mention China & NZ ) to pick up the tab - also, Geelong have been keen to get as many games as possible out of Melbourne.
A since Andrew Demetriou replaced Wayne Jackson, there has been no appetite for rationalisation of the over supplied Melbourne market.
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- #307
One left Melbourne. The other left the AFL but is still in Melbourne.
Since Ross Oakley in 1996.
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agreed
The law of supply and demand won’t apply if Melbourne clubs disappear. Cutting clubs will decrease both the supply of AFL footy and also the demand. MOST people who followed Fitzroy did not pick up another Melbourne club. Some followed Brisbane, some followed local footy and many were lost to the game. The AFL is never going to do anything that will shrink their market.
People like to follow their sport at the highest level, thats what happened in WA & SA.
Sure it takes time to get some back, e.g the Swans.
It has taken the Eagles 30+ years & having success (7 x GFs).
The AFL each year fixture games out of Vic ... oops !
Bring a traditional football state, and going from the success of WC, Adelaide and Freo in attracting supporters to a new club, and that I live here leads me to know that most would drop their allegiance to a mainland team in a second.
Iceman!
Brownlow Medallist
Really? I am not against getting a team down here but i struggle to see most people who have 10+ years of supporting a club leaving that.
I know i couldn't do it.
Nah. Most ex Fitzroy families I know (24 years is a long time) have far less interest in football at any level than those who follow other clubs. The AFL can’t afford to lose a generation of fans. It will never happen. It may be possible to give a club like St Kilda enough of an incentive to relocate (cash, draft picks, increased salary cap, larger list, academy, retain lumper, nickname, song, etc). But going by past history. Other clubs may not approve that anyway.
Some won't change for sure. But as I said, WC, Freo and Adel have shown that people will support a start up team from day one.
North, you know it will be north
Most West Australian footy followers had a VFL team, e,g I barrack for Subi, the Blues were my VFL club - I wasnt sure who I would follow in 1987.
It took about 5 years to get the majority of WA footy fans to move their allegiance.
Note Subi are still 'MY' team.
Why do you want to turn the discussion into 'which team' ?
No, a team won't go to Tassie. It's simple economics. No matter how much people complain that there are too many games in Melbourne, the fact is Melbourne has 5 million people and is growing much faster than anywhere else in Australia, and it isn't close. Tasmania by contrast has 500 000 people and is growing very slowly. Taking games from the biggest, fastest growing market and giving them to the smallest, slowest growing one is economic suicide.
Yep, Melbourne added a million people between 2011 and 2018.
Plus if Tassie was to get a team, they don't want a transplant.
I see North have been trying hard to catch this wave by marketing themselves in Tarneit and Wyndham Vale, two of the fastest growing areas. Do you know how successful they've been at this?
Yep, pretty much every Tasmanian on BF agrees.
Adding a team isnt happening until we are on top of the line of credit. The AFL admin need to face up to hard decisions,
- Apr 24, 2018
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I know what you’re saying but that’s the thing a Tasmanian team wouldn’t need the majority of people to drop there current clubs to be successful with the huge amount of support already down here for the traditional Victorian clubs it would ensure every home game Tassie play against one of the vic clubs would be a gaurented sellout its the next generation of young were the rusted on supporters will come from!
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Simple economics
when was the last time you visited Tasmania? How many times do you need to post the same thing over and over it’s getting boring!
Don't know, sorry.
sherb
Hall of Famer
It doesn't have to be either/or, you don't have to drop your existing alliegance, you can still maintain that while following a Tasmanian side.
It's not like the fixture is like it was back in the day when all games were on Saturday at 2.10pm. Under the current fixturing, a Tasmanian local could watch Tassie play live whilst watching their existing side on TV on most occasions.
It's then up to them who to support when the two sides clash.
I've done it for years. I've been a Carlton supporter for 50 years, but having lived in Sydney since the early 80s I ended up watching the Swans live regularly. Win/win.
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