I'll ask you the same thing.....well do you?
Gladly, soccer came from a very low base from years of parochial ethnic soccer clubs into something that was mainstream and well supported by the modern media. Complete change of direction. They did not have a well established and supported competition with heavy emotional investment that had been around for 90 years. As you could see by the reaction from the general public to super league and the formation of the A league.
Firstly that doesn't answer my question at all.
Secondly, yes they did have relatively well established and well supported clubs most of which were going on 50 years old when the NSL wrapped up, some of their clubs were over 100-120 years old when the NSL was scrapped, many of their clubs (particularly the successful ones) still have relatively large fan bases to this day even though their clubs haven't played in the top tier for over a decade now (South Melbourne and Woolongong are good examples of this), and most of whom have seen little to no TV time in that since then either.
Sure the NSL (and soccer in general for that matter) was never as well supported as the NRL has been, but to suggest that they didn't have well supported clubs with fans that held massive emotional attachment to their clubs is ridiculous to say the least, hell it could be argued that your average NSL fan is more passionate and emotionally attached to their clubs then your average RL fan considering that many of them are still following their clubs to this day and according to you if any club is dropped from the NRL it'll cause a mass exodus of that clubs fans to the AFL.
NFL is popular in every US city so all would love a team and support it in huge numbers and revenue.
HA, tell that to the Los Angeles Chargers (seriously look up their current situation) or the dozens of other clubs that have been forced to relocate at one time or another to keep up with the growth of the competition.
And again this doesn't explain why the NFL hasn't crumbled into nothing through loss of fans and erosion of their base after all their relocations and chopping and changing.
Having said that I am not against expanding rugby league I just think we should also protect and grow Sydney because this is where the real revenue is for our game, we should not damage it further as other codes would love to have it as seen by AFL's growth in the last 20 years.
BS, the Brisbane Broncos and the Melbourne Storm individually add roughly the same value to the TV rights deal that all 9 of the Sydney clubs do together, they almost certainly add more to the value of the NRLs' and the clubs sponsorship space then all the Sydney teams put together, and the lost of either one of them would have more of an impact on the competitions bottom line then the lost of 4-5 Sydney clubs would (especially in the long run).
And exactly what's been seen by the AFLs' growth in the last 20 years?
That they're a better run organisation that better understands the value of government lobbying and investing in the grassroots then the NRL?
That they have better used their resources to spread their competition then the NRL has?
That they have much less in fighting (though it still occurs) and are better at organising then the NRL?
That they haven't effectively been controlled by two media companies for the last 20 years?
The AFLs' growth has had little to do with the NRL in the grand scheme of things, and has had a lot to do with them simply being more willing to jump at opportunities then the NRL and better run then the NRL.
To borrow your words..."Do you even sit down and think about it for a few miniatures before you say it!?"
I have no issue with the above, Perth will have a team in the coming years. Thus growing the revenue as we have another game and time slot to sell.
Again to borrow your words...."Christ, do any of you people do any research before you say things like this!?"
I was using the Bears as just an example.
I think you will find the SL war gave the AFL the impetus it needed. Fremantle admited to comp, Port Adelaide, Lockett to Sydney Swans. Lockett admitted in a radio interview recently the SL war was the thing that helped the swans the most to gain appeal. We look back at Super league and see an Adelaide team but today they would be up against two AFL clubs that average 46,000 and 38,000 in a tiny market. I'm for a small number of games each season there, even a test. Storm playing one or two games in Tassie. Perth must have a team
Firstly who cares what some old AFL player says, that's like saying that something is right because Wally Lewis or Andrew Johns said it, if anything if Lewis or Johns say something it it's almost certainly untrue.
Secondly the AFL was planing their late 90s expansions long before SL was even a twinkly in John Ribot eye, in fact the AFL was actually planning their second clubs in Adelaide and Perth right from the beginning when they admitted the Eagles and the Crows, but they wanted to give the WCE and the Crows roughly a decade to establish themselves before admitting the second clubs.
Thirdly you still haven't proven that the SL war or the peace deal caused the growth of the AFL over the last 20 years, you've got correlation, but not causation and it's causation that matters.
Frankly I think that the Super league war and rationalisation did help the AFL grow to a degree, I also think that the merger of Fitzroy and the Brisbane Bears probably helped the NRL grow in Melbourne, however the help that those events gave to the AFL and NRL respectively was insignificant at best especially when compared with other factors going on at the time.
The death of clubs turned the casual fan off our game, something we still struggle to win back.
Evidence?
If you'd have said that SL turned casual fans off I'd have agreed with you, though we're well past that being a problem anymore.
The real reasons that we can't draw as many casuals as we used to is because the NRL and the clubs have consistently shown that they are incapable of marketing themselves at all (let alone effectively) and we've failed to adapt to compete with new and often cheaper forms of entertainment.
Also in the current climate with better governance, drive for club memberships, Tv revenue, salary cap strickly followed allowing a more even compeition, private ownership etc why could clubs not stand alone today. Take the turnaround in South Sydney as an example.
Don't get what this's got to do with anything.
I'd like to see the game eventually grow to 20-22 teams with conferences.
That's fine but which potential bids that are potentially more valuable then your average smaller Sydney club are going to miss out so that Sydney can have 9 clubs that they can't support?
