Just out of curiosity

[TheParraboy]

Any of you Storm fans used to be predominately AFL fans,
but now are fans of both codes?

 

[Dani]

Used to love AFL.
Can't stand to watch it any more.

 

[Surandy]

Same as Dani. I lost interest in AFL around 1990. Got on board the Storm in 1999, first game of RL I watched was the 1998 grand final.

 

[Ice777]

I'm still a fan of AFL but don't go to anywhere near as many games as i used to, only about 2 or 3 a year. Been a member of the Storm since day one and rarely if ever miss a home game.

If you're asking because of what Fitzy said about us having no AFL converts supporting us that's total bullsh*t and he hasn't got a clue. As you can see Dani, Surandy and i are and the group of six blokes i go with all are as well so i have no doubt there's plenty more at our games.

 

[TheParraboy]

If you're asking because of what Fitzy said about us having no AFL converts supporting us that's total bullsh*t and he hasn't got a clue. As you can see Dani, Surandy and i are and the group of six blokes i go with all are as well so i have no doubt there's plenty more at our games.

ok cool


So why is the home crowd average only around 10,000-11,000 at games?
This is at a time when Storm are the dominant team in the comp, it is usually under 9000 when they are not. Has been that way for 10 years. Will it really improve a lot more than that?

4 Million people in Melbourne, with the best RL side at their doorstep

Dont get me wrong, I dont want Melbourne moved or axed like Fitzy, just trying to understand why the city hasnt really embraced it. We hear horror stories up here how games are shown late at night as well as little media coverage, which wouldnt help

 

[Surandy]

sh*t hole of a stadium. Built in 1956 and has hardly had any improvements to it.

The new stadium will make a huge difference. They are digging the foundations at the moment.

 

[B-Tron 3000]

Don't bullsh*t.

The Victory sell out Olympic every game. When they play at Telstra they get 30 000+.

What's the real reason?

 

[TheParraboy]

I think exposure and media have a lot to do with it from what I understand down there. I'll find out a little about that when Im down there over the weekend. eg paper coverage, telecasts (manly/cowboy coverage).

AFL in Sydney in the 80's was pretty much non existant in that area. The Swans first 10 years or so were pulling crowds of what Melbourne are now, around 10k (note: they were no where near successfulll as the storm are now).

However the last 10 years I think the Swans average well over 30,000 per home game, They are marketed real well, in schools a lot (which is fantastic idea). Have a decent grade competition from what Ive heard. They have had lots of success on the field, AFL is covered here 2-3 times a week on prime time tv and also gets decent coverage in the papers. It is well and truly accepted now. Same with the Lions in Brisbane. Both cities once were League towns only.

Anyhow, hopefully there will be a huge turnout on Sunday

 

[Captian_Klutz]

Used to love AFL.
Can't stand to watch it any more.

Same.

Played RL here and QLD.

 

[Molly]

Don't bullsh*t.

The Victory sell out Olympic every game. When they play at Telstra they get 30 000+.

What's the real reason?

Well....the Victory play in a summer comp where they are the only game in town...I think that helps.

 

[sheet_ed]

In order to understand why crowds are not very big down here, I think you need to go back down to the grass roots.

1. NRL was only known by NSW & QLD expats until 1999. We have only 1 player born in this State. Soccer has a bigger base than even AFL in both kids playing and ethnic support (Melbourne is the 2nd largest Greek City in the world).

2. There is VERY HIGH following of AFL by women in Victoria, who then tend to dominate children sports selection. As they don't want their kids to get hurt they will not try an unknown sport - hence the direction into AFL and now more prevalent Soccer.

3. Most Victorians STILL call league RUGBY so the code lives in a false shadow. Having said that a great deal of AFL followers like RUGBY but don't like League, I would have guess that it has something to do with the "free for all" that AFL and Rugby can have in common.

4. Media. If Greg Inglis won tattslotto, married Jennifer Hawkins, was presented with the Nobel Prize he would still be on Page 10 of The Age if an AFL player sneezed. Channel Nine has the capacity to show Storm games refuse to do so. Even SOO is delayed by up to 2 hours after some innocuous sh*te.

5. Sports ground. Olympic park is a hole. It reflects badly on a side's image. The Titans have a 5 year jump on Melbourne in this area. Even the crappy Telstra Dome which has the capacity to move it's seating close to the action refuses to move the seating.

6. We have BOOF-HEADS in Sydney spouting the crap that the Storm should fold, means that attracting players gets harder and harder because they are worried about their security.

7. League is just starting to be played at some schools. There is a lot of ground work being done to get kids playing touch to understand the basics.

If you were here and saw how hard the Storm have worked to get a niche in this market who's media sometimes seem to go out of their way to smother the Storm, you would understand how steeled we are in our resolve for our team to survive.

Brain Waldron, who I thought would be the poison pill for the Storm, has turned out to one of the most professional Sports Administrators of any team. He is a self confessed AFL fan, yet week in and week out he has built the Storm. The image of the Storm is squeaky clean down here and players are heavily scrutinised to ensure the image is protected.

Before you condemn the Storm have a look what the AFL is doing in your backyard, then measure the task that is being undertaken.

 

[sbk]

I spent my first nine years in Newcastle before the Knights existed and then moved to Melbourne. I have attended Storm games from day 1 and have a family membership and go with friends who follow three different AFL teams. These days we all go to far more league games than AFL because we all enjoy supporting the same team together and Storm look after their members. There are a few high profile retired AFL legends who enjoy watching Storm play. I reckon its because it reminds them of a times during AFL history when the game was more physical than todays style.

 

[Ice777]

Well....the Victory play in a summer comp where they are the only game in town...I think that helps.

Exactly right. Some people will look at crowd figures alone when it comes to Victory v Storm crowds but what they fail to realise or conveniently don't want to see is that the Storm are directly up against the biggest football competition in Australia competing against 10 clubs in a city where the vast majority are obsessed with AFL. Not to mention often playing at the same time as a footy game at the G with up to 80 odd thousand people there.

What are the Victory up against? The odd game of cricket that would rarely clash on the same day anyway. The bottom line is to compare Victory crowds to our crowds as was done in a previous post is just plain ridiculous on so many levels. Why anyone would even bother i don't know.

 

[Stormboyz]

Followed AFL all my life and got disenchanted with it a while ago to be honest. Doesn't help that my team hasn't done a thing since 1980.
Went to a Storm game five years ago and never turned back. Still follow AFL, but I have been to nine home Storm games this season and two away games (Brisbane and Townsville) and only 2 AFL games.
Gotten to the stage where I would prefer to watch a good game of league on the TV than any game of AFL.
sh*ts me when Denis Fitzgerald says all our fans are NZers or Q'landers. It's just not true and insulting to be honest. There are plenty of RL fans here that are born and bred here.

 

[LESStar58]

Dont get me wrong, I dont want Melbourne moved or axed like Fitzy, just trying to understand why the city hasnt really embraced it. We hear horror stories up here how games are shown late at night as well as little media coverage, which wouldnt help

Mate, there is a massive predjudice against rugby league in this town. Most people think the code is full of rapists, drug addicts and woman bashers. Our players are referred to as "neanderthals" and the lack of support for anything to do with the club or the code is deplorable. Mind you, the fact that there is little advertising done on behalf of the Storm doesn't help us!

It's AFL and nothing much else here. Theres a lot of support for the Victorianry because soccer is very much en vogue. I'd like to think support for soccer will wane but I'm doubtful!

Nobody from the northern states has a clue if they say "you have the best team but can't draw crowds" ....

Parraboy let me just state loud and clea at this point.... not having a dig at you with that last comment OK mate? It's just an argument I hear quite often but people need to live here to get any sort of idea....

Any rugby league tragic (like me) who has grown up with the code and then comes to Melbourne..... it's a culture shock. The amount of coverage the AFL gets is sickening and you are treated like a leper if you watch any other code besides AFL and God help you if you have the nerve to criticise it. NRL coverage in Sydney and Brisbane might dominate sports pages but it doesn't hold a candle to aerial ping pong coverage in Melbourne. Even Channel 9 won't play ball! They showed our first game against the Tigers and Origin One live and then that was it. The Nazi in charge of programming always plays the "RL doesn't rarte card" even though this has proven to be incorrect several times over the years (even when Origin is delayed).

AFL types look down on rugby league. It has pissed me off so much at times that I have fired off rather curt ,yet polite, emails to two journos arguing in defense of the code.

People can criticise as much as they like but the fact is that we are not given a good run. I mean, one game and a few origins live and the broadcaster decides "thats enough"? I smell a rat.

 

[LESStar58]

As for the topic at hand....

I followed AFL when I first got here in 87 (Carlton) but have paid little or no attention since 1998 when I got straight on the Storm bandwagon.

Can't bring myself to watch AFL again. I despise pretty much everything about it and I admit a lot of it has to do with AFL fans and media bagging out league. In 2004 I got called a "rapist" by some wick prick on Fitzroy Street for wearing my Australian Kangaroos jersey. Now, I'm not a big guy and certainly prefer to avoid trouble and violence but I turned and gave him a look that could melt steel and he turned and ambled off.

I do, on occassion, hear the old chestnut of "rugby league exploits women" because of the cheerleaders. The article Samantha Lane wrote in The Age last year about being at Origin and then criticising the NRL for having a terrible policy re: making the sport an "inclusive environment for women" was the last straw for me. As sheet_ed said:

There is VERY HIGH following of AFL by women in Victoria,

Not just that, but the fact that rugby league is frowned on by women becase of rather unsavoury incidents over the years. THE AFL do a great job of pitching the game to women but TBH if these women knew ANYTHING about some of the stuff posted in The Fight Club, I'd find it amazing how they couldn't be disgusted with the way some players (Brodie Holland, Colin Sylvia, Ashley Sampai, Jeff Farmer etc) have behaved with women over the years. And lets not forget the biggest rat of them all: Wayne Carey.

who then tend to dominate children sports selection. As they don't want their kids to get hurt they will not try an unknown sport - hence the direction into AFL and now more prevalent Soccer.

Lets not forget that there isn't much of a junior comp down here bt even if there was, yeah the mums probably don't want their precious little kids getting hurt.

Look, i don't plan on having children but if I do I hope there is a decent comp in Victoria for them to develop in. Hell, I'll take them straight from the delivery room to the Storm game if it's on that day!

Also, there is a strong misconception that rugby league fans in general are all toothless, drunken, lazy, uncultured morons.

There are so many misconceptions about the game in general that will take quite some time to overcome.

Theres also a bit of paranoia. RL will never knock over the AFL in Melbourne but obviously we are perceived as a threat. Hopefully the Storm partnership with the Demons when we move into the new stadium together will build a bond with the AFL fans. f**k the Victory, they can stay out in the cold for jerking us and the State G'ment around with commiting to the new Stadium. Also, Brian Waldron is an ex-AFL man. He was pretty much hired as he knows the Melbourne market in a way people like Ribot, Johns and Stanton couldn't. He's doing all the little things right but hopefully he can use a few of his "connections" to get us noticed.

 

[LESStar58]

Don't bullsh*t.

The Victory sell out Olympic every game. When they play at Telstra they get 30 000+.

What's the real reason?

Love soccer.

Hate the A-League as I think the standard is very poor but they have been very smart with getting it up and running and marketing it properly.

However, if soccer was a winter time sport in Australia (yes I know its played in summer to be in line with the European competitons) it'd almost certainly die in the arse again. Victory might still do alright but can you imagine if the Roar had to compete with the Broncos or if the Glory had to compete with the Eagles and Dockers. Add to that the level of bandwagon support for Sydney FC..... and the Jets competing with the Knights in Newcastle? Forget it. Theres 4, possibly 5 teams, that would be under the pump to compete if it was in winter. I'd take great joy in seeing an NRL side on the Central Coast and the Mariners competing with them.

And given theres only 8 teams in the comp, well its wouldn't look realy peachy would it....?

:sarcasm:

 

[TheParraboy]

thanks for all the feedback guys

Lesstar, sheet_ed some astonishing feedback there, that I was totally unaware of, thanks for explaining things in detail. I understand it now.

Hopefully there is a big crowd on Sunday, a very small step I know, but better than having a smallish crowd for a semi, that would give the afl honchos and the likes of fitzy another thing to crap on about.

Anyhow, I got a big drive down there tomorrow, better hit the sack soon

Good luck, hope its a corker of a game

 

[Eelectrica]

NRL coverage in Sydney and Brisbane might dominate sports pages but it doesn't hold a candle to aerial ping pong coverage in Melbourne. Even Channel 9 won't play ball! They showed our first game against the Tigers and Origin One live and then that was it. The Nazi in charge of programming always plays the "RL doesn't rarte card" even though this has proven to be incorrect several times over the years (even when Origin is delayed).

AFL types look down on rugby league. It has pissed me off so much at times that I have fired off rather curt ,yet polite, emails to two journos arguing in defense of the code.

People can criticise as much as they like but the fact is that we are not given a good run. I mean, one game and a few origins live and the broadcaster decides "thats enough"? I smell a rat.

That's where the NRL has to step in and allow fox to televise live games into Melbourne on one of their spare channels. It won't help everyone in the short term. It might force Ch 9. Melbourne into a corner though and into a situation where they have no choice but to do the right thing and televise games live.

 

[LESStar58]

Channel 9 simply do not care. Nothing will make them budge. And putting it on Fox doesn't exactly help those people without pay TV.