Does Western United ring a bell
You seem to have completely misunderstood point.
Are western United and MacArthur 2nd clubs in their respective cities though? Ah that’s right they are the 3rd clubs. And was I praising A-League expansion in Sydney and Melbourne with 3rd clubs? No.
Both Melb City and WSW were each cities second clubs. WSW is actually a better example of how to do expansion right as it’s location and marketing power is focused solely on a defined geographical area with millions of people (West Sydney) which loves football (soccer).
Melb City v Victory is not really based on geographical areas. Buy and large people supported City cause they hated Kevin Muscat or were Man city fans. I think this undermines the Melbourne rivalry, two teams claiming to represent the exact same area. They should have split Melbourne in half with Victory south of the river and City north of the river or vice versa. Or done it east v west. I think A league stuffed up here.
That’s why I specifically gave the example of WSW, arguably the smartest and well executed expansion club in any code. Their brand and marketing power is specifically targeted at people that live in the area, alot with immigrant backgrounds and who are proud to be in Western Sydney.
Moreton Bay and Redcliffe don’t have the clout of West Sydney - I dare say that’s one reason they dropped Redcliffe or Moreton Bay references from the team name, as it don’t have the bravado “West Sydney” people have about their region nor does it appeal to anyone outside of Redcliffe. Brisbanes “west Sydney” is actually South and west which includes Ipswich and Logan.
Branding a second A League team in Sydney “the wanderers”, basing its HQ in Manly or Cronulla, playing the bulk of its games at the SFS and expecting anyone outside of Manly or Cronulla (be it Campbeltown, Parramatta, Ryde, North Sydney, Penrith, Fairfield, Bankstown etc) to switch allegiances to “the wanderers” would have been astoundingly stupid move.
Sure you’ll capture 400k that live in Cronulla or Manly but everyone else in Sydney (5m people) will continue to identify with Sydney FC. You’d be limiting the opportunity for the 2nd franchise to actually grow its brand by lobbing it into Manly or Cronulla when the west of Sydney, where the people are and they don’t like the snobs in “eastern” Sydney, is available.
A 2nd Brisbane team will not be a failure regardless of whether it’s in Ipswich, Stones Corner, Logan or Redcliffe. You could seriously put a 2nd side in Yatala and call them the “meat pies” and it still wouldn’t fail.
The question is which location and brand will be the most successful, both as a club and for the benefit of the game as a whole. That ain’t the Dolphins, it’s the Firehawks.
The dolphins main appeal will always be to those based in Redcliffe, deception bay and to some extent Moreton Bay region - your talking about 460k people right now. Sure it will grow in number over 20 years. But right now that’s a 500k market.
People on Sunshine Coast that have supported the falcons don’t identify with Redcliffe or Moreton bay or the dolphins. They probably more likely to remain Melbourne storm supporters.
Suburbs like Strathpine which is in Moreton Bay area mostly identify with “brisbane” as its 22km from both Redcliffe and Brisbane CBD, so you’ll struggle to convert broncos or other club fans even in Moreton Bay.
Then there’s the issue of limited neighbouring geographic borders. For example:
Penrith v parramatta
Easts v Souths
Souths v St George
St George v Cronulla
Manly v North Sydney
Manly v Newcastle
Wests v Canterbury
Canterbury v St George
Brisbane v Titans
Brisbane v NQ
NSW v QLD
City v Country
Dolphins will have an automatic rivalry with Broncos. But not with Titans. I doubt their rivalry with NQ will match brisbane v Qld. NQ wanna take on the big end of town and stick it to the snobs from Brisbane, not the their little brother down the road.
So dolphins will need to rely on the other rivalries that happen over time due to clubs that aren’t neighbours either due to:
1. poaching each others players (wests v Manly, Manly and Easts v everyone really)
2. where the teams are highly successful up the top of the ladder and/or play off in finals (parramatta v bulldogs, Melbourne v manly, brisbane v canberra, brisbane v St George, wests v NQ, Penrith v Melbourne etc)
3. where the NSW clubs just hate the state the club is from and the team is successful (Melbourne v any NSW club and Broncos v any NSW club).
4. Due to a infamous violent act or brawl on field or between supporters.
So the rivalry with the titans will need to be ground out over the years until they meet in big finals or there’s some players poached or a infamous brawl or violent act occurs. Even then if it’s 14th v 17th on the ladder - who gives a shit?
The overwhelming benefit of Firehawks is it would have split the city in two population wise and geographically (just like WSW) with over 1.1m people for both broncos and Firehawks to market too, would have links inner south suburbs to CBD with great opportunity for sponsorship from big companies and it shares a geographic border with both titans and broncos.
The Firehawks litterally have over twice the amount of people south of the river to market too in comparison to the Dolphins and are 10 min drive from HQ to CBD (corporates) and close to Suncorp stadium.
The icing on the cake is it cuts the AFL expansion into south west Brisbane off at the knees.
It’s a no brainer NRL should have stolen the blueprints for WSW and applied it to the Brisbane2 and got Firehawks in the comp in 2023.
What an essay I’ve delivered. Measured, logical and completely designed to educate the rugby league loving community. What a boost to my ego
