It is disingenuous to suggest the AFL don’t want less teams in Melbourne.
Sydney was a relocation because in the early 80s, you couldn’t play league football on Sundays in Melbourne. That way the dead team got moved to Sydney and they could televise a live game in to Melbourne. Smart move. But clubs didn’t like the travel.
Many AFL supporters in SA and WA argued putting a team in to the AFL was going to kill the local WAFL and SANFL, paralleling the arguments in Illawarra, Newcastle and Brisbane that their local comp would suffer. Some still argue that. Argue their best youngsters get drafted and shafted to Sydney or Brisbane/Gold Coast.
Hawthorn and Melbourne looked to merge in mid 90s much like Easts and Saints. The mid 90s professional era had begun and clubs were caught out trying to keep up. There was much anguish over it. The reemergence of Hawthorn mirrors Easts in the past two decades.
North Melbourne mirror South Sydney except Norths were nomadic for a while in Sydney, Canberra and Gold Coast, before getting themselves in order off field. Souths got turfed, fought back and returned.
Fitzroy we’re all but dead as were the Brisbane Bears and the merger worked, as long as the AFL bankrolled it. Once the glow finished, it was back to shit again though recently the Lions have bounced back. Both Wests and Saints have had a lean decade with their mergers. Get the collective shit together and they’ll be big.
The AFL play games in Tasmania, taking advantage of a market while dilly dallying over expansion in that state. Sounds like RL in Adelaide, Perth and Southern NZ.
The AFL really only have Tasmania to expand to, and that’ll be a team like a Cowboys. They play the long game but eventually the dollars will stop and hard decisions will have to be made.
The NRL have Adelaide, Perth and NZ2 to look at with Pacific/PNG pipelines to nurture.
They also have to decide on having a truly independent commission, expansion and junior development, fan engagement etc.
They also need to make sure the Sydney teams represent strong fan and membership bases and ask what they represent because at the moment the brands are great but would one of those brands be better suited in another market? If WT weren’t in the comp are we truly going to say the junior comps out there will die and the talent won’t go to their clubs?