A-League in 5 years - New teams?

Discussion in 'Australian A-League' started by Archie Thompson, Jan 6, 2006.

  1. Crowdie

    Crowdie New Member

    Jan 23, 2003
    Auckland, New Zealand
    And I would hardly say that a Central United squad would be competitive in the A-League.

    Northern Premier League 1995 Final Standings

    1. Bay Olympic 41 pts (W12 D5 L5)
    2. Eastern Suburbs 39 pts (W11 D6 L5)
    3. Waitakere City 38 pts (W11 D5 L6)
    4. East Coast Bays 37 pts (W12 D1 L9)
    5. North Shore United 34 pts (W10 D4 L8)
    6. Uni-Mt Wellington 34 pts (W10 D4 L8)
    7. Tauranga City Utd 33 pts (W9 D6 L7)
    8. Central United 32 pts (W9 D5 L8)
    9. Glenfield Rovers 32 pts (W10 D2 L10)
    10. Mangere United 26 pts (W7 D5 L10)
    11. Papakura 17 pts (W4 D5 L13) - Relegated
    12. Ellerslie 7 pts (W1 D4 L17) - Relegated
     
  2. Ragnarok14

    Ragnarok14 New Member

    Jan 14, 2006
    Queensland
    I doubt the a-league goes past 10 teams in the near future unless it really takes off and the money starts rolling in.

    I think the only likely places for expansion would be:

    1. Canberra - does have a history of problems

    2. Gold Coast - Perfect if we move in there before the AFL, we beat the NRL to the central coast but they beat us here but seeing as we play at different times of the year it would work well.

    3. Nth Queensland - good option like the Gold Coast

    4. Tasmania - clash with the cricket season and population problems (anyone know what the size is?) maybe if some exhibition games were played there we might get a better guage of the possibility here.

    5. Darwin/Alice - heat issues/playing conditions could be a problem and the players desire to go live there.

    6. Pacific teams - would be great for the region if a fiji team or PNG or something was introduced but travelling could be an issue, maybe they could be based out of NZ or Nth queensland or something.


    Either way I think the a-league will be in pretty good shape money wise after the move into asia. I can't see the one team one city policy being changed either, would be stupid if they did.
     
  3. sherrinator

    sherrinator New Member

    Dec 2, 2005
    A-league comp wishlist:

    Adelaide Utd
    QLD Roar - Brisbane Utd Roar
    Central Coast
    Newcastle Jets
    Sydney FC
    Perth Glory
    Melbourne victory

    New Teams
    Gold Coast City
    Wollongong Wolves
    Canberra FC
    Townsville

    Minus any team from new zealand.

    It is extremely hard to understand why people think a team in northern nsw let alone nsw anyway is a good idea. northern nsw has no stadia no cities of large size and its just a stupid stupid idea cosidering there are so many places that are more deserving and have more people. btw its bad enough gosford got a team to start with.

    Gold Coast will have a great stadium, so they are a shoo in despite they have a team in the NRL. Australias 6th biggest city deserves to be represented.

    Wollongong had a lot of fans and has a decent stadium. they are from nsw but if another team comes from this state it has to be them.

    Canberra. sucked ass in nsl. but think about it, the nsl sucked ass to begin with. a team named canberra fc is a good idea. plenty of possible players from the AIS and canberra is australias 8th biggest city, and the nat capital and people currently have no soccer team to follow.

    Townsville. I'm sick of people saying north qld or far north qld. townsville has a good stadium. townsville holds the teams. call it townsville. a city of 160,000 people can hold a nat soccer team, as we've seen from central coast area. and surely the people of cairns (140,000) and other cities/towns will get begind townsville anyway. townsvillians had to support the broncos before they got a RL team, so why not a team from down the road.

    New Zealand should never have gotten a chance at a team. bringin in canberra would have been potentially better an idea.

    thats my two cents.
     
  4. Ragnarok14

    Ragnarok14 New Member

    Jan 14, 2006
    Queensland
    I wonder if it would be possible for there to be just an AIS team based in canberra? maybe just in the youth league if that every gets started. I dont think it was stupid having a central coast team, they got a great stadium, but I think being stuck between sydney and newcastle they got screwed.
     
  5. Crowdie

    Crowdie New Member

    Jan 23, 2003
    Auckland, New Zealand
    You are going to love it when O'Neil starts bringing teams in from South East Asia. If you have issues with a Kiwi team how are you going to handle Asian teams?
     
  6. Champagne Football

    Champagne Football New Member

    Dec 5, 2004
    Melbourne, Australia
    How about 2 teams from NZ? One for the North island and one for the South?
    Leave the Knights in Auckland and the new team, to be based in Christchurch, could be known as the NZ Daze!! (Get it?) :p
     
  7. JLSA

    JLSA Member

    Nov 11, 2003
    I don't know which is worse: this "joke" or the mental torment caused by imaging two NZ sides in the A-League.

    John Kosmina was on ABC Radio yesterday and had the following comments on expansion (I'll paraphrase):
    - He would rather have four rounds (28 games) first and then look towards expanding the size of the league. He wants around 35 games a season as the players are professional and require that many to be at their best.
    - He would supplement this with a pre-season comp that included non A-League sides.

    To give my (not his) suggestion as to how you could do this, imagine a pre-season comp with the 8 A-League sides plus 8 others - probably 1 each from WA, SA, Tas and Qld + 2 from NSW and Vic. Split them into 4 groups of 4
    1 (West) - Adelaide, Glory, SA + WA
    2 (South)- Victory, Knights, Tas + Vic1
    3 (North)- Roar, Jets, Qld + NSW1
    4 (East)- Sydney, Mariners, NSW2 + Vic 2

    Arrange the games so the A-League teams get 1 home game and the others 2 (prevent the non-team having to travel too much).

    Group winners play semis and finals.

    Something like this would give a number of State league teams something to aim for, although the timing would be tricky as the mathces would need to be in the middle of many State seasons to be pre-season for the A-League).

    There's probably a zillion better ways to do it - but there you go.

    J
     
  8. almango

    almango Member+

    Sydney FC
    Australia
    Nov 29, 2004
    Bulli, Australia
    Club:
    Sydney FC
    Nat'l Team:
    Australia
    Kosmina suggested State League select sides to give the best state league players a taste of higher standard football. Not a bad idea. The aim being to develop players from a number of clubs rather than just have a club compete in a competition they have little chance of progressing in (or being promoted to).
     
  9. JLSA

    JLSA Member

    Nov 11, 2003
    Indeed, you could replace the NSW1, NSW2, VIC1 and VIC2 in the above by NSW, Northern NSW, Victoria and ACT squads along with State-select squads from the other States. Would presumably either an honour for State-league players to play against higher teams, or a chance to blood some good younger players.

    J
     
  10. Paul Marcuccitti

    Paul Marcuccitti New Member

    Jan 5, 2006
    Adelaide
    Bear in mind that in future seasons, Australian teams are likely to play in Asia's Champions' League. The first phase of that typically begins in early March and ends in late May. Then the competition rests until early September (the quarter final stage) and concludes in early November.

    The A-League kicks off in late August and ends in early March so, in deference to Asian competition, extra A-League fixtures and other serious tournaments are not likely.

    www.planetworldcup.com
     
  11. FAR-QUE

    FAR-QUE New Member

    Dec 10, 2005
    12 teams 28 rounds
    the current 8
    plus

    ACT BLUE-DEVILS
    West Sydney
    Exhibition / Regional development scheme Spot * 2

    ---------------------------------
    teams

    rounds 1,5,9,13,17,21,25
    Australia-AIS
    Nth Territory XI

    rounds 2,6,10,14,18,22,26
    Tasmania XI
    Nth QLD

    rounds- 3,7,11,15,19,23,27
    Geelong
    Broome

    rounds- 4,8,12,16,20,24,28
    Gippsland
    Woolongong
    ---------------------------------------
    Top 4 Regional sides join the top 4 Full-time Squads in the A-League Championship

    All 18 clubs play in the A-league Cup, with the Champion & Premier getting a bie in the Group stage ie 4*4 groups

    also
    move all the State feds(senior comps only) to a Autumn/Winter season and have A-league clubs loan players to State clubs during the off-season
     
  12. sherrinator

    sherrinator New Member

    Dec 2, 2005
    amen to that brother.

    i see you have put two more nsw teams in. nsw team 1 from wollongong. makes sense. nsw 2? never. never ever.
    victoria 1. geelong maybe? vic 2. there maybe a couple of vic country places ballarat or bendigo but keep in mind, country people are the most anti soccer people in aus.
    Qld should get more than one extra team.
    compare that to your extra WA and SA teams. WA and SA have no large centers except perth, and adelaide, and giving extra teams there would go against one city one team policy and they struggle enough for crowds as it is.
    Tasmania could be a good idea. launceston and hobart are pretty big and assuming that they make a decent stadium in either city, you could expect gosford size crowds at least.
     
  13. JLSA

    JLSA Member

    Nov 11, 2003

    Three words: PRE SEASON COMP

    As Mango noted, they would presumably be State selections, or League selections - suggesting 1 Vic + 1 ACT.

    J
     
  14. Gold is the Colour

    Dec 17, 2005
    Perth Australia
    Club:
    Perth Glory
    Nat'l Team:
    Australia
    NSW population is 1/3 of Australias so why the problem with 1/3 of the teams from NSW? My only problem is that if five teams then at least one should be outside of Syndey/ Newcastle/ Woollongong.There is over a million people north of Newcastle in NSW, about the same South/West of Sydney/ Woollongong. Either one is more than the whole of Tasmania or NT or even WA/ SA outside of their capitals. I can't believe someone even suggested Broome compared to country NSW.

    In saying that, any expansion to 16 teams is a LONG way off. If we are talking pre-season comp then it should be a "Champions league" style for the lesser teams, with some sort of play-offs to see who gets in - otherwise how do you know who deserves it.
     
  15. Crowdie

    Crowdie New Member

    Jan 23, 2003
    Auckland, New Zealand
    In five years time I can see O'Neil adding at least one Asian team to the league, from Singapore for example, as well as giving the Australian teams that did not meet the initial standard, nearly always for being ethnicly based, a chance to show that they now meet the required standard.
     
  16. Paul Marcuccitti

    Paul Marcuccitti New Member

    Jan 5, 2006
    Adelaide
    I have been praying that the required standard includes an unwritten rule that bans those ethnic clubs from ever participating in the A-League.

    Allowing teams like Melbourne Knights, South Melbourne and Adelaide City into the A-League is a sure way of destroying its future.

    www.planetworldcup.com
     
  17. Crowdie

    Crowdie New Member

    Jan 23, 2003
    Auckland, New Zealand
    What of the first things I remember O'Neil ever saying after leaving the ARU and joining Soccer Australia, as it was then, is that the ethnic clubs had to change. He made no bones about it. The rule banning ethnic clubs in the A-League was well known and all the clubs who applied for entry certainly knew about it but the majority of clubs who failed to gain entry into the A-League did because of that rule. There has been a lot of talk about the Knights taking a position in the A-League from an Australian club and this is just not true. Soccer NZ and the FFA had already agreed that a NZ based club would be in the A-League BEFORE the FFA reviewed the Australian applications. Australia, like New Zealand, is a multicultural country and being multicultural is not about tolerating other cultures - it is about accepting them.
     
  18. pozz

    pozz New Member

    Jan 16, 2006
    Melbourne
    there's quite an accomplished stadium slightly north of the melbourne cbd that's recently been vacated by its tenant. The 40,000 capacity stadium and top notch grass is going to waste.

    How long till FFA create a Princes Park based A-League team???
     
  19. FAR-QUE

    FAR-QUE New Member

    Dec 10, 2005
    well what about ROAR?
    surely you know about the ROAR/Lions/Hollandia history?
     
  20. Champagne Football

    Champagne Football New Member

    Dec 5, 2004
    Melbourne, Australia
    Been there, done that....:rolleyes:
     
  21. Paul Marcuccitti

    Paul Marcuccitti New Member

    Jan 5, 2006
    Adelaide
    Firstly, I wholeheartedly support the inclusion of NZ Knights and hope that they will be more competitive next season. I have written many articles on www.planetworldcup.com about Oceania - I couldn't be accused of not caring about the region. One of my last pieces ( http://www.planetworldcup.com/GUESTS/paul20060105.html ) lamented Oceania's plans for the next four years because they do little to help NZ prepare/qualify for the 2010 World Cup finals. I want NZ soccer to succeed.

    On to your point about multiculturalism. Well, hello, my surname doesn't exactly suggest that I'm a descendant of 18th century colonials, does it? Until a few years before it left the old National Soccer League, I attended Adelaide City (Juventus) matches. City is backed by Adelaide's Italian community (well, some of it anyway) and my parents are Italian migrants so it was a natural fit. But only 2,000 - 3,000 spectators turned up every week and most were Italian.

    Perth Glory showed everyone in the NSL that people would flock to matches if a team represented its city, not just one of its communities. And, thankfully, before the NSL's last season, Adelaide City withdrew to South Australia's State League and, at short notice, Adelaide United was born. Now it's a minimum of 10,000 at Hindmarsh Stadium and a few matches are filled to its 15,000 capacity.

    To be truly multicultural, A-League clubs need to represent everyone, not just individual ethnic communities.

    Yes, and I even attended Adelaide City v Brisbane Lions matches many years ago. And guess what? I have no issue with Queensland Roar's heritage.

    I didn't really think I needed to spell it out but the real problem with some of the ethnic clubs is the nationalism that goes with them. It just turns other supporters away and, in some cases, leads to clashes between rival fans. It still happens in some State League matches (Sydney United v Bonyrigg Eagles, anyone?) and the A-League doesn't need it.

    [Do Queensland Roar / Brisbane Lions / Hollandia express Dutch nationalism? Are there hateful chants about Belgians or Germans emanating from the stands? Do your online message boards include stories that boast about clashes with other supporters? I think the answer to all those questions is no.]

    It doesn't matter how you re-badge or market teams like Melbourne Knights, South Melbourne, Adelaide City, Marconi, Sydney United, etc. They will always attract their own communities and other supporters will always be reluctant to attend their matches. And the result will be that, financially, those teams will fail in the A-League.

    www.planetworldcup.com
     
  22. pozz

    pozz New Member

    Jan 16, 2006
    Melbourne
    Lol, nah i'm not suggesting a revamp of the good old Carlton SC. An AFL aligned club was never gonna work. But such a good oval is going to waste.

    I could throw a few names up for a team there.
    Melbourne North FC, Northern United or Northern Aligned?
    Something that isnt based in one suburb specifically but that covers all the northern metropolitan area of melb.
     
  23. Champagne Football

    Champagne Football New Member

    Dec 5, 2004
    Melbourne, Australia
    But Princes Park is only about 7 or 8km from Olympic Park. Is that really far enough to justify a separate venue? If there was going to be a second Melbourne team, it will be after the initial 5 year moratorium, by which time the new rectangular stadium is built next to the current Olympic Park stadium. Surely the second team would share that stadium withe Melbourne Victory (and Melbourne Storm in NRL) to offset the costs. (The other problem with Princes Park is the oval playing surface.)
     
  24. MVFC

    MVFC New Member

    Jul 17, 2005
    Melbourne 5-0
    Bitter VPL supporter?

    :rolleyes:
     
  25. MVFC

    MVFC New Member

    Jul 17, 2005
    Melbourne 5-0
    I would not want to go to Princes Park/Optus Oval for Victory games. My fellow supporters agree.


    And what does the Melbourne Victory marketing manager have to say on the matter of Princes Park?


    Oympic Park is fantastic. The Terraces are quailty.

    Our new stadium will be amazing.
     

Share This Page