More than a game? Or more than Victoria?
Autumn is here. Footy is back. This weekend is the second half of the first (split) round of the Australian Football League (AFL). For the next six months, 18 teams will compete in the competition. Ten from Victoria. Two each from Western Australia, South Australia, New South Wales, and Queensland. As can be seen from these figures, the AFL continues to be dominated by Victorian teams. Even when accounting for Victoria’s larger population (as compared to WA and SA, anyway), this is still a disproportionate number of teams.
But what if this wasn’t the case?
Some quick Fun Footy Facts for my non-Australian readers (and possibly some readers from New South Wales and Queensland):
- The two main codes of football followed in Australia are AFL* and Rugby League. These codes are basically divided along state lines, with Rugby League being the main code in New South Wales and Queensland; and AFL being the football code of choice in Victoria, Western Australia, South Australia, and Tasmania.
- Until the 1980s, each AFL state had its own state-based football league. All were founded in the late 19th century, starting with the South Australian National Football League (SANFL) in 1877, the Tasmanian Football League (TFL) in 1879, the Western Australian Football League (WAFL) in 1885, and the Victorian Football League (VFL) in 1897.
- By the 1980s, the VFL, despite being the “baby” of all the leagues, played the highest standard of football, due mostly to its larger population and better financial resources.
- The VFL turned pro in the 1980s and 1990s, changing its name to the Australian Football League, and admitting teams from other states. (South Melbourne was also relocated to Sydney in 1982 to become the Sydney Swans, and in 1996, the Melbourne-based Fitzroy Lions relocated to Queensland to merge with the Brisbane Bears, forming the Brisbane Lions). The VFL changed its name to the Australian Football League in 1991.
- In the last couple of years, two additional teams from the Gold Coast and Western Sydney respectively, have also been admitted.
The result of having the AFL spawned from the VFL, is that the leagues in WA and SA have declined. Wikipedia indicates that the average attendance at a SANFL match today hovers around the 3000 mark - a far cry from when matches in the 1970s or 80s might attract around 25,000. In addition, much of the footballing history of WA and SA is lost. Most books and articles on AFL which cover the pre-1991 history of the AFL will focus on the VFL, and ignore the history of the WA and SA leagues**.
Remarkably, nearly all of the foundation clubs of the VFL still play in the AFL. To put it in perspective, this would be the equivalent of the original small-town/city clubs such as the Akron Pros, or the Dayton Triangles, still playing in America’s NFL today.
What’s done is done - if the national competition had to have been derived from any of the state-based leagues, it would have been the VFL, as the strongest competition. But it’s nice to think about what could have been.
Take soccer***. In Britain, soccer teams move up and down divisions, according to their performance in the previous season. For example, the bottom two or three teams in the Premier League are relegated to the next tier down (the Football League Championship), whereas the top two or three teams in the Football League Champion get promoted to the Premier League the following season.
Could this have been done in Australia? Could all the state-based teams have merged into the one big system, with the top few teams forming a premier league? Imagine a Grand Final, where Glenelg plays Collingwood, or South Fremantle takes on Hawthorn!
However, I believe this wouldn’t have worked in Australia, for a couple of reasons. Firstly, with Victoria having the numbers and finances, a premier league would have quickly become dominated with Victorian teams anyway (although the traditionally weaker teams such as St Kilda, Footscray, and Richmond would have languished in the lower divisions) with a few of the stronger teams from WA, SA thrown in for good measure. This has already happened a bit in Britain, where the same few teams - Man U, Liverpool, Arsenal and Chelsea, etc - dominate the Premier League.
Secondly, Australia’s geographical size presents another drawback. Whereas the lower division teams in Britain can travel around that small island relatively easily, Australia’s size makes this less feasible. There’s no way a team like Peel Thunder would have the financial resources to fly to the eastern states every fortnight. , the lower tiers would have to fly great distances
What about American football? Wikipedia tells me the NFL has 32 teams playing in two conferences (the National Football Conference and the American Football Conference). Each conference is further divided into four regions - north, south, east and west. Eight teams (four in each conference) play in a region. Teams play most of their games against other teams from the same region. Then the winners of each region/conference, and four wild card teams make the play-offs.
I believe the NFL system would work better for Australia. Obviously, we only need the one conferences, due to Australia’s smaller population. But the competition could be divided up into west (WA), south (SA), east (Victoria and Tasmania) and north (NSW, Queensland). Or you could simply have two regions. North-west (WA, SA and Queensland) and south-east (Victoria, Tasmania and NSW) or however you want to divide it. The top ranked teams from each region would compete in the finals.
Playing most games in the same region would solve much of the travel issue (currently the two teams from WA are at a disadvantage, as they have to fly east for at least ten “away” games. In comparison, a Victorian team might only need to fly four or five times). And because scheduling for the following year is based on the rankings in each region from the previous season, the invariable annual debates over the “fairness” of game schedules would be resolved.
Most importantly, it would ensure a fairer representation of teams across the country, to make it a truly national competition.
*The proper name for this code of football is “Australian Rules Football”, but it has come to be known as “AFL”.
**A similar thing has happened with Rugby League, where the local New South Wales competition has expanded into the national competition, to the detriment of the local Queensland league.
*** Yes, I know it’s technically “football”, but this is Australia, and we call it “soccer”!
But what if this wasn’t the case?
Some quick Fun Footy Facts for my non-Australian readers (and possibly some readers from New South Wales and Queensland):
- The two main codes of football followed in Australia are AFL* and Rugby League. These codes are basically divided along state lines, with Rugby League being the main code in New South Wales and Queensland; and AFL being the football code of choice in Victoria, Western Australia, South Australia, and Tasmania.
- Until the 1980s, each AFL state had its own state-based football league. All were founded in the late 19th century, starting with the South Australian National Football League (SANFL) in 1877, the Tasmanian Football League (TFL) in 1879, the Western Australian Football League (WAFL) in 1885, and the Victorian Football League (VFL) in 1897.
- By the 1980s, the VFL, despite being the “baby” of all the leagues, played the highest standard of football, due mostly to its larger population and better financial resources.
- The VFL turned pro in the 1980s and 1990s, changing its name to the Australian Football League, and admitting teams from other states. (South Melbourne was also relocated to Sydney in 1982 to become the Sydney Swans, and in 1996, the Melbourne-based Fitzroy Lions relocated to Queensland to merge with the Brisbane Bears, forming the Brisbane Lions). The VFL changed its name to the Australian Football League in 1991.
- In the last couple of years, two additional teams from the Gold Coast and Western Sydney respectively, have also been admitted.
The result of having the AFL spawned from the VFL, is that the leagues in WA and SA have declined. Wikipedia indicates that the average attendance at a SANFL match today hovers around the 3000 mark - a far cry from when matches in the 1970s or 80s might attract around 25,000. In addition, much of the footballing history of WA and SA is lost. Most books and articles on AFL which cover the pre-1991 history of the AFL will focus on the VFL, and ignore the history of the WA and SA leagues**.
Remarkably, nearly all of the foundation clubs of the VFL still play in the AFL. To put it in perspective, this would be the equivalent of the original small-town/city clubs such as the Akron Pros, or the Dayton Triangles, still playing in America’s NFL today.
What’s done is done - if the national competition had to have been derived from any of the state-based leagues, it would have been the VFL, as the strongest competition. But it’s nice to think about what could have been.
Take soccer***. In Britain, soccer teams move up and down divisions, according to their performance in the previous season. For example, the bottom two or three teams in the Premier League are relegated to the next tier down (the Football League Championship), whereas the top two or three teams in the Football League Champion get promoted to the Premier League the following season.
Could this have been done in Australia? Could all the state-based teams have merged into the one big system, with the top few teams forming a premier league? Imagine a Grand Final, where Glenelg plays Collingwood, or South Fremantle takes on Hawthorn!
However, I believe this wouldn’t have worked in Australia, for a couple of reasons. Firstly, with Victoria having the numbers and finances, a premier league would have quickly become dominated with Victorian teams anyway (although the traditionally weaker teams such as St Kilda, Footscray, and Richmond would have languished in the lower divisions) with a few of the stronger teams from WA, SA thrown in for good measure. This has already happened a bit in Britain, where the same few teams - Man U, Liverpool, Arsenal and Chelsea, etc - dominate the Premier League.
Secondly, Australia’s geographical size presents another drawback. Whereas the lower division teams in Britain can travel around that small island relatively easily, Australia’s size makes this less feasible. There’s no way a team like Peel Thunder would have the financial resources to fly to the eastern states every fortnight. , the lower tiers would have to fly great distances
What about American football? Wikipedia tells me the NFL has 32 teams playing in two conferences (the National Football Conference and the American Football Conference). Each conference is further divided into four regions - north, south, east and west. Eight teams (four in each conference) play in a region. Teams play most of their games against other teams from the same region. Then the winners of each region/conference, and four wild card teams make the play-offs.
I believe the NFL system would work better for Australia. Obviously, we only need the one conferences, due to Australia’s smaller population. But the competition could be divided up into west (WA), south (SA), east (Victoria and Tasmania) and north (NSW, Queensland). Or you could simply have two regions. North-west (WA, SA and Queensland) and south-east (Victoria, Tasmania and NSW) or however you want to divide it. The top ranked teams from each region would compete in the finals.
Playing most games in the same region would solve much of the travel issue (currently the two teams from WA are at a disadvantage, as they have to fly east for at least ten “away” games. In comparison, a Victorian team might only need to fly four or five times). And because scheduling for the following year is based on the rankings in each region from the previous season, the invariable annual debates over the “fairness” of game schedules would be resolved.
Most importantly, it would ensure a fairer representation of teams across the country, to make it a truly national competition.
*The proper name for this code of football is “Australian Rules Football”, but it has come to be known as “AFL”.
**A similar thing has happened with Rugby League, where the local New South Wales competition has expanded into the national competition, to the detriment of the local Queensland league.
*** Yes, I know it’s technically “football”, but this is Australia, and we call it “soccer”!