The thing that annoys me most is when people who oppose it put it down as some sort of European wet dream, the reality is those who follow an npl club follow this format, on Monday night I'm watching south Melbourne travel to newly promoted bulleen, they will kick, scratch, park the bus and do whatever possible to take points off us..why? Because they want to remain in the division and avoid relegation, this is football, real football, if people actually step outside the A league bubble they would realise this concept is part of what we follow year in year out, hell we almost got relegated in 2008. Promotion/relegation is not just a European thing, thousands of supporters in this country live it week in week out.

I agree, however I am not opposed to a finals series either. That there aren't many professional clubs and the draw rigging makes the FFA Cup not as good as it potentially could be. The finals is the best simulation of end of tournament (wc & ac) knock out conditions. Apart from the ACL, but not as many players get exposure to that.

Correct, and it is an admission by the FFA that most of their franchises could not stand without the protection of an enclosed environment. This is the problem, and until the FFA and A League are separated, we will never get a second tier, promotion/relegation or genuine development of the top tier.

The problem needs to be addressed in this way, and from the AFC (both the FFA and A League apparatchiks are conflicted) as it is their right to demand that we conform to their policies wrt promotion and relegation.

How it be done, I suggest the only viable way is for aggrieved NPL clubs to develop a proposal for a second tier. Properly documented with teams, potential sponsors, budget, media content etc and put it to the FFA, knowing it will be knocked back. Then take it to the AFC (via the back of a truck), to show them that the rubbish the FFA tell them regarding viability is incorrect. Then, and only then, will the AFC be in a position to force the issue.

Aren't we taking about he same clubs that crippled and ultimate ruin end the NSL through politics and self interests?

Unless there's been a massive shift in that then the old saying, fool me once shame on you, fool me twice shame on me rings true

Being interstate it would nice if someone could elaborate on that for me

just because you follow a team. doesn't mean you have a right to follow it in the A-league ,,,Australian football, the A-league can not afford having a teams like Dordrecht (eredivisie) make the A-league, we can not afford the risk of having the wrong teams from he wrong city make the A-league ...FFA can just not take the risk

NPL teams, state local teams, do not have a fucking right to play in A-league

when Dordrecht played in eredivisie last season, it's highest paid players was on €2000 euros a month, and they had home crowds of 3500 people....no wonder there no player in eredivisie being paid more then €1m a year now...



Edited by adrtho: 11/3/2016 08:58:03 AM

This isn't a bad idea. Two others I like:

2 tiers of 10 playing each other twice and then the other tier once, pro/rel one team in a playoff
Create APL through best of NPL and other teams working towards full A-League membership. Pro when they meet the requirements, no relegation until generations have grown up with the club.

Either way the idea is not going to happen now no matter how romantic it sounds. Our top tier needs to be sustainable, then we need an actual second tier, and of both tiers we need supporters to bring in the revenue.

None of that will happen overnight.

mostly yes.....

Really soccer Australia crippled the NSL, the NSL clubs themselves as proven by the past decade are built to last, politics and self interest will forever be part of the game.

What you have posted has nothing to do with my promotion/relegation comment, where my point was that for a lot of us it's not just a foreign concept on the other side of the world, some of us grew up having it as kids in the NSL up until the mid 90s and we still have it today in the npl, for us it's reality not a eurosnobs wet dream, that's my point.

As for who belongs in what league, I've always believed on field results should dictate what division a team plays in, by the same token the ffa really had no right to boot my team out when they finished the last NSL season as semi finalists...we have just as right to be there as the Mariners...who in the real world would be preparing for local football next year. If Dordrecht are good enough to make the eredivisie then good luck to them, they earnt it, they couldn't cut it once in and they went down, again tough luck, point is they have their destiny in their own hands, that's exactly where every football club wants to be.

This was my comment to the article from yesterday that is still pending :P

I agree Les that we have the support and ambition to have a national professional second division. The policy for promotion and relegation should be approached in a staged approach with the pyramid system setup first. Ideally in my eyes you would have the A-League 1 as the top division, A-League 2 as the second division and the regionalised NPL league system as the third division with of course the state leagues acting as the fourth division. If in the future we ascertain enough support for a national professional third division to come into being then that can easily slot into the system.

I would argue that this second division can be established sooner rather than later as initially a stand-alone league, similar to the NASL in the US. You can incorporate a mix of established clubs to step up and take on any proposed new club bids. You just need to set out a well thought of set of criteria to meet and you should be able to get a good group of clubs together from across Australia.

You allow the league to establish itself and capture its following before moving to introduce promotion to the A-League 1 and relegation to the NPL. A good example of this transition league from a set league to a regionalised lower division and how they work out promotion and relegation is the 3.Liga in Germany. But by not implementing promotion and relegation straight away it allows the powers to be to establish the league far sooner than it would otherwise be willing to. The benefits of establishing the second division outweigh the promotion/relegation mechanism in my view and that should be the primary priority.

Les, you mention the US situation of a closed shop vs open league structure. It is an interesting one now in the US with where football has progressed in that country. You see rapid expansion of the MLS with quite a number of the new clubs not being made from scratch but instead ‘promoted’ from the second and third divisions in America. Portland Timbers, the current champions, is a prime example. The US has put a lot of work in place in really setting up the football pyramid in the US and really it now shows with these lower clubs applying for entry into the MLS that they whole system is ready to be interlinked. The US did a good job at establishing the levels and the clubs and now is the time to open things up. It does provide an interesting perspective to Australia on a potentially good route to take to get to the stage when promotion/relegation can naturally be implemented into the system with a minimisation of potential risks. The US is perhaps not going to take this step but that does not mean it is not a good path to take to get to this step.

The last point I wanted to make is in regards to “Would say a ten team second division be viable?” I really believe we should be striving for 12 team first and second divisions in Australia rather than 10. Ten teams create a situation of too short a league season with clubs playing each other too often. Twelve teams to me makes for a far more interesting league season overall.

I think the lack of foresight and ambition by the FFA in both its newly coined ‘4 year plan’ and its longer Whole of Football plan towards reaching out to the wider footballing community in Australia shows that it will fail in its efforts to capture more of the grassroots football community by getting the grassroots to support an A-League club. For me personally I have waited since the inception of the A-League for a team to support. I follow the league intently but I am always frustrated not to have a team to call my own. With no end in sight to Canberra getting a team in the A-League and no prospect of a national second division I feel I can be connected only so much to the league, so how is the FFA connecting with me and others like me?

Perhaps in retrospect the FFA should have immediately implemented the one major recommendation regarding the football league structure in Australia within the 2003 Crawford Report, and setup an independent organisation, under licence, to run the national soccer league (Recommendation 46, p.12). If an independent organisation was running the A-League perhaps its objectives and timeframes would be a little different to the FFA today.

good read.

there seems to be a lot of momentum from the extended football family for the move towards expansion and p/r - particularly with the intent of opening up access of the top tier to most of football - which is not represented by the 10 franchises.

the resistance from the ffa seems strong. probably they push the message firmly to try and build confidence and stability in the existing setup. im not convinced that their public position is internal.

there is going to have to be change within the ffa for p/r to happen. my guess is they need at least 3 things to happen before they change their position and publicly state so. i dont completely agree with this, but i can understand where they are coming from.

1. they need to sell newcastle. they need it to look like a safe investment. risking the slip - or future - slip into a 2nd tier is probably a concern. they also need to ensure the investment into current HAL clubs.

2. they will need to sign off the next TV deal. any risk of change is probably a concern for a TV deal. they want a solid - consistent product to sell.

3. expand and settle the new teams. again they will be relying on being able to ensure that an investment wont slip into a 2nd division in the near future.


considering how risk averse the ffa is presenting, i cant see their position change until they manage the above 3 financial moves. then things might change publicly.

I checked with a pretty cluey lawyer and apparently there is no law in Australia that states if the FIFA approved national football association in Australia introduces P/R, they must invite every NSL team to the second tier

Does that help?

x 9999999999

Plus just about all of South America, Africa, Asia... Only North America and Australia appear to operate completely without promotion/relegation from the top division. But those against keep on repeating the Eurosnob wet dream routine, because it's easier than actually discussing the issues.

when i grew up as a kid, to give the son a bit of a beating when he did wrong was part being a good father , it not today ...just because something happen when you was a kid, and you have fond memories, doesn't mean it the best way today

your team doesn't have any right, this is a mistake you and other like you are making ...you team has no right to ever play in the A-league

the A-league was set up, to make sure the right teams (image) was played in the right city (money), with the right people involved

the old way failed in Australia, just as it is now failing in most European countries

:lol:

because that what is is for 95% of you on here...a Eurosnob wet dream

again, the only 2 non P/R league are A-league and MLS.....and both those league have a long term tend that is up

Wtf is a long term tend. If anything you sounds pro pro/rel. Idiot. :lol:

>only eurosnobs want p/r
>mls and a league are the only leagues in the world without it

So its not just a eurosnob thing and in fact it has very little to do with being a eurosnob.

you, shouldn't use the word idiot so much

Don't deflect.

Edited by TheSelectFew: 11/3/2016 11:52:10 AM

It's explained to you that practically the whole footballing world has promotion/relegation, having previously been explained that even Australia has it below the HAL... Then you yourself note that only the MLS and HAL don't have it... Yet you continue to believe it's a Eurosnob issue.

Surely Eurosnobs wouldn't care about promotion/relegation in Australia, because it's beneath them as they wish to follow Barcelona, Man Utd, Bayern Munich, etc. Snobs wouldn't have any interest at all in South Melbourne or Marconi, or whoever, being a part of the A-League.

And no doubt the 50 blokes in the crowd are enthralled by the whole affair

And yet Mls has higher crowds and greater commercial success than many European leagues

it is on here.....EuroSnobs want things to be like it is in Europe

EuroSnobs doesn't mean just to follow European football league or team , it also means that only Europe know something about football, and Australia can never do something better then Europe in regards to Football

If money equaled development china would have won the wc a couple of decades back.

All of Asia , South America and Africa are eurosnobs. Tardtho facts. Idiot.

Edited by TheSelectFew: 11/3/2016 12:16:33 PM

you're not even a muppet