Hey all,

I have been working on a bit of a side project recently for fun (images below), having a crack at re-designing the general A-league logo and it's overall branding as well as most of the foundation clubs crests which would by extension influence a total brand update for each club.

I know I'm not the first or last to have a go a trying out some new logos, as I'm sure most of you agree it's desperately needed for some of the clubs. Having a design background, I see great value and importance in the clubs and the league re-evaluating their brands and how they present football and their offerings to the Australian audience. I think right now so many of the clubs crests and the overall A-league brand lack a thoughtful or well executed representation of their brand, and as a result I think it perpetuates a lack of interest to potential audiences, it come across as a bit tacky from a design / brand point of view and quite honestly it's unappealing, why would you want to support a club that looks amateur and lacks a strong identity - I'm talking strictly in terms of branding here, obviously what happens on the pitch is the biggest factor when it comes to continuing to excite fans, but how you package and sell the game to to the Australian audience is equally as important to generating that interest and excitement. 

With all the talk of expansion and new broadcast deals in the near future, now feels like a critical time in my opinion for the A-league and some clubs to asses their brands and update them to reflect the growth of the competition and hopefully present a bolder, clearer and more concise brand moving forward in order to create a stronger and more appealing offering to those who aren't already invested in the A-league.

Below is a small selection of work from an ongoing project I've put together, I wouldn't say it's finished by any means, there still a lot of tweaking and refinement that can go into almost every part or other Ideas Ive put together but I thought it might be cool to share it as is and hear anyone else's thoughts on it so far & subject in general.

Overall, I wanted the A-league brand to feel more contemporary and visually bold but also clean and simple enough to act as a flexible framework that could be used to create marketing / advertising to promote the game and the 'A-League Brand'.

With the team crests I tried to strike a balance throughout between traditional and modern as well as instil some form of visual connection to the city, area, history etc of the club without it being too in your face.

Anyhow, that's my 2 cents for what it's worth. It would be awesome to see the A-league become the biggest competition in Aus and I think 'Brand' plays a huge part getting there.

Have a looksy and feel free to rip it apart or let me know if you think some of it's got some legs. Any feedback is welcome. 

Cheers lads,
Dave

i like most of what you posted, they mostly look more traditional and less plastic especially the sydney fc and ccm ones

I prefer the current A-league and Sydney logos.

For some reason your design for the a-league makes me think of evil fascist groups in movies. I think it is all the straight lines.

I don't like the balance of the tiny Opera House at the bottom to the mostly blank shield. The warped harbour bridge makes my eyes confused trying to decide if the logo is also warped. The anchor seems a bit to small a fine detail that is going to look like a crap line on an embroidered badge.

I think it's really awesome! I'm a sucker for sexy TV graphics

Should point out you spelt Phoenix wrong, though!

There would be hell to pay if we ever got the English crown on our proud Scottish Club's badge.....

Adelaide badge looks good though.

the a-league branding is wonderful. thats what we need, something more youthful to target the youth. the big bash is winning the marketing war and will continue to win.

Really makes you realise how crappy some of the current logos are.

On this topic, wasn't there meant to be a league wide refresh last season?

-PB

Your work is definitely an improvement.

Yep. Don't worry. I haven't forgot about it. 

CCM one is sick. If only our kit could be the same.

Really good work. 

Particularly like thew MV one.  Would be interested to here what MV supporters think.  (Adelaide and Phoenix are great too.)

Can you put up the Brisbane one if you've done it?

I like the Vuck one, although like MT earlier in the thread I am a tad puzzled as to what the Crown is meant to symbolise - plenty of Vuck supporters are quite proud of their 'anti-establishment' ways, so it seems odd to have reference to a monarchy on our crest. I'm sure Dave has a reason, but as far as symbolism goes you couldn't pick a worse club in the A-League to have a crown as part of their crest haha. I reckon if the crown was removed it'd be an excellent upgrade on what we've currently got.

10/10 dave. Stellar work. Your club logo designs blow what we currently have out of the water. 

Awesome stuff.

With the Jerks could you please re-do it but with emerald&cinnamon as opposed to red/blue? 

Planned for the 2017/18 season.

Mariners one would have to be my fave out of them all. I like the Nix one too, even though it does look a lot like Liverpool

Love everything you've done with the exception of the Phoenix badge, which I think is excellent in its original form and hard to top - and the A-League logo itself, because it kept making me think of a Union Jack.  The rest - outstanding.

Just a thought on the HAL logo - are there 8 chevron things because it was originally 8 teams? Or is that just coincidence?

Should the logo be updated when new clubs are added to the league? 

Doubt it was coincidence but I cannot remember reading anything offical on it.
I remember the Victory joking at the launch that the big V on the top was meant to represent them.

STEVEN LOWY’S OPEN LETTER TO FOOTBALL FANSThe initiatives outlined at Tuesday’s launch include;;•

A refresh of the A-League brand to connect more fans to the competition as viewers, members, ticket buyers and consumers of digital content.• .

http://www.foxsports.com.au/football/a-league/football-federation-australia-to-assist-aleague-clubs-in-luring-international-marquees/news-story/e341f68e0eca221bffcc37341c89cfd4

Winner of Official 442 Comment of the day Award -  10th April 2017

adelaide badge is hot af

In general, these are fantastic and I congratulate you. Your style throughout is clean, sharp, mature and sophisticated; elements which I personally think should be the norm for sporting crests and overall branding. They won't be everyone's cup of tea though. Some thoughts:

• You want 'identity' for each club, yet each crest does seem to have the same style or flavour. Again, I very much like this style, though I feel there should be some individual flavour to each crest.
• I'm slightly worried that your very thin borders and strokes would be hard to actually manufacture in a physical sense/whether the sophisticated details would show up in the real-world.
• Jets logo should start using the F-35 silhouette as opposed to the F/A-18 (nitpick)

Out of all of them, I love Sydney, Adelaide and Wellington (pains me to say it cause it does resemble the liver bird logo of the shite).

Very nice well done. Nix's one is great except the spelling.

Good effort however I don't think the brand (esp. the logos) of the league or the clubs are a big issue. I doubt many people are out there saying if only the had a better logo I'd support them.

The only time a new logo really works is when the old one has a bad reputation. At the moment the A-League and clubs don't have a bad reputation, most just don't have enough marketing savvy.

Good for a bit of fun and pipe dreaming though ....

Just noticed the Adelaide soccer ball logo looks a lot like the champions league logo.



Are you allowed to do that?

Great stuff, especially Adelaide and Perth

Thanks Dave for putting in the time and effort to come up with a design concept project for the A-League. I always appreciate talented people putting in the time to create something for the game.

A-league branding looks brilliant. simplifying the design but keeping the overall concept idea of the original A-League design. It is a contemporary update that stays true to the original concept that is quite unique in the world of football. That concept promotional material really looks spot on to what the league needs. And the match day graphics are cool, clean and distinctive to the brand. It does have a little similarity with the new epl graphics just without the array of pastels.

As for the club crest designs, The Adelaide design is really top notch stuff, though the stars in the centre do look like the UEFA Champions League badge. Wellington design is nice but I do like the current design, I think it is one of the best in the A-league currently. But given the overall design concept you are going with I can see why your re-design works better. That is one of the best Sydney FC crest re-designs I have seen to date. From what I have seen so far the Sydney FC crest seems very tricky to get right for everyone to like, more so than others. The CCM crest is an interesting design. Not my fav I have seen done over the years but it is up there. I'm not such a big fan of the Newcastle or Perth re-designs you have done but that is just me being subjective. The quality of them is good, just not the style I would go with.

All in all brilliant work. Keep it up

The designs are all nice, but the MV one reminds me of Police sleeve rank insignia/stripes

the glory one looks like something straight from football manager create a club mode. love all the others though