^ ughhh reading so many of these posts make me want to bang my head against a wall. It's actually the iq of 2 year olds.

Davo, you are 1000% right, not even a grammar mistake could make you less right.

For those who say we don't need marquees or we don't want to attract the eurosnobs... Get off your high horse. We want this sport to be the biggest in the country, but we don't want euronobs, nor hooligans, nor afl or rugby fans or whatever... Iv heard it all... It's pathetic dick measuring.

We want our game to grow. Why are people who love football and want the a league to succeed arguing about this sort of stuff.

The seasons before adp, sydney averaged 10k ... Now after his gone they average 20k...plus WSW average 15k... Both adp and another team helped grow the exposure of the sport. Adp helped get people through the gates and the majority have stayed since he has gone. From a financial point of view, adp has been the smartest business decision in the a league to date. If anyone wants to question that i'v got plenty of answers to that.

Davo is right, victory and WSW won't financially gain from lashing out on a named marquee. Clubs that should are those who have big markets and room for crowd growth.

Brisbane roar
Melbourne city
Sydney fc

Those 3 clubs can see the biggest return on a big name player and have the markets to do so .

Whilst heskey helped bring in a few extra fans, the population of newcastle is a smudge compared to the big cities so it is harder to see a return.

Melbourne victory is the benchmark of this competition and because they have done so much right. But make no mistake if they were playing in a 50k stadium week in week out. A named marquee player could benefit them just as much as the other 3 clubs I mentioned.

The very fact that the membership pages in this forum this year are a fraction of the sizes of previous years goes to show even those you have the most interest in a league care less about it this year.

FFA know that marquees is a way to ensure the financially viability of the league. This is why they introduced 2 foreign marquees and have even said that they will help fund this. Clubs are stupid if they don't look at the financial success of sydney fc from a result of paying a player 4 million a season which has seen them drop their losses from 7-10mil to only 1-2.... Not to mention how much money adp poured into every clubs coffers when he visited your home ground.

rants pretty much over for now. But I just felt sorry for Davo speaking to people who quite frankly couldn't hold a business type conversation to save themselves. And before you get in about it, this business is about bringing more people to our games. So that one day we have the league we probably all want to see... Not relying on ageing marquee players. But without them ... Clubs aren't making money. Once the fans are in, our market share grows and TV stations pay big dollars for our game... Then we can revisit this argument that we don't need marquees.

But until the a league (not soccer) is considered mainstream and has a substantial market share. Then Im over hearing shit like marquees aren't necessary... Based on one or 2 clubs in the biggest 2 cities in australia who have both had success. And even one of them isn't turning a profit.... Have a little think about that. Even WSW need more money... How do they get this when there stadium is almost at capacity? Sponsorship, TV deal sharings etc.... Which is derived from more people wanting to watch the a league and get involved. It doesn't matter who those people are.

rant over.

Go victory.

From someone who wants the best for this sport in the country and isn't naive.

For fucks sake, how many times do i have to say it that MELBOURNE VICTORY DOESN'T need a high profile player. I have never said they should. in fact it would be wasted if Victory brought in anyone big. Just like it's wasted if WSW do so too, because there's no room left to fill in their smaller stadium.

Sydney FC and Melb City should be the two clubs that every year can afford and have the space to grow (in a large market) to have high profile players.



Edited by Davo1985: 14/9/2015 07:01:26 PM

yeah mate I am serious.

Even just today I spoke to 2 avid football fans who follow the EPL religiously and have attended Sydney FC games previously, however when i asked them whether they would be attending games this year, they answered with this

"Who have they recruited? I've hardly heard anything about it in the news" followed up with, "when they had adp it was awesome, everyone was talking about it. Even i went to a few of games."

Now you might reply with: "well who gives a fuck about those types of euro snobs", but the fact of the matter is that there is a lack of general awareness when we're not in the media's attention, and the media (at least in sydney) mainly take notice when there's hype around profile players.

So although the people i spoke to may never be converted, the result is two fold:
1) Literally less people attending games directly
2) Some people that are initially attracted to the a-league through high profile players may decide to stay around and like what they see and slowly become attached.

In the case of point 2) I know a number of people that have now become members due to the success of ADP coming to play for us.

On a side note, can't you see how a high profile player can also help the smaller clubs in the league by increase gate takings etc, rather than a player that may actually perform better on the field than an older marquee player, but does nothing to bring in the crowds? Crowds that many of these smaller clubs absolutely rely on.

Clubs that can afford to bring in a marquee without reducing their community or youth development commitment are Sydney FC and Melb City. Both of these clubs should be bringing in big profile players.

24,000 MV season ticket holders and not a marquee player in sight....

Are you serious?

Nah but remember when everyone on here was saying that high profile players does nothing to grow the game?...

I've always said we need to have a sprinkle of big name players, at the very least to use as a way to market the game to a larger audience who will then get a taste and get attracted to watching the game in the long term. but you can't do this one year and then stop and hope that the job is done. It needs to be ongoing year after year, that's how we'll be able to keep the game in the limelight in the media and in the attention of the casual viewers.

Then as the quality of the game improves naturally, we'll be less reliant on the high profile players as we will have already won the market over. We're not at that stage yet.

=d> \:d/

Nowhere near as much hype as there was same time last year. It's all about the troubles at Brisbane and the PFA vs FFA.

As much as I don't like a 40 year old ex-superstar running around taking a Visa spot from a still half decent 28 year old, a David Villa or Del Piero type certainly would have helped.

MV 23,261

Yes except Melbourne at that stage was only on 17k. They are now almost at their cap.

The roar is definitely having an impact, so to is city without villa etc. Just curious to know why Adelaide is lagging

Which can be attributed solely to the Brisbane Roar shambles. We're tracking fine, everyone relax.

Surely that 5k is mostly the lack of Roar memberships. Where were they at this time last year?

The total today is about 5k less than the same day last season.

I think you'll see memberships rise in the last 2 weeks before the season. The A-league's had basically no coverage this offseason, apart from the FFA Cup. We missed a massive opportunity when Real Madrid was here, and instead of them doing promotions alongside City and Victory, they were kicking Sherrin footies around the MCG with the AFL fraternity.
I'm not sure where the overall membership numbers will end up, but we need to remember that in these last 4-6 weeks the game has been getting terrible publicity from the Matildas pay and also the whole PFA v FFA war which is still going on, and the debacle at both the Jets and now the Roar.

Can someone explain why Adelaide are down 1,700 from same time last year? Since then they won the FFA cup and got in the finals of the a-league season. Why the sudden drop? Is it because memberships went out later this year?

Btw I read somewhere that City were targeting 13k. not without headlining marquee you don't. Mooy is a great choice considering what he's delivered, but CFG should have at least brought in a high profile plaer to replace Koren who has dont nothing much on the field thus far and certainly done NOTHING in terms of increasing the membership base, despite making the finals last year too.

Brisbane and Newy we're well aware of, but seriously Adelaide and City should be doing better considering where they were last year.

We grew a lil over 1000 in the last week. At this rate we'll be lucky to hit 85k by season's start, which will still be lower than 2013.

Club Total 2015/16 (Total 14/15)

1) Melbourne Victory: 22,755 (24,200)
2) Western Sydney Wanderers: 16,490 (18,706)
3) Sydney FC: 9,258 (11,510)
4) Newcastle Jets: 6,529 (10,003)
5) Melbourne City: 6,264 (11,759)
6) Adelaide United: 4,922 (9,505)
7) Perth Glory : 4,357 (6,298)
8) Central Coast Mariners: 3,621 (6,242)
9) Brisbane Roar: 3,513 (12,113)
10)Wellington Phoenix: 1,867 (4,185)


TOTAL: 79,576 (114,521) ........ as of Round 1 2014 membership count was: 97,252 (rd 1 2013 was 86,352)


Legend: #blue = change < 100 since last update, #violet = change > 100 since last update. #black = no change since update.
Stats are taken from the individual club membership pages, the main a-league tally as well as directly from club representatives.

Wanderers are still edging up. 16490 today.

Wellington are a fucking joke. Fold.

How much have the Jets membership prices changed on the last year.
I notice the bottom is 160 so that seems to be an increase. Pretty good figures if there has been a reasonable raise in the membership fee.

Some good increases by sydney, adelaide, city and even the roar up by over 100

Proper update via a-league website

Melbourne Victory 22,755

Western Sydney Wanderers 16,448

Sydney FC 9,558

Newcastle Jets 6,477

Melbourne City FC 6,222

Adelaide United 4,922

Perth Glory 4,357

Brisbane Roar 3,513

Central Coast Mariners 3,457

Wellington Phoenix 1,867

Goes to show much the big name signings do for the league, regardless of if people think as a league we've passed that stage or not.

MV 22,755

Five weeks to go with many clubs needing to update..

TOTAL: 78,250 ........
as of Round 1 2014 membership count was: 97,252
rd 1 2013 was 86,352

So we are roughly 19K away from last years round 1 figure and 8K away from the the 2013/14 year.

Considering the mess at the Roar, Jerks and MC no big name signing those don't look to bad.

Very slow week in memberships tbh. We're basically 5 weeks away from the start of the season and we still have A LOT of ground to cove if we want to come close to last season, never mind surpassing it.

Obviously expecting a real spike once the Brisbane ownership issues get sorted but even if we increased their membership by 3k-4k the overall figures are still weak. And still not much press talking about our game. Yes im aware it's finals for NRL and AFL, but this time last year we had
articles all over the pace due to the hype of Villa, a high profile player who many people here are against..

Club Total 2015/16 (Total 14/15)

1) Melbourne Victory: 22,104 (24,200)
2) Western Sydney Wanderers: 16,448 (18,706)
3) Sydney FC: 9,149 (11,510)
4) Newcastle Jets: 6,477 (10,003)
5) Melbourne City: 6,216 (11,759)
6) Adelaide United: 4,600 (9,505)
7) Perth Glory : 4,296 (6,298)
8) Central Coast Mariners: 3,621 (6,242)
9) Brisbane Roar: 3,472 (12,113)
10)Wellington Phoenix: 1,867 (4,185)


TOTAL: 78,250 (114,521) ........ as of Round 1 2014 membership count was: 97,252 (rd 1 2013 was 86,352)


Legend: #blue = change < 100 since last update, #violet = change > 100 since last update. #black = no change since update.
Stats are taken from the individual club membership pages, the main a-league tally as well as directly from club representatives.

Edited by Davo1985: 7/9/2015 06:32:18 PM

Latest count is 77,727. (http://www.a-league.com.au/membership)

Hopefully will have a big update this week.

WSW started offering supporter membership during the ACL final to fans that wanted to get in early and attend the ACL final, i believe they added 2-3k during that time which got them past 18k.

Full Ticketed members for WSW last season was over 15k before general public offerings according to this article so its safe to say most of WSW memberships and full season memberships.



http://www.smh.com.au/sport/soccer/aleagues-wanderers-top-the-list-for-membership-sales-in-western-sydney-20140901-10b2tb.html

So this will be the third year in a row the WSW have sold out there 16500k full season memberships.

16396 members atm for a stadium cap of 16500k ticketed member at Pirtek is over 95% renewals.

Edited by Multibet: 3/9/2015 11:14:40 PM

Last season Wanderers progressive total included non ticketed Supporter Members. Assuming they are doing the same this season we have no idea of the number of ticketed members or the number of Supporter Members we currently have and won't until we get the final figure.