Absolutely. Gives pause to ask the question as to the ability of the NPL sides to potentially move up to the A League, or A2. any benchmarks better than none.

All we need then is the criteria that the FFA set out to really make a meaningful debate about expansion possible.

Top 10 places should be reserved exclusively for the HAL franchises

Not if Green Gully knocks off CCM.

Me too. The FFA Cup, NPL Champs and NYL are the only competitions that help to calibrate the different leagues. But the FFA Cup is the only one that includes the A-League clubs.

The more A-league vs non-A-League games that are played, the better idea we'll have about the gap between Tier 1 and Tier 2.

Out of interest I've used the current rankings (and a few extra inputs) to calculate some match odds for the first FFA Cup game day.

Take them with a grain of salt!

Love it all! =d>

Blacktown and Sydney United is gonna be juicy.

damn straight. if only the ffa was transparent.

love how melbourne city are third. im a supporter, but i dont know how that works considering they havent done shit.

They are being rewarded for consistency. City finished 5th and 4th in the last two seasons, whereas Sydney had a great 2014/15 season but fell away in 2015/16. On the other hand, Wanderers had a great 2015/16 season, but had to play catch up after a poor 2014/15 season and are still behind City in the rankings.

This graph is messy, but shows the movement of the A-League clubs over the last two seasons. Interestingly, you can also see the effect of the FFA Cup pushing the overall league higher from one season to the next.

Disappointing they haven't been given their Wiggles colours

Victory > Juve and Atletico.

Surely we can factor in some bonus ranking points there ;) :lol:

Your odds picked all four results - are you going to do the same for this weeks games?

Well ELO's would equal us shooting up big time.

-PB

Funnily enough, both clubs' current ELOs are lower than ours. :lol:

I'll take 3 out of 4, which still isn't bad! The Hume v Marconi game ended in a draw, so can't count that one.

I'll do the same thing for this week's games after I update the table in the morning.

Mariners and Blacktown will probably trade spots. Will be funny.

Updated to 31st July.

The big change to note this week is Blacktown City moving ahead of Central Coast Mariners into 11th. The win against Sydney United in the FFA Cup wasn't enough by itself, but the 4 goal margin made the difference.

Biggest upsets of the week:

- Avondale (57) def. South Melbourne (15) 3-1 (VIC NPL)
- Western Strikers (124) def. Port Adelaide Pirates (94) 3-0 (SA State League 1)
- Werribee City (139) def. Moreland City (116) 5-1 (VIC NPL1 West)

FFA Cup Game Day 2 odds, as per the elo rankings.

If only it was Bentleigh v CCM instead of Green Gully...

Mariners :lol:

Green Gully > Mariners.

The ranking system works.

ELO's for lyphe

-PB

Can't wait to update the rankings!

Game Day 3 odds as per the ELO rankings.  No prediction for the Surfuers Paradise game because they're not on the rankings list yet.

How much was the league vector change between NSW and VIC because of the Hume City Marconi draw? Was it much? Obviously it will get hidden a bit now because of VIC's win over the A-League.

Hume City were expected to win quite easily.  So apart from the direct exchange of points from Hume to Marconi, every NSW team gained approx. 4.8 points and all VIC clubs lost approx. 3.7 points.  

Might not sound like a lot to each club, but overall that's 126 points from VIC to NSW.

I couldn't wait until Monday to update the list after the two big FFA Cup upsets.  So here is a little teaser:

Lol oh dear

Haha wow!

How far up have Gully moved?

Adelaide still on top!?

Damn. 

16 team HAL comp please!