TERMS:

1. Without ethnic backing
2. In any sport
3. Below professional level

Going through some old state attendances, I realised how high they were and how reliant they were on ethnic communities. Is second tier sport a fallacy in this country? Is it possible without an established community backing it?

Link for those interested - http://www.ozfootball.net/ark/States/VIC/2005PLR.html

Edited by SoccerLogic: 10/5/2016 11:07:02 AM

What's your definition of strong following? Are we talking regular crowds above 5,000? or more?

South Hobart looks strong.

wollongong wolves

A lot of players in the Shire go through Sutherland Sharks so if they had an A-league team, I'm pretty sure the club would be well supported. People in the Shire are very loyal to the area.

Sutho loyal
All 80 people who attend
The loyal group are Wolves

we probably average 250-400 home supporters each game, not too far behind Olympics crowds except we usually wait til the 90th minute before heading home.

I agree, we would be a good candidate for a second division when it comes along. Wollongong wolves are well supported along Northern Fury still get have a decent following also I think.

Got him.

:lol:

Most of the new country outfits in Victoria seems to go between 100-150 a game, and less if the weather is bad.

In Melbourne proper it's really only the mv npl outfit, not much happening there aside from when 50 odd nt members that decide to rock up to select games.

When a club has no chance of being promoted to the top, I'm not surprised people don't go to watch. If it was in the A-league, it would be a different story. The club has played an important part in football in the Shire.

People in general do not watch 2nd tier sports in this country, obviously the ethnic clubs are still capable of occasionally pulling decent numbers on the back of history and decade long rivalries with other teams within the same division, aside from that if you have no prospects of leaping up to a higher division most wouldn't see the point. The same would apply to the state based Aussie rules teams as well.

Edited by southmelb: 10/5/2016 08:45:46 PM

The Sydney Rugby union competition seems to get decent second tier crowds. I went to a local game last season and would have been over 2000. They seem to engage the local comunity better and get more coverage than the NPL. Having a live game a week on FTA would help that also.

Good point SuthoFan.
As much as I dislike to contribute on this code private school 1st grade rahrah here in Syd gets sound weekly support and at derby time up 2k as mentioned.
I've heard it and seen it, glad the top end management of their code have gone pear shaped to date.

The National Rugby Union comp is probably Australia's strongest 2nd tier, but is really like a 1.5 tier lol. Do any Rugby League clubs get good crowds in the NSW comp?

Here in VIC the VFL crowd numbers are just below 1000 and this is with AFL team representation... NPL here gets around 500 with the biggest crowd puller South, Knights and Bulleen.

The Newtown Jets still get half decent crowds. They've got a good following.

What kind of crowds do they get?



Yeah IIRC Port are a pretty sad story I reckon. Nearly got admitted to the AFL (VFL back then) in the 1920's but Richmond won the place because Port's fans were too feral.

They've got a passionate following and storied past.They're like the South Melbourne of the AFL :P

But seriously these guys were apparently more Collingwood than Collingwood...

A couple of years ago I remember seeing a very, very old woman with a blue and white Williamstown VFL team scarf, but she has most likely passed away by now, long after most of the popular support for the older VFA (now VFL) teams before the VFL (now AFL) breakaway.

I never thought about this before, but in many ways the VFL clubs breaking away in the 1890's was a lot like the foundation of the A-League, but 110 years previous. :lol:

It's not bad. They've got a pretty loyal following in the Inner West, playing in the Toyota Cup (or whatever it's called these days). I'd say they easily average a couple thousand per home game at Henson Park.

Each home game is ironically announced that there's 8,972 in the ground. Never near that much, but that's a throwback to their final ever home game crowd in the old ARL in 1983.