I'd love to see the specifics because the players sure as hell aren't seeing much of it. 

Plutomania.

There is that temptation of a World Cup or Olympic medal up for grabs with AFL I guess.So an extra 5k will be an added bonus..
Maybe if all goes well they can dress in lingerie?

To tell you the truth I think Israel Folau felt guilty for earning so much money for a sport he had no idea how to play. I hope they spend more to lure him back. It would be a complete waste of money and I love when the AFL wastes money. 

Idk how Sheedy remains a legend in AFL culture when he just comes up with the dumbest (and most offensive) shit to get his name in the paper.

I'd say he was a major reason in why so many people in the West hate the Giants in the first place.

I noticed how you ignored the $1.5 million isn't new money, but repurposed.

Sheedy has lost his marbles.Which seems to be a disease spreads throughout AFL land at the moment.
Maybe he is receiving a commission for NRL converts?

It is part of Holden's original $3 million per annum sponsorship package to Collingwood, but Holden has insisted that half be directed towards the womens team (or Collingwood were going to lose it entirely if they did not agree).

Because when Eddie McGuire outed himself as your garden variety domestic violence advocate Holden forced them to divert the funds to womens programmes to compensate for the brand damage to them.

The best thing about Sheeds' crazy ideas.... is the AFL gags for them. I remember when he was well past it, coaching the Greatest Waste of Money Giants, and he just brain farted this idea out of nowhere that the Swans derby game needed a name like "the battle for the bridge." It was just so cheesy, I couldn't stop laughing at it.






About 3 weeks later the ads were running on Foxtel for the Battle of the Bridge.

I think that you can rest assured that this was all scripted for him days if not weeks before he was interviewed.

How does the bridge relate to western Sydney though. 

It's not about Sydney, it's about projecting strength in Sydney to the plebs in Melbourne. They could call Sydney v GWS the Battle of DeeWhy for all they care

This is true. 

You can see it from parts of Drummoyne.

Agree. This has the potential to have disastrous consequences. Plus, as I've pointed out before. Football needs to start making inroads against Aussie Rules on all levels in order that it can get some kind of influence in Australia's sporting cultural landscape.

The majority of children in Australia have a mother. Her tastes will have some influence in what they do (or at least, when you've got enough mothers who like such and such, it's influential).

When women and men alike have been brought up playing football, it's far more likely they'll bring their children up playing football and supporting the NT and an A-League team. Punching the women's game in the guts is massively unhelpful.

Australian football has had a national, televised womens league for how long? Australia has an international womens team that plays in... how many recognised world competitions? There are pro/semi pro womens competitions in how many other countries? And the AFL hacks together an 8 team comp in Melbourne and throws a wopping 25k a a marquee per club and 5k at the rest... and we are supposed to be making inroads in to them? Here's a question for you. If 5k doesn't cut it for an aussie fools player then why don't they have a crack at pro womens sockah in Australia..... or America...is the sky falling on them now?

I've got an idea for how women's AFL can suffer big time and football can be painted in a really good light in terms of encouraging girls to play it.

The trouble is that it would require very aggressive marketing from the FFA and would have a backlash. It would be regarded as backwards in terms of how women should view themselves.

But I suspect it would be rather effective.

The sky isn't falling. It's more of the same. The AFL being parochial, defensive and aggressive all in one. Needlessly. And this time tapping into progressive ideas of women in sport (professional and grassroots). This is something that it's very difficult to criticise without looking like a tosser. It suits the AFL's agenda perfectly. I'll make myself like just that and say that, yes I'm all for women in sport, but the AFL's attempts to gain athletes from other sports makes me just about vom.

As for women foregoing a measly five grand to have a crack at sockah...

I don't know enough about the women's game (as in I don't speak much to people involved), but I'd suspect that a girl without the technical skillset for football (brought about through playing for ages) is not about to acquire that skillset at the drop of a hat (unlike with Aussie Rules ;) )

That plus people don't tend to think outside the box.

Are we sure that the women just get 5 grand for women's AFL? How much does the average W-League girl get? Surely it must be more (or maybe sponsorship benefits?) for them to consider jumping ship.

Assuming this article has a reasonable amount of merit

The Womens AFL pays 25k for a marquee, 10k for the top draft picks, down to 5k for the rest. It has 8 teams and 1.6 million for wages. Take consideration of the far larger squad size for an aussie fools club. This is total payments including superannuation and doesn't include insurance. 

The W League has a 150k wage bill per club.

So at 200k per AWFL club, with twice as many players to share it, and no possibility for the best players to earn match payments from a national team, and literally no other competition in the world to ply their trade..... the AFL wage "danger" claim is utter bs. 

The article in the OP is targeted squarely at the FFA and represents the interests of the football players union, nothing more.

Then why are this lot, allegedly, giving serious consideration to jumping ship? There must be something other than financial motives (which is possibly more disturbing, if true).

It would be interesting to hear, anecdotally, from posters who may know girls in the W-League and their thoughts on all this.

It is standard hyperbole from a union in any industry.

That's right, nevertheless it's a $1.5 million annual sponsorship package directed at the new womens football team.

Do you want to give up on the living in your home state in the W-League, Matilda's, Olympics, World Cup, moving to a foreign club or an American univerity? We will give you 5k and the chance to move to the shitty suburban parts of Melbourne that we abandoned decades ago?

Nobody could resist that pitch.

It's $5k now but what if, in 3 or 5 years time it was a $30k base salary?  Plenty of the girls currently playing W-League, going by the survey in this or the other thread, may jump ship.

It's a hypothetical of course but it could happen.  More worrying is girls taking up AFL at a social level.  

The neanderthal brigade who think 'women's football is shit' are missing the point as usual.

As an aside it's amazing how so many 'I don't care about women's football' types find the need to constantly denigrate women's football.

30k in this day is still FA. 

For a bloke.

The matildas base wage was $21k until they went on strike.  I think it's now $34k.  But remember that's the 'elite' contracted players.  The W-League lasses are on waaaay less.

I guess this is a Melbourne thing. Sports in Aus have co-existed for centuries just a few zealots and media nutcases behaving badly. Also think there is a bit of an inferior complex on both sides of the fence. For the football fan you should feel complimented that AFL with all there resources keep having to prove how relevant they are.

all of the W-league clubs except Melbourne City are no where near the salary cap (a few seasons ago Sydney Fc wage bill for W-league was $70,000). W-league players without Matildas contract generally earn between $1000 and $6000 a season, although there are a few clubs (Adelaide and Brisbane) where some players don't get paid at all, just costs covered. So the minimum 5000 at the Afl would be tempting to any w-leaguer who is not going to ever be good enough for the national team or playing overseas.

That's right, and it's worth mentioning that $5,000 is the base pay, and I'd say about half the team will be on that, others will be on $10,000 and $15,000 (two marquees will receive an additional $10,000, bringing their pay to $25,000, still on the low  side, but it's a start).

The salary cap is currently $190,000.  Each of the 8 teams will receive $250,000 from the AFL, and total annual costs for the inaugural season are estimated to be $500,000, meaning each club needs to find $250,000 in additional revenue. 

All the clubs already have sponsorships lined up (with Collingwood's womens team receiving $1.5 million from Holden).

What this is telling me is that the 8 clubs are going to cover their costs for the first season with absolute ease, plus some, meaning they can look to increase both teams and salaries from the second season onwards.

At least one game, possibly two, will be on FTA starting next year.