Wmg should poach Ronaldo, he is a 30 something now..

Has the shovel ready stadium started yet?

I think wmg will bring in Mario balloteli

Curious, will be interesting to see where that goes.

https://theworldgame.sbs.com.au/we-ll-re-ignite-the-a-league-s-spark-claim-western-melbourne

Same, same really for the most part, but the info about playing up to 4 games in ‘suburban centres’ was interesting.

Does that refer to locations in the western suburbs, or a strange interpretation of saying a regional city like Ballarat?

As has previously been discussed, maybe it will look at the Whitten Oval in Footscray, Knights Stadium in Sunshine or at a stretch trying to play a match at Avalon Airport Stadium in Werribee. Surely it doesn’t intend to play at AAMI Park.

Would all depend on what the FFA and Foxtel allow too, considering the reasoning given as part of the winning bid press conference about top class stadiums.

Australia's football stats are similar to Sweden in many ways.
From registered players to crowd figures and so on.
We are more inline to a football nation with a pop of 8-9 million such as Sweden
The other 16 million Australians are either hostile or indifferent so shouldn't be a part of the conversation .Unfortunately the FFA has spent too much time trying to court the other 16 mill and neglected the population already engaged in football to some degree.
When people say Syd FC's crowds are terrible for a city of 5 mill what does that mean.How many follow sport?How many follow football? how many don't follow WSW?
All of a sudden it doesn't look so bad and is similar to Malmo FC
Strategies need to be based around this

'West Melbourne', or 'Western Port Phillip and Corio', might  geographically capture the target market. Otherwise Western Districts? 

West Metro FC

What we have in Australia is a quite low take up of the game.  In the big countries with a well developed football culture 8-10% of the population are registered players.  In Australia it averages 2.2%.  In NSW and the ACT it's 4.0% while in the rest of the country it averages 1.5% with only Tasmania above 2.0%.

If the quality of our elite players is going to match the well developed countries then we need to quadruple the number of registered players we have and develop our player pathways to cope with the number of talented players that will bring.  Thats a task that will take decades to achieve (if ever).

The question that needs to be discussed is how do we grow the whole football ecosystem for us to become a regional and world football power?  I'd suggest that the A-League has a big role as the shop front of the game and that we need to consider moving part of that shop front out of the centres of the major cities to the suburbs where appropriate and we need to include major regional cities as well.  We also need to understand that each market is different so the strategies for growth need to be targeted for each market.  Of course the A-League is only a part of the ecosystem and the strategies for the rest of the game need to be specific for the needs of each market as well.

Scott Brown

could west melbourne possibly have a marquee player lined up?

Maybe they promised ffa they could get a big fish and that's one of the reasons they got chosen 

Growth corridor is stupid though. It doesn't reward sporting merit, rather commercial merit.

speaking from a Melbourne perspective, all of the suburban AFL grounds closed in the 80s and 90s and centralised into 2 stadiums. In that time, metro Melbourne has expanded considerably. Werribee wasn't even considered part of metro melbourne 25-30 years ago. It was a country town.

The HAL now has a great chance to reverse this trend by decentralising and bringing professional sports backs to the burbs, or "growth corridors" as they now call it. there is a unique opportunity for football here and I am wrapped that the FFA are looking to take advantage of it. its the best way to bring new fans to our game as the demographic are generally young familes and usually have a higher percentage of immigrants who love football.

MSWS fits this bill as well. I read somewhere that the Wests Tigers are relocating to the new stadium in Parramatta. are there any other tenants at campbelltown stadium now apart form MSWS? or will MSWS now have the stadium to themselves? 

it will be about as interesting as going out to any other housing estate

There'll be a whole commercial development around it including office buildings, so I'm sure there'll be facilities like that, hopefully they don't feel too soulless as you mention.

You'd hope that part of this development includes a couple of bars in the area because it looks pretty bleak getting a drink anywhere else in the area and having a couple of good bars is important to a good match day culture. Have a feeling though that even if they do, it'll end up being like those soul sucking venues around Homebush.

using an expression like "growth corridor" allows them to avoid what they really want to say:  we don't want no effniks!!

True,

but has this what it has come to ?

We are now assuming that the FFA CEO is lying about everything and we need to debate the opposite

Will the game ever reach a point where we never have to hear the words “growth corridor” spoken again?

I can't believe that you of all people are basing an argument on the idea that the FFA wouldn't contradict themselves.

Yep it's really arse about. No sensible person is doubting the value that stadium ownership brings to the bid, but firing the gun before that bullet is loaded makes the whole thing go off half-cocked. Much better to show some imagination, courage and leadership and plan at least a few years ahead and award them a licence as a 13/14th or 15/16th club once they're ready rather than saying "right, in you go" with no home a few months from kickoff. Compared to Japan's 100 year plan that's nothing.

Who says they do ?

FFA say they won't.  I've seen nothing to the contrary

$$$

Yeah, the 3-year limbo is baffling when other options would be ready to go. I'd be very interested to hear what the FFA's justification is. 

Amazes me that a new club will need to resort to playing in Ballarat in front of 1500 people. Should have just been given a licence, guarantee to come into the comp in 3 years when the stadium is ready. Canberra should be the ones playing next season, or even South Melb. 

Pity they never finished the whole design:

https://www.austadiums.com/stadiums/stadiums.php?id=417

Throw in some temp stands and it seems very workable.

its my understanding that this is definitely an option, especially in January when Kardinia Park will probably be unavailable due to the BBL. Morsehead Park is quite a nice little upgraded Football facility.