"The discussions were highly constructive, with all clubs expressing a shared vision and dedication to creating an NST that serves the interests of all stakeholders."


Hmmm it sounds more like "the highway" ..

It seems like a Greek man hurt him/her/they very badly... Might have even involved stitches and trip to the proctologist. hahahahahahaha 

I hate that I am the eternal doom and gloom poster mate but you really ARE a romantic if you believe that will ever happen. There is too much water under the bridge for a new dam to ever really hold all the leaks. Respect is a two way street and unfortunately the "haves" will ALWAYS fight to ensure they dont become the "have nots" .. Old Lowy really knew what he was doing when he set up a franchise system... 

The APL (and yes I know I come across as a conspiracy theory nut but I really hope the more logical forumites out there can clearly see what is going on now, more than ever) will NEVER allow their franchise licenses to be devalued more than they are now with the threat of relegation ... They dont even want to "allow" the other 1000+ clubs around the country to properly unite under one pyramid in case it becomes too successful and devalues their closed off league even more ( if there is another logical reaosn for them fighting so hard against it I am open to hearing what that is btw) ...

In a way I understand the foreign ownership groups fighting so hard to protect their marketplace, what I really dont understand is how hard some of their customers fight to make sure their way is the ONLY product on the market... How would it harm the average Aleague fan if there where another 10, 20,30 teams in Australia pushing to be professional? Are they scared of losing what little fan support they have left? Surely the shitty Monoethnic Social Clubs aren't that much of a threat? Why all the bile?

I'm hunting down old socceroos games (triantis is playing for an academy but don't ahve a stream) I wish I could find that 2-0 confed cup win against mexico

Yep, well put, it's disheartening.
Man that NovelStructure redditor won't let up, like they have some sort of personal vendetta against the NST. I'm still reading all the comments whilst watching big Ange.

There definitely needs to be respect on both sides, but ive always felt that if one side is more priveledged and powerful than the other, they have more responsibility to be magnanimous

Like us a league fans could tune out and ignore nst people if they annoyed us and we get to watch  our teams compete at the highest level with no cap on our ambition. Would it kill other a league fans to be magnanimous and say "man that sucks, i really hope the nst gets off the ground and hope nothing silly is standing in its way, if not i feel for you mate"

If JJ gets the NST league over the line for next year then he'll be anointed St James! Would be a miracle.

Yeah if the NST goes ahead next year then I think it will be a huge step towards the healing. If it's a success and something to really look up to then that would go a long way, and we'll be closer to a fully connected pyramid where old soccer and new football can earn respect on and off the pitch on the same terms. Respect for and from both sides might be the biggest thing missing IMO. How can the public respect any of us if we don't respect ourselves?

The connected pyramid... every player and supporter in most participated sport in this country will have a connection all the way to the top of the domestic pyramid. Endless storylines. Can you tell I'm a romantic haha?

Yeah and its gotten worse every day on a league reddit. They are normally quite polite on other topics.
I think its worth reading just to really understand the depth of bias out there. If jj somehow gets a h amd a happening when this is the darkness in the soul of the code i think that deserves a lot of credit. Criticism if it all blows up, sure but that should cut both ways.
Do u think healing can still happen if an nst comes through? Would love the code to unite

Yeah geez, I've only just started reading that Reddit thread and it's already descended into Greeks vs Greeks. I'm about 10% through it and wondering if I should bother with the rest of it.

Goddamn football in Australia needs to do some healing and I thought NST was going to be a large part of that. Dropouts, delays and paranoia are just rising tensions and people are taking it out on each other.

I'm genuinely disappointed in the people who don't even want to try for the NST. I understand the financial concerns, but the intangible cost and damage to the code if this NST league doesn't get going might be irreparable. I don't want to be dramatic, but I've seen out there some trauma from the past creeping back to the surface.

I hope those with the power for change know what they need to do for the healing to commence and the game to move forward. For all the good times over the past decades, there has been a darkness lurking in the soul of the code.

not sure, at minimum there would unspoken pressure for more than half of voters to be happy with you

I'm no expert on the politics of it all. Do all those members of the Congress actually vote for/against an NST launching, or do they only vote to elect members to the FA board? Or something else?

to be fair to them that governance structure looks insane

the apl gets 40% say over the fa (but not vice versa) and the state feds have qld as well as a state in tasmania that wants to sink a tassie bid

Yep agree, I’m actually starting to lose patience with FA and JJ they promised us the NSD and even the transfer system which has gone cold too.

Even Ernie Merricks technical plan has gone cold as well, it’s time FA deliver on their promises otherwise they are just under delivering and might be having a debate if they any better than there old FFA lol.

Well JJ has led us to believe upon the original announcement the game needs this to happen.
How you drag so many along and the costs involved astounds me.
Its either put up or shut up.

Would love that, but would need the fa to be sufficiently on board. Hope they are!

I just reckon we need someone from FA to go fuck it, it's coming so deal with it. With better diplomacy. 

Can relate to this.

Yeah sorry about that dumpster fire
Doing my head in arguing with people there

I wasnt online in 2004 in football circles. I wanted to be a fan of the nsl but could only see snippets of the strikers on news occasionally. The a league made it possible to be a fan of the sport for me. So greatful for that. 

Just wish we didnt throw our history out and a league fans werent so aggressive towards nsl fans. 

As the saying goes...
"Actions prove who someone is; words just prove who they want to be."  

I've had a look and i have to say im pretty shocked. Not just the general anti agenda but even the casual open racism.

I've seen a lot of back and forth between some SM supporters on there and the other redditors, the SM supporters are pretty level headed, make sound arguments, they dont even mock the A league, quite the contrary, and the responses are basically "you ruined the sport f off", some even hang crap on Ange Postecoglou lol.

Here the discussions are pretty decent, very much 2024, over on A league reddit its a throwback to 2004.

So was the meeting the fa saying my way or the highway?

On number 1. Maybe they're talking about tables overlapped,  not pyramids? They might be saying the NST should look like budget A-League at the top and NPL on planes at the bottom of the table. That's the only thing that makes it make sense to me haha.

2. They can't see the difference between NST NPL on planes and CL NPL on planes. Fair question I guess. The league would cost more overall to run but would be cheaper per club and per match than CL, so it should be more profitable on match days. I've done the math 🤓

absolute sweet fuck all press release again virtually came out til then no point mention til such time.

Sure is. How to say the same thing five times 🥱
The only news is that it's "weeks" away again.

More like FA telling the 8 this is whats happening next....

well this is a nothing announcement
https://x.com/FootballAUS/status/1825456537508192588

i must admit i feel a bit of dispair. If even a breakaway league happens that would be great as a next best thing but the divisions in oz football are heart breaking

I just kinda wish people were a bit more tentative and less aggressive over there. You aren't gonna get to the truth  if you are 100% confident of your own view and attack everyone that disagrees with you?

I couldn’t believe how bad the discourse was over there, at least this forum provides a good balance of discussion.

I would not normally do this but i spent some time on reddit for a little bit as well and they are very anti pro-rel, a lot of excuses such as we have a low population, travel costs, having alot of sports where it’s got nothing to do with the purpose of rewarding teams that do well and punishing teams that don’t do well.

What do they expect? A closed system with no incentives to develop teams, players and coaches?
Only to suit their own teams regardless of how where they finish on the table?

The overall discourse in aus football has got a long way to go when it comes to educating the sports means and why things like pro-rel are part of football all over the world and why it’s a crucial part of growing the sport.