Was only a few years ago when we were competing with the bigger  sports these days we're lucky to compete with nbl and aflw.

What's your memory of it?

Lost a lot of good men in the code wars

i think if we start pumping out epl quality players people come back. Maybe p and r happens and is the magic elixer people hope for. In any case i am glad the other sports i care about (league and cricket) have very little animosity towards football

At the cricket today a few Tas Cricket Members have been won over by the Matildas in the WC.

Definitely won some new fans to football from the women's World Cup.

Round 6 average attendance was 4900, round 5.5 k, give or taken a few.
We are now approaching NSL territory. The A League is in deep trouble, no doubt. Personally, I have no idea what can be done to turn things around. 

so true

Ha! Same discussions will pop up again, it all goes round and round. A week of smaller crowds will happen from time to time and big surges in attendance too. Just live within your means and gradually attempt to build. 

yep the subject comes round and round, thats shows not good business period.
A professional business needs customers matey.
Without them your slowly going down and down with more smaller crowds - you can't just live on the derbies thats the big up surge that only subsidise's the loss's and no profits.
How long you can last as a business owner is only as long as they care to invest, that doesn't last forever.
They killed their goose, can't see anything bring back their short lived heydays.

Whereas local Clubs weather the lulls like 20yrs, funny about that.
The code wars is just as SM, when its on the news/insta/tiktok today your forgotten tomorrow.

Not the same this time. We are heading for the lowest A League season average attendance on record, and the general lack of interest across the media is unprecedented.

My feeling is that we have to nothing to lose now and potentially a lot to gain by moving to winter. 

Don’t want to rain on your parade but also heard that before. Winter will generate a new set of problems and commercial hits. Need to just grow within our means. 

What where you competing for mate? They are all different sports with different rules and different sets of fans yeah?

I dont get it.

In terms of popularity we were battling nrl and some smaller afl teams. 

It's when people thought football could be the biggest sport in Australia. Journos used to have a go at us because they were scared we were gaining popularity obviously mentioning this now is laughable but in 2014 it was the reality 

Football is the biggest sport in Australia from both a participation and popularity perspective mate... Just NOT the Aleague .... who cares?

Just accept what you enjoy and let the rest carry on with what they do.... If people want to follow two or three sports then so what? 

Well I think it was about football finding it's place in the mainstream because the more popular it is the more opportunities it gets. I remember driving home from games listening to sen doing a post match.

 These days you'll struggle to get a fan podcast talking about the match. 

Finding its place in the Mainstream???? Do you think there is a single child under 18 in the country that doesnt know who Messi or Mbape is?

I see more Barca, Juve and PSG gear on kids at the local shops than ANYTHING AFL related.... Dont know about the other cities but I assume the same?

Or the million plus subscribers to Optus Sport dont watch at least one club from EPL religiously?

Totally.

I take my kids to school and it's only football shirts 

FFS, my son had a list for santa a mile long - all what you say Mbappe, Messi, Foden shirts etc

Speaking of I cannot believe how expensive they are now. 175 for a man city shirt with foden on it - get farkked lol

Hahaha just take the clippers and carve a couple of strips out of his eyebrows dude.... that will suffice. HAHAHAHAHAAHAHAHAAh

lol, not even lying - did it the other week for him 

Hahahahaha 

This so much. 

We are the most popular game. Just drive this point. 

By a MASSIVE amount . AFL and NRL are just 2 state comps..... Football is global.... even in Australia we have over a thousand local football clubs.... thats a huge outreach of people that must at least "tolerate" the sport no?

Exactly, I can assure you Sam Kerr is a bigger name in Sydney than any AFL player & likewise in Melbourne for NRL players. 

True.

Eh I still miss the days when the a league was popular. Even had hopes Australia cup will catch on more then that did. 

Yes we have fallen a fair way back, such a shame as I think the playing level is so much better.

However, football administration in this country knows how to keep the national league down.

You are so correct that the football quality is so much better, but crowds and interest are down.

The reason the football quality is better is the Aus coaching overhaul when the game was booming in interest a decade ago. All those naysayers banging on  about the Dutch, and the European curriculum  being wrong - now have egg on their faces.

Enjoy what you want to enjoy mate, you dont need everyone else around you to validate your choices... Football fandom can be a lonely road sometimes... especially in this country where so many of us are pulled apart. 

Australia cup, will mature over time, its fairly new and was the first step to healing old wounds.... 

Even back in the day when "the A League was popular", there were always sudden slumps in attendances which sent everyone into a tizzy.

Crowds will always fluctuate. Adelaide's crowds have been great this season until last Sunday when the weather was dreadful.

Competing with other codes caused the problems we have for the A-League. Tried to make the league like them rather than just steadily growing a Football product. 

Yes and now that we're not doing that football has never had it better- who wants mainstream media attention, who cares about packed stadiums, respectable TV ratings, household name sponsors, anyway?

We showed them alright!

The funny thing is, back when I finished school in 1973, there was only one other fellow in my year interested in the English First Division, let alone any other league or lower division. That side of things has changed so much.

I am very hopeful of the NST getting a bigger footprint than the old NSL did in its heyday, after all, it is multicultural!

I am quietly optimistic.... 

I was at a family do on the weekend and some of the youngsters got involved in a debate over recent EPL clubs when an older cousin and I joined in ... absolutely amazed at how much these kids know about the prem and how, despite being under 18, some of them have gone back and researched and discovered the old players.... 

Anyway, by now, the whole family knows what a tragic South fan I am but these youngsters (who all are either MV or Melbourne City fans and very regularly attend with their friends - or at least used too) are now asking about South and who we play, who we will play and what it was like in the old days... Not a word of a lie some of them are frothing at the mouth to come and watch the club their fathers and grandfathers once loved.. AND they are all bringing their friends not one single mention of Greek or Croatian or Italian or otherwise (most of these kids can barely even say their own names in Greek btw being 3rd or 4th generation) ... not one... 

And we have never competed with AFL and NRL for crowd sizes. That is absurd. We have always just ignored those comps.

Yes we did.

Wanderers were beating gws 

Brisbane was beating gold coast 

Victory and Sydney were beating some lower afl clubs with attendance.
Don't you remember the journos attacking us every week? 

They ignore us now 

There was never any danger of AU coming anywhere near Crows or Power attendances- nobody bothered about it. Don't care what fickle Syd and Melb fans thought.

No need to do anything more.

AFL v sockah was a tame code war compared to the bloody war that finished us the fuck off: sockah v sockah

That’s about it more than anything but I’d point the finger to Lowy and Jnr appointing afl/nrl/cricket leaders leading a game that they detested previously and knew nothing of its dna in the first place.
Sure our game has been its own worst enemy normally but looking from the sidelines stuff me having those mugs turned away all their devoted supporters more than anything else and here we are.

Question: do u think if we had football people running the game from when the a league was riding high until now, do we avoid the crowd doldrums we have now?

Should have appointed a panel of socceroos captains instead

I was neutral about the war between Lowy/FFA against the AL clubs.

Paul C was strongly in support of Lowy. Most of the rest of the forum were on the side of the clubs. 

We have to credit Paul C with being right.

The AL has  plummeted since the AL club ascendancy, with FTA TV, which all of us, me in particular, thought would advance the game.

I feel like we are heading down the old NSL path to failure again.

I'm very involved with politics off forum. What is always a problem is the enormous ego of some stakeholders - often clashing on the same side. This phenomenon extends to football.  The winners in football v football have prevailed, but the game is moving backwards.

I was strongly supportive of Lowy as well.

The problem is as we move further from the past, people forget it, and then repeat it..  "Careful what you wish for" - S Lowy 16 August 2018.

But lowy was no good either. APL or FFA wasn't working we need a proper leader in charge like Johnson only suit that's worth even knowing his name 

So things are better under Johnson than they were prior to 2018?

Well Johnson has done great with the FA. I have no doubt he would do well with the a league if given the chance 

So go the FA gets control of the clubs back..like what Lowy wanted?

Sure but Johnson gets the wheel not lowy he can.. help with the luggage 

The news just came out today that WelNix chairman Rob Morrison has been appointed to the APL board. Combine that vote of confidence in Nix leadership with billionaire Bill Foley's new franchise, and compare that to - for example - Newcastle and Perth's permanent ownership woes. Now compare that to the FFA days when the Nix were only ever in the competition on sufferance and David Gallop was openly trying to kick them out.

The A-League is never going back to FA because the Kiwi clubs are now powerful and popular and they won't allow it.

Absolutely they are.

We have just hosted the most successful EVER Womens World Cup
Our FA has more money in its coffers than it has EVER had
Incredibly mind-blowing viewer numbers and attendances at both Womens World Cup and Mens fans sites have elft the FA in a position to negotiate for a bumper new broadcast deal
The FA is finally working through some key issues with the game, namely a proper national second division and domestic transfer system.

I would say that things are a thousand times better than the old administration.

Only facet of the game that seems to be lagging is the Aleague(s) who gives a shit?

Yeah well a home World Cup will do that.  The public interest and growth of the game has since then has been extraordinary.

Yeahs since 2018 ....... 

All fair points.

Except most of us really care about the A L.

Yep.