I'm in agreement with PapaBear RE AFL.
AFL is the best resourced code out.
Putting aside League v Union, visualize if Sydney & Brisbane were League/Union only, ie all of sydney and brisbane was rugby league or all of sydney and brisbane was rugby union.
It would be a more dominant code than AFL. Combine with the backing of the Corporate Side of Rugby that makes it the powerful middle class game, alongside the grassroots "RSL" club support. You could have all those Sydney teams and a heap of Brisbane teams.
State Of Origin in May and the Bledisloe Cup in August. The other two football codes wouldn't stand a chance for coverage. But unfortunately it's not to be. The AFL is dominant in Melbourne and the other cities which makes it a powerful sporting entity. With its broadcast deal and strong infastructure they can regularly attract 70,000+ crowds in Melbourne putting them in an enviable financial position.
From there, the AFL use all of its influence and power to kill off the other codes. Rugby League, for all the lack of love between Rugby Union, has never really made a play to get rid of it so to speak. Their media attacks rugby, but you don't see Rugby League administrators directly mounting an attack on Rugby's grassroots.
AFL is different. Wheras my problem with rugby league is with it's media (I stated in OP that I actually enjoy Rugby League and SOO), my problem with AFL is its evil administration. I can never bring myself to attend a game of AFL knowing I support the one code that wants to legitimately kill the others.
The AFL injects $millions into invading whichever part of the country they see as relevant to their interests. They do hostile takeovers of the grassroots. They plant development officers like spies, use their money to influence local council decisions, build clubs and invade the schools with propoganda style campaigns to get them to play AusKick.
Which I really don't like. I think that goes way above and beyond what Sport is.
And it's not just at the Grassroots level that this kind of behaviour occurs. They are the experts of doing it at the Corporate level. I don't even have to google these examples because they come straight from the top of my head:
- Attempt to block Australia's 2022 World Cup bid. Regardless of what you think about the World Game (again, I really enjoy it), trying to block the bid was a complete dick move. Everyone wants the World Cup to come to Australia, it's a great benefit to our economy and it's a once in a lifetime chance to see some of the greatest athletes on planet Earth go against each other. So what does the AFL do? Create a massive hoo-hah about stadium usage etc. Shut up. (they did the same hoo-hah over the MCG usage for next years Liverpool game).
- Make sure when ANZ was redeveloped in 2001 that it HAD to be able to be used by AFL. This was up there with the most insincere moves I've seen. Stadium Australia already had its flaws like being out at Homebush, not having a whole stack of pubs, but this move by the AFL made sure Rugby League & Union would always struggle to fill the joint: Scream up and down about the redeveloped stadium being able to be used by the AFL.
The result is that about 45% of the seats there are total shit. The net result of that is that it destroys people's goodwill about going there, which in turn leaves a few empty seats initially, which in turn means less atmosphere, which means that less people turn up again because it ruined match day experience, which means that a culture of non-attendance at games permeates, and that's where we are with the status quo today.
Imagine if Rugby had an 85,000 seat stadium right next to the Opera House on Sydney harbour with a train station 10 metres from the turnstiles, an entire street full of pubs, clubs and restaurants?
Say what you like about Football (Soccer), Rugby League and Rugby, but the code out to kidnap and torture them all is AFL
We're flat out running our own show.
