Expansion AFL to Fast-track Women's National League (2017)

[CrowdedHouse]

http://www.theage.com.au/afl/afl-bid-to-fasttrack-womens-national-league-20150224-13noxh.html

AFL boss Gillon McLachlan will push to fast track the launch of a national women's league with the goal of creating an Australia-wide competition by the start of 2017.

Challenging the competition to bring forward plans for a new national league to be in line with the next broadcasting deal, McLachlan told Fairfax Media: "Ultimately we should be viewing ourselves as a multi-sex competition."

McLachlan's push comes despite internal research concluding that the talent pool in junior and under-age women's football would not have sufficient numbers for a vibrant national league until 2020.

"I'm challenging our team to be more bullish about the growth of women's football," McLachlan said. "We've had spectacular growth in women playing football and we're very keen to get a women's league up and running. I'm being pushy because I want to do it earlier."

"It's the right thing for us. It's what our women players want but it's something that's up to us to progress...To be honest I have no research on what others (football codes) are doing, I just see this as something that is a natural progression for us. Women are integral to our competition."

One proposed model for the formation of a women's league within two years would see two teams based in Victoria and one from every other Australian state and the Northern Territory. McLachlan did not rule out future AFL club alignments.

The AFL boss has communicated his push to every state league boss, most recently AFL Queensland's Michael Conlan where 51,000 women are registered AFL players – the third biggest state total – representing an annual growth of about 14 per cent. "The transformation in the women's game has been incredible," he said.

The move to fast-track a national competition for women is linked to a new Australia-wide review of the game from community football to state league level. McLachlan has won support from all states for the season-long review – including the SANFL and the WAFL – which will be overseen by football operations boss Mark Evans and community and people manager Dorothy Hosgrove.

AFL authorities recognise the game needs to become more attractive to a more diverse and larger number of Australians, attract more talent on and off the field and make better use of the estimated $80 million invested annually into the state leagues.

"We have to be a game that truly represents all Australians," McLachlan said. "We need more women in senior positions in this industry. We must become more diverse. We need to create better, clearer pathways for players, for coaches and administrators."

 

[Forward Press]

No sexist stuff in this thread, thanks.

 

[Engimal]

One proposed model for the formation of a women's league within two years would see two teams based in Victoria and one from every other Australian state and the Northern Territory.

T..A..S..I..E
A
S
I
E

Let's get this show in the road!

 

[Xtreme]

No sexist stuff in this thread, thanks.

I would still rather watch lawn bowls than a woman's football match. Tennis is the only sport that I watch AND enjoy women's matches (that is when they are not error filled matches). I would consider watching the WNBA (don't mind women's basketball) if it were available in Australia.

I just don't think women's AFL matches are that appealing, but would be interesting to see how athletic it would be compared to regular AFL - (might be a throw back to 70's - 80's vfl standard ?).

 

[Lensen]

51000 women registered players in queensland

How much gall do you have to have to exaggerate that much

 

[Righteo]

Talent wise it might work but I could never see it garnering a significant amount of interest both in terms of attendance and ratings and therefore can't see it being very sustainable. Would be cool to see it prosper and become as big as say women's basketball is in the US though.

Just realised that depending on how the acronym plays out it has a chance of being called the "AWFL", wouldn't the league fans like that.

 

[coniglio_number1]

I think this could work. I enjoyed the exhibition games thus far and would happily support a women's league. Make the games curtain raisers for the men's league and offer reduced priced tickets to the men's game if you are there to watch the women's game. This will ensure early crowd numbers until it can start to take off on its own.

I'll put money on daisy to win the inaugural women's version of a brownlow

 

[Xtreme]

Talent wise it might work but I could never see it garnering a significant amount of interest both in terms of attendance and ratings and therefore can't see it being very sustainable. Would be cool to see it prosper and become as big as say women's basketball is in the US though.

Just realised that depending on how the acronym plays out it has a chance of being called the "AWFL", wouldn't the league fans like that.

Good they can also use it as a trial for the night time grand final they think everyone wants to see.

 

[coniglio_number1]

As a shift worker I would love a night gf. May actually get to watch it instead of listening to it on sub par radio commentary which hardly describes the happenings on the field.

 

[Rob]

Only way it can work is if they hang off existing AFL teams. Maybe 4 Vic clubs, 2 WA clubs, at least 1 from every other state. Have to be careful that it's aligned with playing strength, as it's going to be largely amateur.

 

[Matchu]

One proposed model for the formation of a women's league within two years would see two teams based in Victoria and one from every other Australian state and the Northern Territory.

Does this mean Northern Territory will get a team and ACT won't?

 

[The_Wookie]

51000 women registered players in queensland

How much gall do you have to have to exaggerate that much

Figures from the 2013 AFL Annual Report

Participation

The participation of female footballers of all ages continued to rise with 169,292 women and girls involved in AFL 9s, Auskick, club and school competitions of six weeks or longer in 2013 (up 24-36 per cent from 2012). It is estimated a further 80,000 were involved in gala days, lightning carnivals and ‘come and try’ days in rural and remote regions. The breakdown of female participation by segment is:

• AFL 9s – 11%
• Auskick – 17%
• Club – 7%
• School – 65%

These figures place Australian Football in the top four most popular sports among females of all ages and is underpinned by a focus on implementing new Junior (33 per cent growth) and Youth Girls (16 per cent growth) competitions.

QUEENSLAND

• Total participation reached 157,704 – up 8.5 per cent.
• Queensland again recorded the largest AFL school participation in Australia with over 100,000 primary and secondary school students.

With those figures above in mind, it does seem unlikely that there are 51,000 female players in Queensland, unless there are significant numbers in school and auskick systems.

 

[Mitchell Madness]

Warrnambool, geelong, Gippsland, Melbourne districts should be the vic based ones

Spread it around, and ensure its successful
Saturate the city and it'll fall over

 

[Rob]

Figures from the 2013 AFL Annual Report


With those figures above in mind, it does seem unlikely that there are 51,000 female players in Queensland, unless there are significant numbers in school and auskick systems.

I can't vouch for player numbers, but Queensland appear to be a consistently reasonable team at womens level, so they must have a few players to pick from.

Having a look at national carnival results over the years the standard does seem to be Vic - daylight - WA - daylight - Queensland - NSW - SA - ACT - Tas - NT.

SA's poor results - they seem to be consigned to Division 2 at senior and junior level - would probably indicate that they couldn't sustain more than 1 team anyway.

 

[I am Jack]

I will be honest here, I don't think it (women's football) will become a viable market - unless it is visually appealing.
People might well say that is sexist, but personally I think that is realistic assessment.
Then I think Gil will be stuck between a rock and a hard place, he will be seen as a hypocrite.
He will be pushing the womens game which won't be a viable business - losing money off it, but keeping it alive to appease moral crusaders.
But on the other hand he will be selling the mens game down the drain - and continuing to compromise purity/equalisation for the sake of a dollar.

 

[jatz14]

The balance will be to get the standard right. Enough teams to create a viable competition, and interest over a broad area, but not so many that it dilutes the talent pool to much. It needs to be a marked step up in quality from current womens club football.

The current AFL exhibition game is a large jump in quality from club footy, but that puts the best 50 players in 2 teams.

The original target of 2020 for a national league was based on the desire to get the talent pool right. Womens footy is growing faster than projected, but fast enough for 2017?

The push to go earlier I think has come from the success of the exhibition games, I think they were surprised by the standard, intensity and level of interest among female players. It also comes from the issue of soccer, cricket, basketball, netball having national pro or semi pro comps for women. It is becoming a bit of an embarrassment for the sport saying 'we are the number 1 footy code, and we will have a womens comp - in 2020 or so, maybe'. The top female cricketers are getting $80000 contracts from cricket Australia

 

[jatz14]

I can't vouch for player numbers, but Queensland appear to be a consistently reasonable team at womens level, so they must have a few players to pick from.

Having a look at national carnival results over the years the standard does seem to be Vic - daylight - WA - daylight - Queensland - NSW - SA - ACT - Tas - NT.

SA's poor results - they seem to be consigned to Division 2 at senior and junior level - would probably indicate that they couldn't sustain more than 1 team anyway.

SANFL seem to have sneered at womens footy initially even more then in other states, and almost caused it to completely collapse, and they have never managed to catch up. Shows what affect the reception and perception of womens sport can have on it. That they are near the bottom of almost every state carnival in womens footy should be an embarrassment, but I suspect they do not care.

 

[jimbler]

Challenging the competition to bring forward plans for a new national league to be in line with the next broadcasting deal

Not sure I understand this. They want to show the games on Fox Footy/Ch 7? If that's the case, I'd imagine the fast tracking has something to do with the ABC recently dumping both the W-League and WNBL.

 

[jatz14]

Not sure I understand this. They want to show the games on Fox Footy/Ch 7? If that's the case, I'd imagine the fast tracking has something to do with the ABC recently dumping both the W-League and WNBL.

Having womens AFL as the only mainstream womens teamsport televised would be seen as a huge win. Especially as it isn't Western Sydney that is the growth are for Aussie rules, its female football.

I think they would willingly carry a bit of a loss for that.

 

[Dan]

Jack Watts come on down....

Will there be enough talent to make it a viable option for television viewing? I'm all for trialling it and see how it goes.

I don't think it'll have much of a following.

 

[Nutsngum]

Should do 6 state leagues followed by the winners of each GF going into a 6 way state of origin with a state grand final the weekend before the AFL premiership.

Oh look, suddenly the womens league looks somewhat interesting and something people might want to pay attention to rather then dismiss it casually.

*edit.

So I propose this.

10 teams per state= 9 home and 9 away matches. With one bye that should finish at the end of round 19 AFL.

Then standard 3 weeks of finals with a likely top 4 system with a grand final for each in round 22 AFL.

Then a bye for all the grand finalists brings us to the end of the home and away season.

Then SoA begins going over three weeks with the winning premier going to represent their state.

Two matches each with your standard points ladder. Top two go on to play saturday night State Grand Final the week before the AFL premiership.

 

[Scotland]

Will there be enough talent to make it a viable option for television viewing?

It's a PR stunt to make it look like the AFL cares about women.

A national women's footy league will not be well supported or commercially viable.

 

[The_Wookie]

It's a PR stunt to make it look like the AFL cares about women.

Well no, they accomplsh that with womens round, and symbolic womens matches over a a couple of years. This is something of a bigger proposal.

A national women's footy league will not be well supported or commercially viable.

Hmm lets see. Basketball has a viable national womens competition, as does soccer and cricket. Not to mention netball. The AFL is simply moving with the times, if not past time.

 

[restitute]

A big problem with women's sport is not enough women watch it or support it as fans. As a result they try to appeal more to potential male supporters and then claims of sexism come in and gender inequality etc.

I think it needs to be fostered more at the state and junior levels first so it can grow a more grassroots following.

 

[juss]

Doubt it will work long term, would require massive amounts of funding to prop it up, couldn't see it being sustainable. Unfortunately, the drop in standard from the AFL would be too great, it wouldn't even come near the standard of the state leagues, and people don't watch that too much either.