Which clubs are really the big four of the AFL?

[gopies1981]

Cats and Dogs lol we had the most through the gates 3 of last 4 years and strangely they dont allow Cats and Dogs in, a membership is MIN $50 and must be human, many Collingwood supporters fail the last requirement and can't afford the first.

Collingwood were fifth for membership this year, sorry Magpies casual couldn't give a s**t supporters, that only claim to support Collingwood because Eddie was on Who Wants To Be A Millionaire dont count.

And how many of your 100000 turned up in 2018??? At least Collingwood have the biggest turnout of any club to a single game with 72,000 against the giants. Also In 2018 Richmond had only the 6th biggest home and away attendance record of all time. Do you want to guess who hold the top 5??

 

[Altum Volantes]

By the way I do not see Carlton as a sleeping giant. Since John Elliot inadvertently slew his Club in the 90s, the Blues have been in a permanent coma.

Perhaps - it could be a persistent vegetative state...BUT there is still a lot of Carlton people around and they still hold sway in the media. Should they actually get their act together, all those absentee supporters will come flying out the woodwork and we’ll remember why everyone hates them so much.

Hell even Melbourne, perennially the most irrelevant club in the comp, managed to suddenly have a bandwagon running for all those ‘hidden supporters’ last year.

 

[gopies1981]

Agree. On the question of most supported, a national survey oddly found Sydney to be the most supported AFL Club. I find this spurious as many of the NSW respondents who ticked the Sydney box would probably have first allegiance to other codes.

Much of the Sydney support is just geographical allegiance. It has to be differentiated from barrackers who are invested in their team and give a rats. That said I am amazed we had 70K members last year including a big base in Melbourne.

In away games in Melbourne we close to outnumber fans from oppo clubs like the Saints,Blues and North. Of course we are only allowed 100 admissions at our annual game at the Litter Box.

By the way I do not see Carlton as a sleeping giant. Since John Elliot inadvertently slew his Club in the 90s, the Blues have been in a permanent coma.

On Carlton they were the second biggest drawing club in 2010 and drew over 1 million fans through the gates from 09-11! Carlton like Richmond were 4 years ago a a sleeping giant. Fans who went to games in the 80’s and 90’s would tell you that Carlton were during this time period the 3 biggest Victorian club.

 

[Grand Uncle Horace]

On Carlton they were the second biggest drawing club in 2010 and drew over 1 million fans through the gates from 09-11! Carlton like Richmond were 4 years ago a a sleeping giant. Fans who went to games in the 80’s and 90’s would tell you that Carlton were during this time period the 3 biggest Victorian club.

Urrkhh and the 70s as well. I know because I was there. They regularly bought some of my mob's better players. Carlton played a key role in the eventual exile of my Club to Sydney. Rich Carlton individuals like that complete filth Dick Pratt colluded with the VFL and actually bought around a thousand Sth Melbourne memberships in an effort to stack meetings and the votes of South members to force relocation.

Sure they have a good fan base and I hope for their sakes their Club does not decline into further irrelevance and eventual amalgamation with a North or a relocation.

As for me the only interest I have with that mob is seeing them regularly propping up the ladder.

 

[Grand Uncle Horace]

Perhaps - it could be a persistent vegetative state.

hehehe... your post made me laugh, this especially.

I do not think SOS has the upstairs wattage or the quals in neuroscience to wake the patient from the vegetative state.

Maybe he is planning a trans-generational awakening hoping his grandsons or great grandsons are involved. His sons certainly wont be. From Jack's exposed form he plays with the skill of his Elliot namesake. I expect SOS has a strategy to get his lad to a 100 less than average games at which point he will be retired to the breeding barn in the hope he will throw better colts.

 

[Bomberboyokay]

People saying Hawthorn have no idea. They're not selling home games for fun. Subject is which clubs are biggest not which clubs have won the most games in the last X years.

Biggest four clubs measured by drawing power and revenue would be West Coast, Adelaide, Collingwood and Sydney. Or another combination but with 3 of those clubs. Not coincidentally those are all the biggest club in their big or big-ish city.

 

[smasha]

It’s good to be the king boys!

 

[RAPPA]

Carlton was up there, but recent prolonged misery has had its effect with other clubs leapfrogging them. I think the club has a a lot of supporters out there, but a fair few bandwagoners that are waiting until more successful times to come out of the woodwork

 

[Isaac Cumming No 1]

1-5 are the giants of the afl

6-8 have the potential to join the giants with sustained success

9-11 are the mid size clubs

12-16 are the smaller clubs who draw 30,000 fans when winning ( except north you can max draw 25,000) but when losing they become financially in trouble

17-18 why are these clubs in the competition. They draw smaller crowds then Fitzroy when they were in the competition. Relocate one team to Perth and the other team to Tasmania

By your logic every child in school is a waste of resources. Should we revoke the citizenship of them all?

Or maybe if you'd concentrated in school you'd have grasped the concept that time is a dimension, things change and sometimes in predictable ways.

Alas it seems you didn't and I expect issues like that have condemned you to a life of manual occupations.

 

[Frank Grimes]

And how many of your 100000 turned up in 2018??? At least Collingwood have the biggest turnout of any club to a single game with 72,000 against the giants.

Richmond had the biggest attendance for 2018. Richmond had 95,000 against the Giants when we played them in the finals in 2017.

 

[Isaac Cumming No 1]

Richmond had the biggest attendance for 2018. Richmond had 95,000 against the Giants when we played them in the finals in 2017.

As a neutral in this argument, and as someone who was at the 2017 PF and last years SF. The Tigers crowd was definitely more involved and created more atmosphere, aside from the raw numbers. Maybe it had something to do with a GF slot on the table, but they were more enthusiastic.

 

[Roddy]

People saying Hawthorn have no idea. They're not selling home games for fun. Subject is which clubs are biggest not which clubs have won the most games in the last X years.

Biggest four clubs measured by drawing power and revenue would be West Coast, Adelaide, Collingwood and Sydney. Or another combination but with 3 of those clubs. Not coincidentally those are all the biggest club in their big or big-ish city.

This is the whole thing, it needs a definitive criteria/definition on which it's all based. I'm not sure if that's ever been done. If it's based purely and simply on crowds and drawing power, then yes, we are nowhere near it. if it's based on a combination of on-field success, off-field success and general support, then we probably exist alone as a 'Big One'.

 

[Jesse Custer]

Essendon, Carlton, Collingwood and Richmond.

 

[Dazzler9]

Who really cares? This ain’t the Premier League. All clubs are competing in the same league for the same prize. There’s an awful lot of discussion on the clock about club success off the field, particularly with finances and supporters but it really doesn’t matter. I personally care about on-field success, and I’ll leave the off-field stuff to the experts. Hawthorn aren’t Australia’s “biggest” club but do you reckon they would trade 4 flags in 10 years for crowd records and first place on the money charts?

I hope that someday I have enough free time to care about the financial state of my club.

Couldn't agree more.

 

[smasha]

This is the whole thing, it needs a definitive criteria/definition on which it's all based. I'm not sure if that's ever been done. If it's based purely and simply on crowds and drawing power, then yes, we are nowhere near it. if it's based on a combination of on-field success, off-field success and general support, then we probably exist alone as a 'Big One'.

Richmond filing for copyright infringement.

 

[Blind Turn]

Right now in terms of size, status, money and success...

Collingwood, West Coast, Hawthorn, Richmond.

Adelaide and Essendon next with Geelong.

Carlton the sleeping giant with chronic back pain.

Sydney the hardest to gauge due to their unique position in the league.

Then Freo...then ‘the rest’.

I assume you place Essendon a tier below due to 14 years without a finals win.

The incredible thing about EFC is that despite the poor success, the saga and the media bashing, our club has record sponsorship deals without losing any sponsors, 70,000 members, huge revenue, and is the second most supported Vic club in Australia. If the success comes I would think our top-tier status will be undisputed.

 

[HTT]

And how many of your 100000 turned up in 2018??? At least Collingwood have the biggest turnout of any club to a single game with 72,000 against the giants. Also In 2018 Richmond had only the 6th biggest home and away attendance record of all time. Do you want to guess who hold the top 5??

Who used to make claims about a top 4 Collingwood outdrawing a top 4 Richmond?
That went down the toilet.
Our average home crowd this year was 67,000. Yours was 54,000.

When we hosted GWS in a final, we filled the place. When you hosted GWS in a final, it was, by comparison, a ghost town.

 

[BBC1967]

GoPies pedalling BS Pies propaganda again!

 

[Turnover]

Essendon, Carlton, Collingwood and Richmond.

Yeah, this is the reason why it’s the big four. And not the big 3, etc.

 

[Benny78]

Geelong and Hawthorn. I laugh at other suggested clubs. There's only been two powerhouses this century. Even the lions were forgotten long ago

 

[smasha]

If you go back right to the very past,Richmond were the first team to get big attendances at finals before any of the other clubs.

 

[Tiger2709]

And how many of your 100000 turned up in 2018??? At least Collingwood have the biggest turnout of any club to a single game with 72,000 against the giants. Also In 2018 Richmond had only the 6th biggest home and away attendance record of all time. Do you want to guess who hold the top 5??

You do understand the mcg is more limited in size and we now play at GCS and GWS some of the old attendance records are impossible to break.
Richmond had the most consecutive games of over 90k from last years finals into this years 1st game, our last years final against the Giants had 92k nearly all Richmond, we again had the highest home and away attendance averaging 54k which was 4k more than Collingwood, for home attendance we averaged 61k which was 12k more than Collingwood, in a year you made the GF.
Collingwood had the largest attendance in a h&a game in 2018 but of the top ten Richmond are involved in 7, Collingwood only 4, 2 of those 4 are against Richmond, as for top h&a crowds ever, of the top 10, 4 involved Richmond 3 involved Collingwood, you pipped us for the biggest crowd ever by 2000 supporters.

Sure you are probably still the biggest supported club but we are not far behind and currently well in front on supporters willing to contribute by buying a membership, I dont count those silly Morgan polls for anything, to support is to contribute in some way not just tick a box in a survey.

 

[gopies1981]

Who used to make claims about a top 4 Collingwood outdrawing a top 4 Richmond?
That went down the toilet.
Our average home crowd this year was 67,000. Yours was 54,000.

When we hosted GWS in a final, we filled the place. When you hosted GWS in a final, it was, by comparison, a ghost town.

Preliminary finals are different. We played Adelaide in the preliminary final and it was a sellout in 2002. Again Richmond in 2018 never did not draw 72,000 of their own supporters in 2018

 

[Captain_Bender]

Preliminary finals are different. We played Adelaide in the preliminary final and it was a sellout in 2002. Again Richmond in 2018 never did not draw 72,000 of their own supporters in 2018

Big clubs constantly get 90,000+ to finals at the MCG Collingwood struggle to do that, Richmond have done that the last 6 finals they have played at the MCG, Collingwood have only been able to do it 3 times in the last 20 years

 

[gopies1981]

You do understand the mcg is more limited in size and we now play at GCS and GWS some of the old attendance records are impossible to break.
Richmond had the most consecutive games of over 90k from last years finals into this years 1st game, our last years final against the Giants had 92k nearly all Richmond, we again had the highest home and away attendance averaging 54k which was 4k more than Collingwood, for home attendance we averaged 61k which was 12k more than Collingwood, in a year you made the GF.
Collingwood had the largest attendance in a h&a game in 2018 but of the top ten Richmond are involved in 7, Collingwood only 4, 2 of those 4 are against Richmond, as for top h&a crowds ever, of the top 10, 4 involved Richmond 3 involved Collingwood, you pipped us for the biggest crowd ever by 2000 supporters.

Sure you are probably still the biggest supported club but we are not far behind and currently well in front on supporters willing to contribute by buying a membership, I dont count those silly Morgan polls for anything, to support is to contribute in some way not just tick a box in a survey.

Please explain why Collingwood lead Richmond by some margin in every survey poll and on social media where Collingwood have over 100,000 more followers!

Richmond are in reality can claim they are the 3rd biggest club but Richmond are now way near as big as Collingwood or Essendon as they are the only national supported clubs in the country.

Oh and since record of attendance’s started in 1921 Collingwood lead Richmond by 9.2 million during the home and away season. Considering Richmond had a 35 year head start at the mcg is quite staggering if Collingwood played all its games at the mcg since 1965!

I have no doubt Collingwood’s attendance’s will sky rocket to well part 1.2 million people during the home and away season especially if we get off to a great start. Our crowds did not pick up till half way through the second half of the year when we looked like making finals. Remember that Richmond in their premiership year only finished 21,000 head of 13th placed Collingwood.

Collingwood have drawn over 1 million people during the home and away season 21 times to Richmond 6. Essendon are even well in front of Richmond with 15