BlueandGoldforever
Cancelled
You've just explained where Oakley forget a major factor in his vision. At the time there were 11 clubs from vic when WC and bears came in.
His ideal model in theory is great but in reality flawed, he forgot about the fan bases of 5 of those clubs...................... fast forward to 1996 and the AFL cornered Fitzroy into surrendering their licence to make way for Port in 1997........................... fast forward a couple of years later and HQ realised the bulk of the Roys fans were not going to come back. Regret sets in.
......................... Fast forward to now and there are STILL 10 clubs in vic, if you could put two and two together it's obvious that the market is still viable for those 10 clubs.
In short: Fans = revenue, more than half the league's revenue = vic.
That last statement you could literally end the thread right there.
But that was then, media rights brings in far more revenue now than crowd attendances, which is why having four teams in NSW and QLD is so important. The revenue landscape has changed, and I am not saying for the better because watching professional sport needs spectators, but the reality is that the AFL model is not sustainable in its current format. That has been proven with the Coronavirus impact clearly revealing that the AFL, and most other professional sports, having insufficient savings to survive.