2026 Pre-Season Thread

[Maboo]

Curtin.


Where was all this?

in the St Kilda in no mans land thread, Its all been deleted, I called out one of the mods for letting it go so far.

 

[Maboo]

Some of the abuse directed toward Jonnobackpocket and mighty lions was pathetic, but calling Fages a racist was a step too far.

 

[BuntonRules]

Curtin.


Where was all this?

Better look at your review of the intraclub, briztoon. Glass houses and things.

As to a media savvy person on the board - just vote 1 weevil.

 

[jonnobackpocket]

Curtin.


Where was all this?

Imagine spelling it incorrectly in the same thread and then being that guy. Thoughts briztoon ?

 

[briztoon]

Imagine spelling it incorrectly in the same thread and then being that guy. Thoughts briztoon ?

 

[Jivlain]

Pumping the massive majority of your content into socials while pretty much ignoring your home page is called “Digital Sharecropping”, and it’s recognised as an amateurish and dangerous thing to do.

Number one, you are freezing out the boomers... i.e., a huge part of the fanbase and oh, I don't know, the people with the most money.

Boomers don’t gaf bout a 15-second clip of Charlie Cameron dancing to a trap beat. But they’ll happily read a 1,000-word tactical analysis or a detailed injury update... and they’ll buy little things like memberships for the grandkids, corporate boxes, you know, just little things...

The other group it mostly ignores is the hardcore footy nuffy; the more detail and depth you give them, the more locked in they get. They don’t have the bank balance of the boomers, but they spend up to 6x more annually than casual fans. They are the ones sharing the content, they are the ones dragging their friends to games, and they are the ones defending the club in the comments section.

So that’s two fairly important groups the club is basically ghosting.

And number two, you are putting virtually all your efforts and resources into boosting Zucc's, Elon’s and the CCP’s platforms.

Now I don’t want to sound too judgmental, but I don’t reckon investing almost everything you have into those guys while letting your own property wither and die is the smartest strategy. It goes without saying that none of those guys cares in the slightest about the Club and would change their algorithms or policies in a heartbeat if it helped their bottom lines.

Social media should be the "Trailer" and the website should be the "Movie". Use TikTok and Insta to hook the kids, but drive everyone back to the website for the full story, the full interview, and the deep dive. Right now, we are giving them the trailer and forgetting to show the movie.

So, we ignore two of the most important demographics. And we’ve spent years building our mansion on land we rent from some of the least trustworthy people on earth.

Sigh.

While I generally agree with the sentiment, there's a bunch of places I'd disagree with the particulars.

As for boomers, some would want a detailed injury report, sure, plenty more would be more engaged with a picture of an Eagle or a Demon with two prosthetic legs and a beautiful cake wondering why no-one is coming to its birthday. I don't think "wanting detailed analysis" over ai slop/fortnite dances/whatever is clustered in any given age demographic.

And while, yes, it's absolutely the case that you should be trying to move people to a domain you control* rather than "the apps", this is sort of a difficult and more structural problem these days. A problem worth fixing but not necessarily within the scope of a football club. Several of the apps also penalise you heavily in the algorithm for outside links (particularly X, not that anyone should be using the nazi paedophile app for anything these days). In terms of commercial imperatives, I strongly suspect that social media interactions count for far more than website impressions in sponsor negotiations regardless of whether that is logical for either party.

As for what we can do - there's only so much we have control over the website - a lot is dictated by the AFL and its contract with Telstra. But certainly we have scope to do more articles there than we actually use. There's also opportunities for engagement - via mailing lists, Roar Deal interviews with assistant coaches, fan days, etc that could potentially be better exploited.

 

[Perrip]

It'd be interesting to see how fans of the club access content and stay across news about the club. We're in a unique position in the league where we have a significant history with a Melbourne footy club, Fitzroy, while being a professional footy club in Brisbane. I was listening to an interview with
Ben Kerswill, General Manager of Consumer Business at the Lions, earlier today.
Was interesting to hear him talk about the club response to the growing membership, the challenges associated with that, and how the club has to try and reach different members who have become Lions members for different reasons.

 

[briztoon]

While I generally agree with the sentiment, there's a bunch of places I'd disagree with the particulars.

As for boomers, some would want a detailed injury report, sure, plenty more would be more engaged with a picture of an Eagle or a Demon with two prosthetic legs and a beautiful cake wondering why no-one is coming to its birthday. I don't think "wanting detailed analysis" over ai slop/fortnite dances/whatever is clustered in any given age demographic.

And while, yes, it's absolutely the case that you should be trying to move people to a domain you control* rather than "the apps", this is sort of a difficult and more structural problem these days. A problem worth fixing but not necessarily within the scope of a football club. Several of the apps also penalise you heavily in the algorithm for outside links (particularly X, not that anyone should be using the nazi paedophile app for anything these days). In terms of commercial imperatives, I strongly suspect that social media interactions count for far more than website impressions in sponsor negotiations regardless of whether that is logical for either party.

As for what we can do - there's only so much we have control over the website - a lot is dictated by the AFL and its contract with Telstra. But certainly we have scope to do more articles there than we actually use. There's also opportunities for engagement - via mailing lists, Roar Deal interviews with assistant coaches, fan days, etc that could potentially be better exploited.

Something we absolutely control on our website, the player photos on our AFL Listed Players page. None of our draftees have their photo up yet. I know West Coast have all their draftee profile photos up.

 

[briztoon]

It'd be interesting to see how fans of the club access content and stay across news about the club. We're in a unique position in the league where we have a significant history with a Melbourne footy club, Fitzroy, while being a professional footy club in Brisbane. I was listening to an interview with
Ben Kerswill, General Manager of Consumer Business at the Lions, earlier today.
Was interesting to hear him talk about the club response to the growing membership, the challenges associated with that, and how the club has to try and reach different members who have become Lions members for different reasons.

Honestly 99.99% of the content I access is this forum.

Because the club puts out sfa.

 

[Viceregal]

Honestly 99.99% of the content I access is this forum.

Because the club puts out sfa.

Nods ... I am not on X, Facebook, instagram, TikTok etc ... I rely on my friends at BigFooty to post/link anything interesting on here ... and it is very much appreciated!

 

[McLuggages]

Some additional match reports on Reddit.

Mcclugage, Bailey, Curtin, Andrews, Linc, Gallop the callouts.

 

[weevil]

I saw some posts implying that we somehow couldn’t produce quality content because of the AFL page template.

While the club's news pages are far from the complete story, they are just one element of the whole communications picture. I thought a very quick comparison with Geelong's page could show how stark the difference in the care, attention and effort the clubs put into connecting with their supporters.

Geelong - News, Fixtures, Scores & Results - geelongcats.com.au

Geelong Football Club. All the latest news, video, results and information

www.geelongcats.com.au

Geelong’s page is full of 'Features', long-form stories like 'Hearing the Noise' (Max Holmes) or 'Learning from the Master' (Ollie Dempsey). They are using their website to build a narrative and turn their players into characters. It’s the 'Movie' I was talking about.

All AFL Team News | Brisbane Lions

The official AFL website of the Brisbane Lions Football Club

www.lions.com.au

Now look at the Lions page. Aside from the AFL pool syndications, it’s a ghost town of corporate memos: 'Injury Update,' 'Club Statement,' 'Premiership Cup reaches Townsville.'





The last story above the fold on the Lions page is just over a month old; the last story on the Cats’ page is five days old.

There is no soft cap for the media departments. We have the same access to resources and the same website template as the Cats. But the Cats write stories to shape the club's identity, they build a content library that reinforces their narrative, culture and values to their fans.

They are not just telling their fans that they are important; they are showing them they are. We are pinning a few dry memos to a notice board. We’re a back-to-back powerhouse acting like a suburban social club.

 

[Section 5]

Something we absolutely control on our website, the player photos on our AFL Listed Players page. None of our draftees have their photo up yet. I know West Coast have all their draftee profile photos up.

 

[briztoon]

View attachment 2523860

Thank *** we didn’t lose Dew.

 

[Saucery]

Honestly 99.99% of the content I access is this forum.

Because the club puts out sfa.

Do you have any idea how much money chief pays the club to keep it that way

 

[Elixuh]

Fagan has always liked playing our top end draftees from the get go.

How does Annable get into this side? Feels like it’ll be difficult? Or we just run a team of mids.

 

[BangyBangy]

Fagan has always liked playing our top end draftees from the get go.

How does Annable get into this side? Feels like it’ll be difficult? Or we just run a team of mids.

Dunkley can ruck....

 

[lionshine]

Torrent noticeably bigger this pre season. Looks like an established, senior AFL player body frame wise. Wonder if he can continue to develop football wise to potentially make his debut at some point this season? If not you’d think he’s on the chopping block come end of year.

 

[Saucery]

Fagan has always liked playing our top end draftees from the get go.

How does Annable get into this side? Feels like it’ll be difficult? Or we just run a team of mids.

Yeah, many people got frustrated when we pumped 50 games into Raynor, then Levi when they were borderline best 22. Annable might get a HF gig with time in the middle due to rotations. With one extra on the bench I can't see him spending much time in the VFL, his development is way past that.

 

[mpal6]

Fagan has always liked playing our top end draftees from the get go.

How does Annable get into this side? Feels like it’ll be difficult? Or we just run a team of mids.

See we had this discussion in the second page of this thread....

 

[Elixuh]

See we had this discussion in the second page of this thread....

View attachment 2524083

View attachment 2524082

Second strike

 

[Nunez]

Second strike

I can't believe mpal6 just briztoon ed you.

 

[SRH17]

Wonder if this will get high rotation coverage from the media?

 

[briztoon]

I can't believe mpal6 just briztoon ed you.

Erm, I generally don't do screenshots.

I'm more of a GIF guy.

 

[briztoon]

Something else I noticed at the intra club, and I don't know how much weight to put on it.

During half time the teams broke up in to their line groups, and Morris spent a good 5 minutes addressing the forwards, before any of the coaches had their say. Lots of hand gesturing that looked like he was showing positioning and where to lead or move. Then Oscar had a short say, then the line coach talked to the group.