20th AFL Team

Which location will be the home of the 20th AFL team?


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Jun 23, 2021
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Interesting concept.
If I am interpolating your statement correctly then you we could call the new AFL team
"Canberra New State" and a push for statehoodness.
by state i meant territory but i also count the NT as a state so I also count the ACT even though they are terriortys, I think colts or stallions works best animal which is kinda aussie and there's a lot in the ACT and is a better name than capitals
 

Coolangatta

Norm Smith Medallist
Oct 27, 2007
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I don’t think there’ll be a WA3. Expansion will come from somewhere new. Tasmania and Canberra are the best two options.

Long term, surely they have their eye on Darwin, Cairns, and Newcastle.

That’s 23 teams, 22 if GWS merges with Saints/North but I think 24 teams is more likely than that happening.

Sunshine Coast would be my smokey.
 

Mr Taswegian

Roo Man
May 25, 2019
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I think Tasmania should only have one team. They'd be super popular. A 2nd team would cause all types of issues.

Minimum population should be 500k per AFL team.
We may struggle to support one team let alone two
I don’t think there’ll be a WA3. Expansion will come from somewhere new. Tasmania and Canberra are the best two options.

Long term, surely they have their eye on Darwin, Cairns, and Newcastle.

That’s 23 teams, 22 if GWS merges with Saints/North but I think 24 teams is more likely than that happening.

Sunshine Coast would be my smokey.
Tasmania is already a certainty so Canberra is probably the most likely for the 20th team.
 

Coolangatta

Norm Smith Medallist
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We may struggle to support one team let alone two

Tasmania is already a certainty so Canberra is probably the most likely for the 20th team.
Well, according to Wiki (but a lot of references are many years old):

Screen Shot 2022-11-24 at 11.27.45 am.png

If you were to go by official bids, then teams 18-22 would look like:

19. Tassie
20. Canberra
21. Auckland/NZ
22. Darwin/NT (possibly merged with FNQ)

A NZ team and a merged Nth Oz team aren't the worst ideas I've heard.

Leaves the door open for "unofficial" bids to become official like Newcastle, SC/Bris 2, WA3 and SA3 to enter. A northern merger allows all of these expansions to occur long-term, as it would result in 26 teams instead of 27. But if the north merger didn't happen, WA could always look to the far-south and not just Perth and grow to 4 teams.

But long-term I'm not sure the AFL will ever want more than 24 teams because it solves the fixture imbalance (everyone plays once, 23 rounds inc. magic round).
 

JPetro83

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Should have stayed at 16 with 2 teams at the time in 2011/12 to have relocated.. 1 to Tassie and 1 to West Sydney. 19 and 20 teams way too many but eventually we will get to 20 teams. i think you need to put the 20th team in a footy state. forget the NT.. if you think player retention is bad at the Suns and GWS and Adelaide every kid will be requesting a trade out of the NT.
A 3rd WA team should be the 20th side, "Perth City" West Coast should have been called "Perth City" all those years ago instead of "West Coast.
 

JPetro83

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Only way a NT teams happens if a brand-new stadium with a roof is built.. state of the art 25-30k capacity. home games split 7-4 or 8-3 between Darwin and Alice.
 

Coolangatta

Norm Smith Medallist
Oct 27, 2007
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Only way a NT teams happens if a brand-new stadium with a roof is built.. state of the art 25-30k capacity. home games split 7-4 or 8-3 between Darwin and Alice.
And if Darwin hits about 400k people.

Anyway, bring on Tassie and Canberra. If I were a betting man, I'd wager that Canberra will be team 20. There's been no serious mention of a WA3 since 2009.
 

JPetro83

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And if Darwin hits about 400k people.

Anyway, bring on Tassie and Canberra. If I were a betting man, I'd wager that Canberra will be team 20. There's been no serious mention of a WA3 since 2009.
relocation to Canberra would work. the AFL still need to get 1 or 2 teams out of Melbourne.
 

Coolangatta

Norm Smith Medallist
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relocation to Canberra would work. the AFL still need to get 1 or 2 teams out of Melbourne.
Canberra Kangaroos.

Still leaves the door open for team 20 which they could play safe and go with Perth Sharks (black, gold, and blue, there's enough blue and white already) or Perth Quokkas.

Then by 2050 could add NT and someone else.
 

Coolangatta

Norm Smith Medallist
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Maybe a Cairns-Uluru-Northern-Territory.
I'd follow the likely Tassie model (Hobart 7, Launceston 4) and just split the NQLD/NT hybrid team if that's what they do between Darwin (7) and Cairns (4). 7-5 if we ever get 24 teams.

Like I said, Wiki classes Tassie, Canberra, Auckland, and NT or NT/NQLD hybrid as "official" bid types.

So I could see Tas and Canberra as teams 19 and 20, then team 21 NZ by around 2050 (8 Auckland, 3 Wellington), then a NT/NQLD split in mid 2050s (or vice versa). If Tassie works out well, then I could see the split model working (even for Canberra, it could be 9 in Canberra, 1 in Albury, 1 in Wagga Wagga).

I think the AFL would then (if they follow this expansion model) still have their eyes on NSW and QLD (Newcastle and one of Sunshine/Brissy 2) for teams 23 and 24 and max out at that cause 23 games is probably the max you can have in a season.

I don't think WA3 or SA3 is ever going to happen but I could be wrong (and it might be the safer long-term bet if NSW and QLD don't grow the way they hope).

Hypothetical expansion:

Tasmania 2027
Canberra 2032
Northern Australia 2050
New Zealand 2055
Newcastle 2070
Perth 3/Adelaide 3/Brisbane 2/Sunshine Coast 2075* (SC if they want to break new territory)

If they went completely balls to the wall insane they could give NT and NQLD their own teams and eventually add all of NZ/Newcastle/Perth/Adelaide/SC and get 28 teams, but anything past 24 calls into the question of promotion/relegation or conferences.
 
May 24, 2022
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Perth 3/Adelaide 3/Brisbane 2/Sunshine Coast 2075* (SC if they want to break new territory)

I'll be nearly 80 by 2075 but i'll be worth it to see my Panthers in the AFL :blueheart: We will be the ones who set up the fanbase for the future generations.
 
Population mainly.

Hobart has like 200,000 people.

Launceston only has 70,000.

The other half of the Tasmanian population is scattered about the isle. One team will take some time to become sustainable, though it really depends how much Tasmanians get behind it. I feel it will be a quicker and stronger growth than the GWS and GC franchises.

Launnie is closer to 100k I believe. You also have to consider that Launceston is the northern hub (in the same way Hobart is for the south), so the 100k+ people in the North West also would attend games there.

In saying that, I think there is no chance that there will be 2 Tasmanian teams in my lifetime. It's just splitting a small market in half for no real reason.
 
May 24, 2022
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Launnie is closer to 100k I believe. You also have to consider that Launceston is the northern hub (in the same way Hobart is for the south), so the 100k+ people in the North West also would attend games there.

In saying that, I think there is no chance that there will be 2 Tasmanian teams in my lifetime. It's just splitting a small market in half for no real reason.

Would Tasmanians even want 2 teams? I spoke to a South Aussie guy on fb the other day who wants Port and Crows to merge to lessen the ammount of teams 🤣
 

Badger17

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Jul 7, 2021
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The biggest hurdle to a Canberra side is probably the lack of a stadium big enough to support an AFL side, and if Labour were to announce they were building an oval stadium for the AFL after decades of delaying the rectangular one it'd cause one of the biggest cultural and political shitstorms in the ACT's history.

I'd honestly find it fascinating to see Barr and Labour go up against the full might of the Raiders and RU establishment, however the outcome of that conflict would probably be bad for all involved, and it'd be in the AFL's interest to avoid that if possible.

The only way a team in Canberra happens before 2040-2050 at the earliest is if they get a stadium built within the next decade, so I'm not sure how the AFL could avoid that conflict if they want Canberra to be the 20th team.
 
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Mr Taswegian

Roo Man
May 25, 2019
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Launnie is closer to 100k I believe. You also have to consider that Launceston is the northern hub (in the same way Hobart is for the south), so the 100k+ people in the North West also would attend games there.

In saying that, I think there is no chance that there will be 2 Tasmanian teams in my lifetime. It's just splitting a small market in half for no real reason.
Hobart is actually 251,000 by the latest count but definitely not enough for two teams in Tasmania.
 
Nov 26, 2016
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The biggest hurdle to a Canberra side is probably the lack of a stadium big enough to support an AFL side, and if Labour were to announce they were building an oval stadium for the AFL after decades of delaying the rectangular one it'd cause one of the biggest cultural and political shitstorms in the ACT's history.

I'd honestly find it fascinating to see Barr and Labour go up against the full might of the Raiders and RU establishment, however the outcome of that conflict would probably be bad for all involved, and it'd be in the AFL's interest to avoid that if possible.

The only way a team in Canberra happens before 2040-2050 at the earliest is if they get a stadium built within the next decade, so I'm not sure how the AFL could avoid that conflict if they want Canberra to be the 20th team.

Go full circle and start the team in Queanbeyan like the Raiders did?

It would most definitely be a shitstorm if the ACT built an oval stadium before the rectangular stadium issue is solved. Last I read Civic Stadium was supposed to be $350 million. That's half of Hobart and it's still taking forever to happen (or not happen).

But would a Canberra AFL team need a brand new stadium? Or would a redevelopment do?

The Manuka Oval masterplan from 2013 has a final capacity of 19,872. From what I can tell, only two stages didn't get completed, which means we were only $45.5m from a near 20k-capacity stadium. That's ~$59 million in 2022 dollars. It's probably just below the capacity needed, but it's less than a fifth of what the Civic stadium is expected to cost. A redevelopment would probably cause some political ire, but maybe more of a s**t-breeze than a shitstorm.
 

Badger17

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After all the expenditure on other stadiums Australian Football deserves a decent stadium in the ACT.
Aside from public swimming pools only three major sports facilities in the ACT have seen a significant amount of money in the last decade, the tennis centre in Lyneham, Bruce, and Manuka.

Bruce has got the bare minimum necessary to stop it from becoming condemnable like the AIS Arena, the tennis courts were a reasonable investment as the city needed them, but Manuka on the other hand has probably had more invested into it than all the other sports facilities in city put together over the last decade.

Meanwhile in the other sports:
  • The arena is literally derelict, and has needed replacing or significant upgrades for well over a decade.
  • The ice rink isn't fit for purpose and the government has been promising to replace it for roughly two decades.
  • The diving boards in Civic are in a state of disrepair with plans to knock them down in the future, but no concreate plans for replacements.
  • There literally aren't enough basketball or netball courts to support the amount of people whom want to play, with community basketball having to run games until almost midnight to support all the teams, and plans to build more courts having sat on the shelf for roughly a decade.
On top of all that, Bruce isn't fit for purpose, hasn't been for years, and attempts to extend it's life only result in expensive band-aid solutions that do little to nothing to improve the standards of it's facilities for patrons.

I could keep going forever, talking about motor sports, some of the struggles soccer has had, any and every niche sport's struggle to get any significant support, etc, etc, but I think you get the point; Aussie Rules and the AFL are very low in the list of sports that need, let alone 'deserve', anything when it comes to the ACT and Canberra.
 

Badger17

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Go full circle and start the team in Queanbeyan like the Raiders did?
Who's going to pay for an AFL standard stadium in Queanbeyan?

I doubt the NSW government would be interested.
It would most definitely be a shitstorm if the ACT built an oval stadium before the rectangular stadium issue is solved. Last I read Civic Stadium was supposed to be $350 million. That's half of Hobart and it's still taking forever to happen (or not happen).

But would a Canberra AFL team need a brand new stadium? Or would a redevelopment do?

The Manuka Oval masterplan from 2013 has a final capacity of 19,872. From what I can tell, only two stages didn't get completed, which means we were only $45.5m from a near 20k-capacity stadium. That's ~$59 million in 2022 dollars. It's probably just below the capacity needed, but it's less than a fifth of what the Civic stadium is expected to cost. A redevelopment would probably cause some political ire, but maybe more of a s**t-breeze than a shitstorm.
The stadium in Civic isn't happening, there is neither the space nor political will for it anymore, but if it did it would cost significantly more that $350mil these days anyway. You could pretty much double that cost at the very least.

Redeveloping Manuka might do, however you'd need to find a way to squeeze in roughly 10k more seats on top of that 20k, and find a way to get more coverage over all the seating, otherwise the stadium will be too small to support larger crowds and the conditions in Canberra will turn away a significant percentage of potential supporters just like Bruce does.

Besides, the nimbys in Manuka have made it very clear that they'll fight any significant upgrades to Manuka Oval, and nimbys rule this city. So even if you could make the necessary upgrades to Manuka (which I doubt BTW) you'd have an uphill battle to get them over the line.

Phillip Oval on the other hand is in a better spot, has less residents around it, better public transport links, parking, restaurants and bars within walking distance, everything you need in a good location for a stadium. That's the place to do it if it's possible to fit a stadium big enough on the plot.
 
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