- Aug 15, 2000
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Picture this: The year is 2036. Tasmania are closing on a decade in the AFL, Canberra entered the league in 2032, all established clubs are alive and well, and despite murmurings here and there, there’s as such no further movement on an additional club in southwest WA, Adelaide or even New Zealand for that matter.
After a decade long push by successive Federal and State/Territory Governments to entice residents to ‘Go North’ with a raft of incentives and perks, the measures have been largely successful and an additional million people have moved north of the Tropic of Capricorn to a now staggering 2.5 million people in total. With this Cairns, Darwin and Townsville are bona fide cities over 300,000 people nearing on 400,000; once backwaters Mackay and Rockhampton are now the centre of metropolises over 200,000 people. Broome has a population in excess of 35,000; Karratha 50,000 people as too Alice Springs and Katherine.
But, despite all these extra souls, there’s no further sporting clubs in this vast, much more populated region than in 2024 with just Townsville’s North Queensland Cowboys in the NRL and Cairns Taipans in the NBL. Despite murmurs of a Central Queensland NRL club nothing has eventuated and the NRL have baulked at attempting to enter the NT market. Burnt by the North Queensland Fury experiment long ago, the A-League have been gun shy in re-establishing a foothold up north, likewise the NBL have attempted any further forays north after the Townsville Crocodiles collapsed long ago. Netball, baseball, cricket too have thus far largely neglected the top half of the continent.
The great people of the Tropics - from the Pacific to Indian oceans - are bored, dejected and annoyed that despite their greater prominence on the national scene, they have no further sporting clubs established to support. The AFL decide they must step in and reward the region’s - particularly the Northern Territory and north WA’s - rich AFL legacy and establish a club for the nation’s northerners to support.
That club - or my proposed club -
is the North Australia Jabiru, named for the black-necked stork native to the region, based in Darwin with regular season matches in Cairns and Alice Springs along with pre-season matches played along the Queensland and WA coast on a rotational basis.
What is your answer for North Australia’s request for an AFL club in 2036?
After a decade long push by successive Federal and State/Territory Governments to entice residents to ‘Go North’ with a raft of incentives and perks, the measures have been largely successful and an additional million people have moved north of the Tropic of Capricorn to a now staggering 2.5 million people in total. With this Cairns, Darwin and Townsville are bona fide cities over 300,000 people nearing on 400,000; once backwaters Mackay and Rockhampton are now the centre of metropolises over 200,000 people. Broome has a population in excess of 35,000; Karratha 50,000 people as too Alice Springs and Katherine.
But, despite all these extra souls, there’s no further sporting clubs in this vast, much more populated region than in 2024 with just Townsville’s North Queensland Cowboys in the NRL and Cairns Taipans in the NBL. Despite murmurs of a Central Queensland NRL club nothing has eventuated and the NRL have baulked at attempting to enter the NT market. Burnt by the North Queensland Fury experiment long ago, the A-League have been gun shy in re-establishing a foothold up north, likewise the NBL have attempted any further forays north after the Townsville Crocodiles collapsed long ago. Netball, baseball, cricket too have thus far largely neglected the top half of the continent.
The great people of the Tropics - from the Pacific to Indian oceans - are bored, dejected and annoyed that despite their greater prominence on the national scene, they have no further sporting clubs established to support. The AFL decide they must step in and reward the region’s - particularly the Northern Territory and north WA’s - rich AFL legacy and establish a club for the nation’s northerners to support.
That club - or my proposed club -
is the North Australia Jabiru, named for the black-necked stork native to the region, based in Darwin with regular season matches in Cairns and Alice Springs along with pre-season matches played along the Queensland and WA coast on a rotational basis.
What is your answer for North Australia’s request for an AFL club in 2036?
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