TAS relocation rumours?

[Brad Roo]

History has a tendency to repeat itself, so looking to the past can be relevant.

That is an unintelligent throw away line.

Are you now denying the AFL has given North a bad schedule, shitty stadium deals (better since this year), low FTA coverage, etc????

No.

By removing the CBF the AFL could quickly accelerate spiralling debt.

We get the CBF in the first place for the very reasons you highlighted in the previous chapter!!!!!!!!

Do you honestly believe we would stand by and let that happen without raising a whimper?

Personally, for all I care they can take away the CBF, just give us a decent draw, decent sheduling, a Good Friday match, and 3 games in Ballarat or 1 game in Perth.

Problem solved.

It's not as if we aren't throwing up alternatives.

Until then we get paid and rightly so.

If I remember correctly you and other North supporters have said in other threads (maybe this one also) that the deal for relocation to the GC was NOT good for North due to the conditions hiding behind the $100 million carrot. The money was not the issue. You haven't changed tune here also have you?

It's a complex issue. I personally don't believe we were ever going regardless of the amount of money, but it was much more P.R. savvy to pick apart the AFL's proposal than to openly dismiss it and appear arrogant.

There was also a very delicate club ownership structure to navigate, so in some ways we had to make our dismissal of the proposal make sense to some of our own people.

Also, there were many enemy forces assembled in the media that were pushing the AFL's agenda. Can you imagine at the time what they would have done if we had flatly told the AFL to go and get stuffed?

The route we took to dismember the AFL's proposal was the smartest route to take.

Is that in the same way that your president said you would play all home games in Melbourne and you are now looking at playing games in Ballarat?

Where did the President state that? We even attempted to get a game to W.A. just this season.

 

[A Living God]

I performed some calculations a while ago based on the figured provided in an article last year I believe which estimated the average attendee at TD generates between $33 to $35 and the average stadium return was 75% of the gate and what the break even mark is at TD. It is a ballpark figure.

Their is a large flaw in your numbers. The 75% only applies to general admission. The Club recieves almost all revenue from members.

Don't be an idiot. We don't own the stadium, it is a 25 year lease with no reserve, it was built by an investment company and the users of the stadium are the ones who are paying it off.

The AFL owns the right to acquire the stadium in 2025, a right which they paid for before the stadium was built. Had they not paid for rights, the stadium would remain in private hands.

You don't need 30k people to break even on a stadium, you would have to be an utter moron to believe that shit. Most of the profit margin from the stadium is being absorbed the stadium owners.

You would indeed need to be a moron to believe that you needed 30k to back even.
You would also be a moron if you didn't release that a lot of a club match day return don't come from the gate but through membership and if you include the relevant component of membership revenue the breakeven point is well below 30k but that isn't mention because it doesn't suit the clubs' agenda.

 

[JiggaDog]

Where did the President state that? We even attempted to get a game to W.A. just this season.

"The thing I find amazing is the North Melbourne Football Club faithful should be over the moon.

"The club hasn't had to relocate. We're playing all our games in Melbourne. We've just built a brand new $15 million facility. We've got an exciting list, and last weekend, Ryan Bastinac won a Rising Star nomination. In Brad Scott, we've got an amazing, eloquent strong leader of the club.

"What people need to understand is that when you join a club as a member, it's the cleanest revenue the footy club gets all year. As soon as people join up, that money goes straight on your bottom line," he said.

"So I would have thought this time in 2010, we'd actually be 5000 members ahead of where we were last year. I just find it staggering that we're behind where we were this time last year, when, in a lot of ways, the club was in nowhere near as good a shape as it is now."

Link

 

[chardonnay]

Attendance details at last weeks game?

TV ratings Fri night - NRL gave AFL a bath !!

 

[Tas]

I hear this from North supporters all the time, numbers on face value you are 1/10th of the pie, but in terms of real support and real numbers you are probably about 1/25th of the pie in Victoria. The TV rights will not implode if there is no North Melbourne. The won't if their is no Port either, but I have never heard a Port supporter use this arguement.

Yet Foxtel pays more for North games than they and Austar were prepared to pay for live and exclusive games for the entire SA and WA market. Go figure...

 

[Brad Roo]

Quote:
Originally Posted by James Brayshaw
"The thing I find amazing is the North Melbourne Football Club faithful should be over the moon.

"The club hasn't had to relocate. We're playing all our games in Melbourne. We've just built a brand new $15 million facility. We've got an exciting list, and last weekend, Ryan Bastinac won a Rising Star nomination. In Brad Scott, we've got an amazing, eloquent strong leader of the club.

I had to explain this in Bay 13, I wasn't expecting to have to explain it here.

Brayshaw is clearly talking in the present tense.

Should I take your understanding of this to mean that the comments of Smorgan and the other AFL Presidents prior to this date lock in the prospective machinations of their football clubs for ever more?

Fair dinkum.

 

[JiggaDog]

I had to explain this in Bay 13, I wasn't expecting to have to explain it here.

Brayshaw is clearly talking in the present tense.

Should I take your understanding of this to mean that the comments of Smorgan and the other AFL Presidents prior to this date lock in the prospective machinations of their football clubs for ever more?

Fair dinkum.

And if you read my earlier post properly, you would see that I said what one person says in the present does not necessarily mean that will continue in the future. It was in response to you saying that your (CEO??) said you are not interested in Tasmania. Which is in the PRESENT. Things could change.

Understand the context now?

 

[Brad Roo]

And if you read my earlier post properly, you would see that I said what one person says in the present does not necessarily mean that will continue in the future. It was in response to you saying that your (CEO??) said you are not interested in Tasmania. Which is in the PRESENT. Things could change.

Understand the context now?

Okay, gotcha.

Of course, Eugene could "possibly" state that we were going to Hobart.

That would also most likely explain as to how the idea was completely shelved after he was found hanging from his balcony.

The North fans wouldn't stand for it, he knows it. It just isn't feasible in reality. There is as much likelihood of Eddie McGuire making that suggestion.

If any club goes, they will have to agree to go.

 

[Rooface]

Attendance details at last weeks game?

TV ratings Fri night - NRL gave AFL a bath !!

Wrong thread sunshine.

Tassie Tigers sounds better than Tassie Hawks i must admit.

 

[snrub]

Without wishing to start a flame war, I would like to ask Hawthorn supporters the following... Jeff Kennett is openly asking for the Tassie deal to extend to 2 pre-season games and 5 home games. The question is, how many games can he sell to Tassie before the supporters openly revolt?

 

[Rik E Boy]

cant see it happening unless a club was on its knees financially

PORT ADELAIDE...or is it TASMANIAN POWER?

regards,

REB

 

[Brad Roo]

Without wishing to start a flame war, I would like to ask Hawthorn supporters the following... Jeff Kennett is openly asking for the Tassie deal to extend to 2 pre-season games and 5 home games. The question is, how many games can he sell to Tassie before the supporters openly revolt?

Are you suggesting that the Hawthorn administration have a policy of relocation by stealth?

 

[SweetLeftFoot]

If the AFL did withdraw funding, given the Dogs get more than us, they'd be worse off than us.

Also, if the Govt, under political pressure, changed the terms by which clubs can denote pokies earnings as 'community benefit' a number of clubs would suffer, the Dogs most of all.

North on the other hand are pursuing a strategy that makes us far more attractive and stable in terms of being rooted in our community, rather than actively rooting our community as the Dogs do with pokies.

 

[John Dorian]

Link

We're short for we are. As in currently we are playing all of our games in Melbourne.

James Brayshaw stated at the Dallas Brooks Hall if it came to the stage where we had to play a home game outside of Melbourne we would and Ballarat home games is starting to become that option we will take to improve our financial situation.

It is also good because we have growing support in that region and have a very strong relationship with the North Ballarat Football Club in the VFL with half our reserves playing there.

 

[TimmehJC"]

Without wishing to start a flame war, I would like to ask Hawthorn supporters the following... Jeff Kennett is openly asking for the Tassie deal to extend to 2 pre-season games and 5 home games. The question is, how many games can he sell to Tassie before the supporters openly revolt?

Source please?
What Jeff actually stated is that with 2 extra teams joining the league if there were to be a 24 round season then there would be reason for the AFL supporting a 5th home game in Tassie, with Melbourne fans still gaining an extra Melbourne home game too. No talk of increasing the amount of
preseason games.


With the way the talk seems to be going between Tassie and the AFL, this would seem unlikely, with the push for another club to play 2 games in the state, it is unlikely there will be any further push into Tassie, if anything it could spark a withdrawl if the money didn't at least maintain its current levels.

Thanks to Tasmania, its extremely unlikely that the club will relocate, due to its strong financial position. We've had profits of 6.7million over the last 2 years. We purchased a 4 million dollar investment property (gym). We've started a foundation of back up money as to never end up in the 1996 prediciment again.

Tassie will only work as a start up club, split between the two cities (as neither city has enough support on its own to sustain a club), similar to Geelongs split between Skilled and Etihad.

 

[Blaster]

Rumours was an album by Fleetwood Mac.

 

[JiggaDog]

If the AFL did withdraw funding, given the Dogs get more than us, they'd be worse off than us.

Also, if the Govt, under political pressure, changed the terms by which clubs can denote pokies earnings as 'community benefit' a number of clubs would suffer, the Dogs most of all.

North on the other hand are pursuing a strategy that makes us far more attractive and stable in terms of being rooted in our community, rather than actively rooting our community as the Dogs do with pokies.

You just love taking pot shots at the doggies don't you SLF? I guess its as one poster said earlier in regards to two people running away from a bear and only needing to be faster than the other person not the bear.

Thing is the Dogs are not running from the bear. Just because our financial situation somewhat resembles yours (albeit with higher debt and much higher revenue), our club is pretty well secure. Our membership is continually growing and profits (hence freedom from CBF) are within sight. Even if that were not the case, the AFL would keep bailing us out anyway due to the region we represent.

Get off your high horse regarding the pokies too. AFL is a business, good clubs are run like a business and pokies are a business. Who is the state government to say what businesses can and can't own pokies? And the Dogs are far from the biggest benefactors of pokies in the league anyway.

5 - 10 years ago if asked I would have honestly said that I feared for the future of my team. I no longer do and don't think I will ever again. There are at least 3 other clubs ahead of the Dogs that should be concerned.

 

[SweetLeftFoot]

You just love taking pot shots at the doggies don't you SLF? I guess its as one poster said earlier in regards to two people running away from a bear and only needing to be faster than the other person not the bear.

Given the sudden newfound love of some Dogs fans to pot shots at us over money - yeah, I'm enjoying pointing out the giant flaws in their 'arguments'.

Thing is the Dogs are not running from the bear. Just because our financial situation somewhat resembles yours (albeit with higher debt and much higher revenue), our club is pretty well secure.

No it is not.

Our membership is continually growing and profits (hence freedom from CBF) are within sight.

We'll see on the membership.

Even if that were not the case, the AFL would keep bailing us out anyway due to the region we represent.

No they wouldn't.

Get off your high horse regarding the pokies too. AFL is a business, good clubs are run like a business and pokies are a business.

No it is not. It is a sport. The AFL itself is a non-profit organisation. Clubs do not exist purely to make money. They exist to play the game of Australian Rules Football with the aim of winning the Grand Final.

I realise as a Footscray supporter this is not a mode of thought you've had to engage with ever - I'm presuming you are not in your 70s here.

Having moeny to run that club is vital but having more money than other others is not. Collingwood are loaded and have won **** all recently.

North won two flags in the 90s out of portables.

Who is the state government to say what businesses can and can't own pokies?

Oh dear Jesus, the situation is worse than I thought.

I have tried to be gentle with you so far but you test my patience too much.

We live in a representative democracy based on the Westminster model. Following a series of constitutiional conventions in the latter part of the 19th Century, the colonies of this island (and the shitty one off our southern coast that I bet my bottom dollar you're frantically trtying to flog games to) federated to form Australia.

According to our constitution, subsequently amended by a number of referenda, the states - such as Victoria - have control over certain elements of government, and the Federal Government - based in a city called Canberra you may have heard of - has control over others.

As it stands, the State Governments have essentially majority power over the control of gambling and pokies. They say who can and can't have pokies and what they can and can't do with them.

The current State Government in Victoria derives its legitimacy from a process we call 'democracy', which involves things called elections. Essentially, a group of people form a 'party' and seek elecetion. They set out their plans prior to the election and then the public at large votes for whichever group or individual it wants to.

Usually, one 'party' gains enough votes - as expressed by seats in the 'parliament' - to form government. The people of the state of Victoria currently seem happy with this state of affairs whereby power is decided by peaceful and usually fair means. However it does mean that occasionally governments, and thus their views on certain matters ... such as pokies ... change. Also, other parties, like say the Greens who were fiercely opposed to your bloodsucking pokie venture in the west, find themselves in a position of power when one 'party' does not have enough seats to govern in its own right.

If you are proposing to alter this system in order that the Western Bulldogs Football Club can do what they want with their pokies, then feel free to try. However I must warn you that the state deploys considerable and highly effective forces against those who would wish to challenge its policies by non-democratic or legal means.

And the Dogs are far from the biggest benefactors of pokies in the league anyway.

Not in cash terms but I'd suggest you are desperately reliant on the revenue. Smorgon said as much last year when he bleated you'd be bankrupt within weeks if the new development didn't go ahead.

5 - 10 years ago if asked I would have honestly said that I feared for the future of my team. I no longer do and don't think I will ever again. There are at least 3 other clubs ahead of the Dogs that should be concerned.

Then you should start worrying.

The price of freedom is eternal vigilance.

 

[tonk]

classic

 

[JiggaDog]

Please spare me the political lesson SLF ... the whole point of which seemed to be that if the Greenies get into power then bye bye pokies. Guess what Scotsman ... the Greenies ain't getting into power (not in Vic, AUS anyway) and pokies are here to stay - government makes too much money off them to let them go and they are already an accepted evil within society. In short, they're not going anywhere.

And without a viable business, there's certainly no playing for premierships. The day's of playing out of portables are over, and those who cannot run a good business will be excluded from the competition altogether, regardless of how many premierships they have or are winning.

 

[SweetLeftFoot]

Please spare me the political lesson SLF ... the whole point of which seemed to be that if the Greenies get into power then bye bye pokies. Guess what Scotsman ... the Greenies ain't getting into power (not in Vic, AUS anyway) and pokies are here to stay - government makes too much money off them to let them go and they are already an accepted evil within society. In short, they're not going anywhere.

And without a viable business, there's certainly no playing for premierships. The day's of playing out of portables are over, and those who cannot run a good business will be excluded from the competition altogether, regardless of how many premierships they have or are winning.

I never said they were going anywhere.

I said the rules that govern how the 'community benefit' element could be changed very easily.

And son, I think its been very clearly demonstrated that I have a far superior knowledge of politics and the political process than you do.

You need to check the polls on the Greens at both Vic and Fed level. The balance of power is more than achievable.

And anyway, existing governments facing a threat to their votes ahve been known to change policies to try and ameliorate that threat.

Put simply, you are entirely reliant on AFL money (the most of any club) and sucking your own community (that you claim to represent) dry with pokies, the terms of which change regularly.

In fact, did you not just recently lose some of your pokie revenue after the State Government auction when Mathieson ****ed you over?

This is why you are almost certainly sniffing round this new Tassie games push.

 

[canberra_dee]

there is no way in hell Port would be relocated. There would be no point. We concievebly could be kicked out the comp and our licence given to someone else, but we would never be relocated because 6 or 7 thousand Port supporters who might remain affiliated with the team to see 1 away game at Footy Park against the Crows would just be a stupid plan. Again that is logic. This thread is about who could, if it was to happen, be relocated to Tasmania and despite your tears, North at the moment would be the prime candidate.

I agree that Port will never be relocated. Adelaide will continue to have 2 AFL teams, and unlike Perth which could support a third team due to its booming population and economy, will always have 2 teams, as that would be the optimum number of AFL teams in Adelaide.

I would think that the AFL would do all it can do to support Port, and if port fails, SANFL will use the licence to have a more broad based adelaide team that will be able to match the off-field support and revenues of the Crows

 

[walhawk]

Source please?
What Jeff actually stated is that with 2 extra teams joining the league if there were to be a 24 round season then there would be reason for the AFL supporting a 5th home game in Tassie, with Melbourne fans still gaining an extra Melbourne home game too. No talk of increasing the amount of
preseason games.

Where does the extra home game come from?
Even if the comp goes to 24 rounds, we move one to Tassie, still 7 home games.
With the two new clubs, the extra away game will be interstate.

And, if they stick with 22 rounds, one extra Tas game would mean two less games in Melbourne,

 

[snrub]

Yep, the days of forcing clubs to relocate are a relic of the dark past. The AFL couldn't induce North to move north, why would they choose to move anywhere?

I think you've got it in one here.

What's more, the only value in relocating a team is to draw on that club's Victorian support as an auxiliary membership revenue stream. The supporters of North Melbourne have amply demonstrated at the end of 2007 that there would be less than 1,000 Victorian members of a relocated Kangaroos, therefore, the only way North Melbourne could or would be involved in the establishment of a full time Tasmanian team is if NMFC was disbanded and the license handed back to the AFL, then the AFL could award a Tassie consortium a new license.

 

[JiggaDog]

I never said they were going anywhere.

I said the rules that govern how the 'community benefit' element could be changed very easily.

And son, I think its been very clearly demonstrated that I have a far superior knowledge of politics and the political process than you do.

You need to check the polls on the Greens at both Vic and Fed level. The balance of power is more than achievable.

And anyway, existing governments facing a threat to their votes ahve been known to change policies to try and ameliorate that threat.

Put simply, you are entirely reliant on AFL money (the most of any club) and sucking your own community (that you claim to represent) dry with pokies, the terms of which change regularly.

In fact, did you not just recently lose some of your pokie revenue after the State Government auction when Mathieson ****ed you over?

This is why you are almost certainly sniffing round this new Tassie games push.

No doubt at all that your political knowledge exceeds mine - it is a topic I find extremely tedious. In fact simply skimming through the long-winded political drivel in your previous post nearly put me to sleep. But I digress, son.

Fact is pokies will always be around, unless they are replaced by a "better" gambling system. Either way.

As far as sucking our community dry, are you naive enough to think that if the Doggies weren't making that revenue from the pokies that somebody else wouldn't? That they wouldn't exist anyway? Get your hand off it. At least the pokies we run are within our "region" unlike some of the greedier clubs who come and set up their pokies in the west even though they play no part in other aspects of the community.

And yes Mathieson did **** us over (Richmond too) to deliver Carlton even more pokies - hopefully those venues go broke.

I doubt very much my club would be sniffing around the Tassie games push. We already have our interstate markets and I don't think we'd bother trying to enter another.

Your fear for the existance of the NMFC really shines through in your hatred of the Bulldogs. No amount of deflection is going to take the spotlight off you though - you should probably just enjoy it as its the only time the spotlight is on North.