Almanac Footy: The Future Of Football (Part 2)

 

THE FUTURE OF FOOTBALL (PART 2)

 

Hi footy fans. This is the concluding second part to a piece that was inspired by events from the latter stages of our last, long summer. You might remember that previously, a couple of weeks ago, we were speculating on the possibility that the expanding influence of the Saudi Arabian government’s Public Investment Fund and its vast resources on international sport might just reach our fair shores, and then….what would that mean for the AFL? In a nutshell- a fabulously exciting future!

 

Let’s have a look at how this thrilling concept can be made to happen. Obviously the first thing to do is get the right people with the right advice on board, ideally involving a figure who already has access to the Saudis through their (probably) massively rewarded existing work with the LIV set up. Someone who also has intimate links with power brokers in the world of American golf would be helpful, for you then have a finger on the pulse of much of the big money in the sport, and their expertise can then be focused on what we want to achieve here with footy. There must be a well known former Australian golfer who fits the bill. Hmmm….I wonder. Someone suitable will surface. And though they probably know nothing about football, well, this has never stopped the AFL in its hiring of consultants in the past. No doubt this person will be expensive, but we all know the AFL is rolling in cash so this won’t be a problem at all. I mean, they’ve just found a spare million or so, plus some “riders”, no doubt, for Snoop on Grand Final day.

 

Second, choose the teams to participate in the new competition, which is intended to be a streamlined and elegantly simple arrangement- this is always the best method. If we use as a model the proposed breakaway European Soccer Super League of a few years ago, which didn’t get off the ground largely due to the blatant greed of those would-be participants, some of which were pretty much publicly shamed, we need a small nucleus of the richest, most successful and/or disliked teams from across the country.

 

The Super League was to involve only an elite of twelve of the hundreds of teams from the many nations of Europe. So, to approximate that sort of scale, we’re suggesting four teams- Collingwood, Hawthorn, and to satisfy the nationwide concept, West Coast and the Adelaide Crows. These clubs tick all the boxes in terms of the criteria required, but most importantly they are loathed….and loaded. (Apologies to Carlton and Essendon who missed the cut by ‘that much’, as Maxwell Smart might say.)

 

Just take a minute and think of the tremendous advantages that such a competition will have over that which currently exists. First up, every weekend there will be just the two games- Collingwood v. Adelaide and Hawthorn v. West Coast, or something very similar obviously- so all that confusing scheduling that so befuddles the AFL….7.20 Thursday?….12.35 Saturday?….3.40 Sunday? or whatever the hell it is- it’s gone. All gone. Good riddance.

 

The four teams can play each other ten times- who wouldn’t love seeing the Crows take on the Eagles ten times a season?- so that we end up with a 30 game fixture. This will stretch out over the period from February right through to November, and the broadcasters will love it! Between the dual sporting highlights of the LIV golf to the Melbourne Cup, perhaps the twin peaks of alcohol consumption (in a crowded field) in the Australian sporting calendar, it’ll be footy, footy, and more footy. Entertainment plus!

 

A vital aspect of this exciting concept is that every one of the four teams involved makes the finals. This will be so important in keeping supporters happy, and will eliminate much of the negativity in the game as coaches won’t have to answer continuous, monotonous and really boring questioning from tabloid hacks about the troubling ramifications of “missing out on playing finals again this season”. In addition, purists and students of the game’s history will be pleased to see the revival of the Final Four system which served the game so well for decade after decade up until the 1970s. And retro is so cool these days!

 

On the subject of the 70s, and who of us at a certain age can’t stop reminiscing about that wonderful time when we were having such fun while the world more generally was irrevocably turning to crap, (the rise of neo-liberal economics just taking off for one thing, and the attendant flattening of wages and increasing inequality), let’s get on to the happier subject of kicking goals and the rewards for booting bagfuls of them.

 

One of the aspects of the game senior citizens like us cling to, is when full forwards bestrode the 70s, regularly kicking a hundred goals a season- greats like Hudson, Jesaulenko, McKenna, Templeton and Wade. A time when the two sides in a contest both kicked more than eighteen or twenty goals in a game! What can we do to bring these goal fests back to the new AFL? Incentives, for a start. With the financial backing involved in this project, significant bonuses can be offered to scorers of multiple goals, rising to eye watering amounts for a ten or twelve goal day out. Imagine the positive impact this will have on the game as a spectacle. There will be Kevin Bartlett clones aplenty, eyes straight ahead, one thing in mind, motoring determinedly toward the goal square. Handball will pretty much disappear- no more of those endless, painful to watch circular chains of it as your team attempts, crab-like, to break out of its defensive zone. The fans are going to lap it up, as players with dollar signs in their eyes constantly attempt to bounce the ball the length of the field searching for the big sticks.

 

Importantly, the draft, such a big factor in modern football, will be simplified enormously. The top 40 draft picks will be divided between the four clubs. Easy as that. As we already know, draftees after pick 40 are more than likely to include some injury-prone duds of little use to the elite teams, so those players can drift off to lesser sides and lesser competitions where they might be able to scratch out some sort of mediocre footballing career in between knee operations and recoveries from concussions.

 

And with ten draft picks a year the four lucky clubs will have plenty of fresh blood coming through, absolutely necessary as the established players will be dropping off at a greater frequency, physically wrecked and burned out by the 30 game season and needing more time out of the game due to, yes, knee operations and recoveries from concussions.

 

Which brings us to the other fourteen clubs of the old AFL, those who didn’t make the shiny new Saudi AFL. “What of them?” I hear you cry. Well, I suppose they can join some local suburban league, in Geelong’s case perhaps a country competition, or some kind of obscure 3rd tier scrubber’s conglomerate where a few of them might have a semblance of a chance of achieving some level of success. This would suit teams like, for example, St. Kilda, Gold Coast and Freo perfectly. In Carlton’s and Essendon’s case, unlucky to miss out on the riches of the new arrangements, you can foresee them bringing in the heavyweight legal eagles and spending the next couple of years embroiled in bitter and hugely expensive courtroom battles which could, come to think of it, be almost as entertaining as the new Saudi set up.

 

And finally, for all of you out there who are keen participants in tipping competitions, think how simple tipping will become. Two games a week, which will take a matter of minutes to decide upon, rather than the hours spent hunched over a poorly illuminated desk scattered with print outs and statistics, which for many of us is currently the case.

 

Look- at the time we were first chewing over these thoughts, some months ago late last summer, it had been tough being an Australian. What, with Chinese warships cruising off Williamstown Beach, the news that our trade policies meant that we were literally stealing the food from the mouths of hungry American children, and the floods in the far north possibly leading to a rise in the price of bananas, this country needed a lift, a psychological boost. And who amongst us might suggest any different as things currently stand?….whatever that means. Well, this new vision of football should put smiles on the faces of all footy fans, and give us all hope for the future of the great game.

 

Read Part 1 Here.

 

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Our writers are independent contributors. The opinions expressed in their articles are their own. They are not the views, nor do they reflect the views, of Malarkey Publications.

 

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