AFL denies claims they are kicking a ‘can down the road’ on Tasmanian team bid
The AFL has hit back at Peter Gutwein after the Tasmanian Premier claimed the league is unreasonably delaying a decision on whether to grant the state its own football team.
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The AFL has hit back at Tasmanian Premier Peter Gutwein, denying that they are kicking a “can down the road” and unreasonably delaying a decision on whether to grant the state its wish of its own football team.
AFL Commission chairman Richard Goyder said it would take “goodwill” from all involved for Tasmania to have proper representation in the national competition but the Carter Report into the viability of a team for the Apple Isle was a “very positive step forward”.
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Gutwein said on Friday that he was “annoyed” by the AFL’s refusal to put a timeline on a timeline on a Tasmanian team, adding, “Once again the AFL has taken the view they can kick the can down the road”.
“I don’t agree with the Premier in terms of kicking down the road,” Goyder said.
“If we wanted to kick it down the road we would have just said, ‘We’re not doing anything now while we’re in a global pandemic’. But we made a very deliberate decision to get Colin (Carter) to do this report, knowing that he would do the work which he has and knowing that there would likely be a recommendation, which there has.
“We’ll work with the premier, we’ll work with Tasmania, we’ll work with the clubs. We are dealing with a pandemic that has material impact not just with the AFL but with all our 18 clubs and Colin’s put in some options and each of those need to be worked through as well. So I actually think it’s an important and positive way forward for Tasmania and with goodwill, we’ll get there.”
Goyder admitted there were concerns around the depth of talent around the country available for a 19th AFL club.
“I think that’s one of a number of concerns about a 19th licence,” he said on ABC radio.
“It’s that, it’s the financial impact, it’s the scheduling. There’s a whole lot of things that bring a complexity that needs to be worked through and that’s why Colin’s come up with a couple of other options that need looking at.
“We don’t want a situation where you’ve got a team based in Tasmania that is a perennial underperformer.”
The AFL will discuss the Carter Report with club presidents next month but has stressed no decision will be made then.
The AFL Commission is keen to explore the option of having a Victorian team relocate to Tasmania or a Melbourne-based club go into a joint-venture with Tasmania before considering awarding a 19th AFL licence.
Why won’t AFL act on Carter report?
Forget the spin about alternate models and joint ventures that will never happen.
For a moment, sidestep the reality that the AFL will again attempt to delay Tasmania’s entry into the league to a date yet to be determined.
Read the Carter report into Tasmania’s right to secure a 19th team and it becomes clear this should be a triumphant moment.
Or better yet, listen to the man himself, who told the Herald Sun on Friday the figures stack up.
After decades of obfuscation as the AFL mocked the capacity of Tasmania to host its own team, and installed two teams into expansion markets, Carter makes clear Tasmania can support a 19th AFL team on its own.
“The numbers here work,” Carter said.
“Anyone who says they don’t work has a view of the way sport operates that doesn’t exist in the real world. To me the 19th team passes the test. There are risks with it and it would be dependent on government funding for operating costs, but I am saying the 19th team passes the test, but we also have an obligation to look at alternative models.”
DOWNLOAD: CLICK HERE TO READ THE FULL COLIN CARTER REPORT
Former AFL commissioner, and long-time Geelong president, Carter has long been entranced by the NFL’s Green Bay Packers, a small-market team with a boutique stadium and tiny Wisconsin population.
The Packers have built a vast legacy of success as a small-market team and Carter’s report touches repeatedly on the message that sporting codes thrive with teams of different cultures and sizes.
On Carter’s estimation, Tasmania’s sporting team could succeed with $15 million of annual AFL funding and Tasmanian state funding of between $7 million and $11 million a year.
As he states in the report of the Packers, who have a population half the size of Hobart: “Green Bay is to the NFL what Tasmania would be to the AFL.”
Of course there would be risks and non-financial costs — player retention, several years of compromised drafts — but the upside is obvious.
Gillon McLachlan’s statement that the AFLW is only whole with 18 clubs applies equally to a team in Tasmania finally securing a truly national competition.
Unfortunately for the Tasmanian bid, that might be where the good news ends now, given the rocky road ahead filled with potholes and misdirections.
Peter Gutwein accused the AFL of “kicking the can down the road” with Tasmania’s challenge now to secure a specific deadline on a vote from the AFL and its club presidents next year as Covid-19’s financial effects fade.
As Carter’s report makes clear the league must also consider a relocation, or joint venture, that sees 50-50 ownership of a Melbourne team that plays half its games in Tasmania under that state’s colours.
McLachlan made clear on Friday his $200 million baby Gold Coast will not relocate or be involved in a joint venture: “The Suns are not moving from the Gold Coast, and that’s definitive.”
But North Melbourne chairman Ben Buckley, or St Kilda president Andrew Bassat, would surely find themselves out of office quicker than you can say “extraordinary general meeting” if they attempted to relocate their clubs or become involved in joint ventures.
Make no mistake about a joint venture, it would end up a forced relocation, as Carter makes clear in his report: “At the end of (say) ten years, an appropriately chosen panel will assess where the bulk of the club’s support sits – in Melbourne or Tasmania – and that will define the future residency of the club.”
Carter says the league and its clubs need to take a 100-year view of the league’s future, which is why relocation cannot be ruled out.
“You could ask anyone, do they think South Melbourne would have been better off if they had remained in Melbourne than relocated to Sydney? I would hope they see that case,” he said.
Of the joint venture, Carter agrees it is less likely.
“The chances are low, but it ought to be put on the table.”
In his report, Carter says the Tasmanian Taskforce’s claim that an extra 11 home games for a 19th side would boost TV broadcast revenue by $17 million is debatable.
The taskforce stated the extra $17 million would effectively neutralise the $17 million AFL dividend the state would need, and he is right if Fox Footy was forced to shove another game into a crowded Saturday afternoon schedule.
But the great benefit of having a bye in the fixture is it allows Thursday night football every week as a team coming off a bye takes on a team that played the previous Friday night.
Given each AFL game is worth roughly $2 million to the league — $400 million per season of broadcast cash on 198 home-and-away games and nine finals — surely weekly Thursday night footy provides for a stunning TV windfall.
If McLachlan couldn’t sell the entire Thursday night package in prime time, and averaging a million viewers a night for an extra $17 million bucks, he isn’t the deal-maker we believe him to be.
Carter sees that opportunity, too, but says in his report he was careful to state the financial facts given broadcast experts were uncertain of the value.
“I have made the case for Tasmania as a 19th side even if that media uptick is not enough,” Carter said.
So Tasmanians will again push ahead believing they have been wronged by the AFL, which has been presented with irrefutable evidence of their case for admission yet again.
But as they suit up for another 12 or so months of battle before a concrete proposal can be put to the AFL’s presidents, they will do so with an AFL-endorsed report that for the first time strips away the financial excuses to hold this bid back.
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