The AFL’s richest clubs have formed a coalition in the fight for cash as the post-COVID planning of the AFL continues
As the post-COVID planning at the AFL continues, the fight for footy money is heating up. And five of the competition’s power clubs have formed a coalition amid fears they will lose out.
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Five of footy’s richest clubs have held talks amid fears they could be forced to shoulder the burden of the industry’s mega cost cuts.
Collingwood, West Coast, Richmond, Hawthorn and Essendon have formed a loose coalition ahead of a proposed post-COVID reshaping of the AFL’s equalisation system.
The gang of five want the AFL to guarantee annual distributions for all clubs equivalent to the full salary cap next year and beyond - and not just to the competition’s cash-strapped teams, as has been the position over the last decade.
AFL chief executive Gillon McLachlan informed club chiefs that there were competing arguments around cash distributions during a tense presidents meeting on Wednesday.
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The league believes its capacity to pay dividends equal to total player payments will depend on the outcome of pay negotiations with the AFL Players’ Association set to reach a climax next week.
Wednesday’s meeting took a surprise twist when Sydney Swans chairman Andrew Pridham suggested the league needed to consider a structural review of the entire competition, including the existing commission system put in place after the 1993 Crawford Report.
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His remarks led some in the meeting to believe he was referring to the possibility of reducing the number of AFL clubs.
St Kilda president Andrew Bassat queried whether Pridham was actually hinting at a reduction in teams, which the Swans boss denied.
Hawthorn president Jeff Kennett declined to discuss details of Wednesday’s presidents meeting with the AFL first aired on Magpie boss Eddie McGuire’s Footy Classified program.
“I am terribly disappointed that someone so promptly after the meeting briefed journalists. I consider these meetings to be similar to a cabinet meeting where things should be discussed freely and openly - and confidentially,” Kennett said.
Western Bulldogs president Peter Gordon said the AFL and “the overwhelming majority of clubs continued to support the need for variable funding from the AFL to clubs”.
“Because just like every other major sporting competition in the world, we have bigger clubs and smaller clubs, and they have different capacities to weather this storm,” Gordon said.
“Every competition has been knocked around by COVID-19, so it’s only natural that we are looking to find new ways to make it work.”
Gordon said he believed everyone was committed to “18 teams in, 18 teams out” through the crisis”. “And if they’re not, they should be,” he said.
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