Cunningham: Proof is in the pudding for AFL team hype in the Territory

The CLP was elected to fix bad news. But at some point it will need a good news story to sell. It will be hard pressed to find a better one than what we saw at TIO Stadium, writes Matt Cunningham.

Fans at the Gold Coast Suns v Hawthorn AFL match at TIO Stadium. Picture: Pema Tamang Pakhrin

The second week of May might have become the best week of the year in Darwin.

It’s not just because the Dry season has arrived.

For the past couple of years, this has also become the week the footy comes to town.

For me, that not only means I get to go two games of AFL football, but I get to spend a week covering the game as well.

With the greatest respect to our Treasurer, I’d much rather speak to Touk Miller about his 200th game than to Bill Yan about the budget.

It’s the week where the footy is the biggest story in town.

Where all the best bits of our city are plastered over every TV station in Melbourne, Adelaide and Perth.

A week where the achievements of some extraordinary Territorians are remembered and celebrated. Where strong Aboriginal men are seen on a national stage as leaders, on and off the field.

The Gold Coast Suns have done a brilliant job of making the Top End their temporary home. It’s a mutually beneficial arrangement that has seen the once-struggling Suns win their past eight games at TIO Stadium, and the Territory given the opportunity to be shown at its best on prime-time TV.

Gold Coast Suns v Hawthorn AFL match at TIO Stadium. Picture: Pema Tamang Pakhrin

The Suns’ Darwin success has sparked renewed interest in the possibility of a Northern Territory AFL team.

These discussions are always met with a chorus of complaints from the naysayers who claim we don’t have the people, the money or the climate for this to work.

Let’s challenge some of these assumptions.

If you don’t like playing footy when it’s 22 degrees and fine, then you’ve probably never played the game.

On Thursday night Gold Coast and Hawthorn played what was probably the best game of the season.

It was fast, high-scoring, and featured two contenders for mark of the year from Jed Walter and Ben Long.

For too long, top-flight footy in Darwin has been given a bad name because it has been played between teams sitting near the bottom of the ladder, who have delivered lacklustre games and then departed as quickly as possible.

This week we’ve seen two games between three teams who could all realistically challenge for the premiership.

The quality of the games has resulted in bumper crowds at both contests.

Almost 10,000 were at the games between the Suns and Bulldogs last Saturday, and more than 12,300 attended the sold-out Hawthorn game on Thursday night.

It shows that if you send good sides, the crowds will come.

If you give us North Melbourne versus a bottom-of-the-ladder Gold Coast at 4pm on a Saturday afternoon – as we had in 2022 – don’t be surprised if no-one shows up.

The crowds at last week’s game would have exceeded even the AFL’s expectations.

If the AFL sent one of it’s big four Melbourne clubs – Carlton, Collingwood, Richmond or Essendon – here, the game would sell out in an hour.

Emmi Hams, Lui Bennell, Taj Hams and Jed Bennell at the Gold Coast Suns v Hawthorn AFL match at TIO Stadium. Picture: Pema Tamang Pakhrin

When Richmond and Essendon played their Dreamtime Game here during Covid, the ground, albeit with a reduced capacity of 7500, sold out in minutes.

If Darwin had its own team, a run of games against the big Melbourne clubs through June and July would be a massive boost for our tourism industry, not just from the influx of interstate supporters, but from the wave of publicity that would come with them.

The biggest hurdle for a Darwin AFL team is the cost.

The NT AFL task force has done a good job earmarking sites and designs for a new Darwin stadium.

But our push for a team can’t be conditional on a new facility.

The West Coast Eagles played for years at the old Subiaco Oval, the Adelaide Crows and Port Adelaide Power at Football Park, and the Brisbane Bears called the old Carrara ground home long before these teams upgraded to bigger, better facilities.

The Tasmanian example shows that linking an AFL team with a new stadium only divides the community, uniting NIMBYS from both sides of the political spectrum.

At the moment the argument appears to be framed as “build us a stadium and we’ll think about giving you a team”.

It should be “give us a team and we’ll think about building a stadium”.

If we can pack out TIO Stadium for a few years, turning people away at the gate as we did on Thursday night, the argument about a new stadium will take care of itself.

To this point, the Finocchiaro Government’s interest in an AFL team has been lukewarm at best.

It’s made it clear its priorities are fixing crime, rebuilding the economy and restoring the Territory lifestyle.

We’ve heard plenty about that first point, a little about the second, and almost none about the third.

During the Treasurer’s budget speech on Tuesday, one of the items he listed under the “Restoring the Territory lifestyle” heading was “new upgrades at the Alice Springs Correctional Centre and youth justice facilities”.

If this is what represents our great Territory lifestyle then it’s time to pack up and leave.

The CLP was elected to fix the bad news. But at some point it will need a good news story to sell. It will be hard pressed to find a better one than what we saw at TIO Stadium last week, where the best of the Territory was on display for a national audience.

Imagine if that happened 11 times a year.

Originally published as Cunningham: Proof is in the pudding for AFL team hype in the Territory