English Premier League support is pretty mature in Australia. And holding some minor games here - let's face it they would be - wouldn't be that much of an issue (except for UK based fans - ask AFL fans whose teams have been forced to Sydney, Brisbane and now Gold Coast). Frank Lowey stepped into line with the Asian Conference, that is our caucus and we did what we had to to support our rep.
No, the danger to the A_league is the financial growth of the American MLS. Amercia has a huge opportunity and potential supporter base, but not enough quality players for the number of teams. Their scouts are already reported to be looking at the highly regarded A-League and the Beckham show has introduced others. The Gold Coast Galaxy is already talking about stronger and perhaps feeder links.
1 comment:
if it wasn`t the mls, then it would be the japanese leagues, or the korean league, or the chinese league. i think it was jacob burns who spent some time in china when he was on the outer with his romanian team. and made a stack of $. nicky carle almost moved to korea 2 years ago. again with a much improved pay packet. and when littbarski gets his old boys from sydney fc to join him in japan, they make a very good pay packet in the SECOND DIVISION. the pay is a lot more in the first, with a mega club like urawa (40,000 every game, big tv deal).
the a-league pays what it can afford, and that is pretty small in the global order of things. that should improve, but we will always be small fish, even in asia.
i think the big risks aren`t external, they are internal. coaches who want their team to play rugby. coaches who don`t give youngsters a chance. teams that don`t value their supporters/communities.
clayton
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