damianFootball Wars Part 2- The World Game
July 21st 2006 23:47
The World Game- Soccer
Were you to walk into a watering hole anywhere else in the world (bar America) and asked about the football this is the code they would talk to you about. And there’s a good chance that it would be the only code they could talk to you about. Yes the rest of the world is fanatical about soccer and until recently we just haven’t cared. It’s amazing what a little bit of success will do for a codes profile in Australia.
Soccer has always suffered as the ‘other’ football code in Australia, always considered the code for immigrants or people who weren’t tough enough for ‘proper’ football. Those local fans who did support the code were fanatical individuals locked away in their football bunkers at unearthly times of the morning tuned into SBS or pay TV. The domestic comp staggered under the pressures of clubs aligned with migrant communities and the off field controversies that followed poor crowd behaviour. The competition suffered economically and not even the services of a free to air television station (SBS- the Soccer Broadcasting Service 
) solely devoted to soccer’s propagation could make any headway. Perhaps most frustrating of all was the dearth of world class talent being produced by Australia that would immediately be snapped up by the large overseas clubs and with them the attention of local soccer fans who instead chose to follow domestic competitions overseas.
What a difference a season makes.
With 2004 came what was considered the last gasp for Australian soccer, the last roll of the dice that could sink the code forever. The last chance came in the shape of the A League, the latest incarnation of a domestic competition. With its radical move to a summer competition and brand new clubs now totally removed from any ethnic traditions the competition finally had the vehicle to get the attentions of the general public. It wasn’t an earth shattering entry but it was successful with very healthy crowds and some very intelligent player recruiting that raised the profile of the sport, finally giving the code the stable foundation that they had been craving. But it has been the World Cup qualification of the Socceroos that has really set off talk of the codes meteoritic rise after thirty years of falling short. With the Socceroos newfound fame and success in The World Cup the code is in another orbit but what about the future prospects of the code domestically?
The major strength of soccer has always been its junior numbers which have made the other codes green with envy for years. With such a huge number of kids playing the game the code has always had the first opportunity to recruit for the future but it has never been able to capitalise on it. This has not been helped by the tendency of players to later migrate to the other more physical codes when they are older, a situation made worse by the perception that the sport is chosen by parents who didn’t want their children hurt.
The codes move to summer is one of the most significant changes to the codes fortunes with it no longer competing with the more popular established codes and putting it up against basketball and cricket instead. This scheduling should benefit the code giving it better media coverage but could also hamper it in that the season opening and finals could clash with that of the other codes as they finish off their representative seasons and finals series and then ramp up for the start of their seasons in February. How the A League holds up within this environment could go a long way towards deciding its long term success.
The A League clubs will also have some say in the success of the league and many have managed to draw in very healthy crowds for their first season but there is also reports that some are heavily in debt. Their ability to handle this debt is crucial to the leagues future but with the heightened exposure of the code they should be able to cover their financial responsibilities with new sponsorship money.
Perhaps the most significant development for the code locally is it’s inclusion in the Asian version of the EUFA cup where champion clubs play off against the clubs of other domestic competitions. This should provide a huge windfall to the code with corporate money flowing in from Asian multi-nationals and will provide an incredible representative platform for the local clubs to feed off.
Finally, the continued support of SBS is by far and away the greatest asset the code has within Australia. No other code has such an intense relationship with its supporting free to air television provider, a support that is impressively one eyed to the jealousy of all other football supporters. How they get away with such support without breaking their government funded charter is anyones guess.
The code is not getting all the breaks however and there are some areas which could still be a problem. The biggest would have to be its lack of free to air coverage, the TV rights being held by pay TV provider Foxtel. This has injected much needed funds into the code but it will limit the audience share that the code can achieve. With the support of SBS this lack will be negated to a large extent but even that may be marginal as SBS itself is still not a mainstream provider. With many Australians not pay TV subscribers or regular viewers of SBS the code will still have a battle to fight off cricket as the number one summer sport. Also, with Globalisation the provider of the codes momentum, it could end up turning on the code domestically. Even if soccer was able to produce more star players with its new fame there is the very real chance that the local competition will not be able to retain them thanks to the bigger spending power of international clubs. Australia is still a small market by world standards and with the pooling of capital (money) that occurs with globalisation it will be interesting to see whether Australia is large enough to stand up commercially. If it doesn’t the domestic competition will always suffer, the code instead becoming an international representative sport the way rugby union has been for decades with players who are famous overseas and come back to play for the Socceroos when their clubs let them.
Regardless though soccer will be the real star performer over the coming years. It will be interesting to see where the code is domestically in a decades time.
Some Links
Football Federation Australia
SBS Soccer
Were you to walk into a watering hole anywhere else in the world (bar America) and asked about the football this is the code they would talk to you about. And there’s a good chance that it would be the only code they could talk to you about. Yes the rest of the world is fanatical about soccer and until recently we just haven’t cared. It’s amazing what a little bit of success will do for a codes profile in Australia.
) solely devoted to soccer’s propagation could make any headway. Perhaps most frustrating of all was the dearth of world class talent being produced by Australia that would immediately be snapped up by the large overseas clubs and with them the attention of local soccer fans who instead chose to follow domestic competitions overseas.What a difference a season makes.
With 2004 came what was considered the last gasp for Australian soccer, the last roll of the dice that could sink the code forever. The last chance came in the shape of the A League, the latest incarnation of a domestic competition. With its radical move to a summer competition and brand new clubs now totally removed from any ethnic traditions the competition finally had the vehicle to get the attentions of the general public. It wasn’t an earth shattering entry but it was successful with very healthy crowds and some very intelligent player recruiting that raised the profile of the sport, finally giving the code the stable foundation that they had been craving. But it has been the World Cup qualification of the Socceroos that has really set off talk of the codes meteoritic rise after thirty years of falling short. With the Socceroos newfound fame and success in The World Cup the code is in another orbit but what about the future prospects of the code domestically?
Socceroos success
The major strength of soccer has always been its junior numbers which have made the other codes green with envy for years. With such a huge number of kids playing the game the code has always had the first opportunity to recruit for the future but it has never been able to capitalise on it. This has not been helped by the tendency of players to later migrate to the other more physical codes when they are older, a situation made worse by the perception that the sport is chosen by parents who didn’t want their children hurt.
The codes move to summer is one of the most significant changes to the codes fortunes with it no longer competing with the more popular established codes and putting it up against basketball and cricket instead. This scheduling should benefit the code giving it better media coverage but could also hamper it in that the season opening and finals could clash with that of the other codes as they finish off their representative seasons and finals series and then ramp up for the start of their seasons in February. How the A League holds up within this environment could go a long way towards deciding its long term success.
The A League clubs will also have some say in the success of the league and many have managed to draw in very healthy crowds for their first season but there is also reports that some are heavily in debt. Their ability to handle this debt is crucial to the leagues future but with the heightened exposure of the code they should be able to cover their financial responsibilities with new sponsorship money.
Perhaps the most significant development for the code locally is it’s inclusion in the Asian version of the EUFA cup where champion clubs play off against the clubs of other domestic competitions. This should provide a huge windfall to the code with corporate money flowing in from Asian multi-nationals and will provide an incredible representative platform for the local clubs to feed off.
Evidence Soccer has become successful
Finally, the continued support of SBS is by far and away the greatest asset the code has within Australia. No other code has such an intense relationship with its supporting free to air television provider, a support that is impressively one eyed to the jealousy of all other football supporters. How they get away with such support without breaking their government funded charter is anyones guess.
The code is not getting all the breaks however and there are some areas which could still be a problem. The biggest would have to be its lack of free to air coverage, the TV rights being held by pay TV provider Foxtel. This has injected much needed funds into the code but it will limit the audience share that the code can achieve. With the support of SBS this lack will be negated to a large extent but even that may be marginal as SBS itself is still not a mainstream provider. With many Australians not pay TV subscribers or regular viewers of SBS the code will still have a battle to fight off cricket as the number one summer sport. Also, with Globalisation the provider of the codes momentum, it could end up turning on the code domestically. Even if soccer was able to produce more star players with its new fame there is the very real chance that the local competition will not be able to retain them thanks to the bigger spending power of international clubs. Australia is still a small market by world standards and with the pooling of capital (money) that occurs with globalisation it will be interesting to see whether Australia is large enough to stand up commercially. If it doesn’t the domestic competition will always suffer, the code instead becoming an international representative sport the way rugby union has been for decades with players who are famous overseas and come back to play for the Socceroos when their clubs let them.
Regardless though soccer will be the real star performer over the coming years. It will be interesting to see where the code is domestically in a decades time.
Some Links
Football Federation Australia
SBS Soccer
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