Bringing new fans to the NZFC
How to bring the immigrant communities into the game?
This is the quandry after around 10,000 locally domiciled Fijians turned up for the O League final a wee while back.
So I had a little think about it and came up with a few ideas.
Firstly identify the communities and tailor the approach to each.
In Auckland, in my view, there are three communities which would be worth pursuing. They are the British ex-pat community, the Asian community and the Fijian community.
Each are different but I believe holding regular "Community Days" would be a start. For this I would invite the communities to the game, but also to participate in a way which would make them feel welcome and also to entice them along in good numbers.
This could be done in several ways, and of course an obvious way would be to have their cultural groups give a display at half time during matches.
But there is another way which is guaranteed to bring the communities to the game is hold curtain-raisers featuring teams from those communities. These could be in any of several formats, either five or six-a-side or full 11-man games.
I know that these sort of events are extremely popular among all communities, indeed they often hold these types of games among themselves and these can attract thousands of people. I can think of the Pacific Islands league tournament, the four nations rugby tournament held at College Rifles annually among British ex-pats, and the Fijians hold a village-based tournament which draws huge crowds.
So the Fijians could be invited to play six aside curtain-raisers featuring village teams, or perhaps Island of Origin 11-man games. These could be determined after discussions with the communities involved.
Asian communities could play each other, indeed an "international" format could be used in a wider sense, perhaps as a Community Friendship tournament, played as curtain-raisers before each NZFC game. There are many immigrant communities who might wish to enter a team, Chinese, Korean, Japanese, Scots, English, Irish, Welsh or other European communities such as the Croatian, French and Italian communities, even the South Americans have Chilean and Brazilian communities.
Quite a few of them already have teams who play in Sunday leagues, and I know the Asians already compete against each other in baseball.
For the ex-pat Brits, another way to bring them along would be through their supporters clubs. Chelsea, Manchester United, Arsenal, Celtic and Liverpool all have large supporters clubs and could be invited along to play curtain-raisers.
So there are several ways to entice them along. Once they get to the game they have to be made welcome, perhaps a tent with a barbecue, beers and iceblocks for the kids. All for sale of course, perhaps a local club could use it as a fund raiser.
Then they stay for the match and are invited to the after match where players and officials would also do their bit to welcome these potential new fans.
I am sure these events would become very popular, and would add to the football experience. It would also help clubs generate more income. More people through the gate, two games meaning more food and drink sold. It has to be a win-win.
And it is no small community building exercise on a wider front. Football could even lobby the likes of Sparc for funding for help promoting these days.
Just a few ideas, but there are certainly a lot of fans out there who just need to be invited along and made to feel welcome.
Any other thoughts
