Team Wellington... no longer an association with Ole. Chur

I think the idea is that you bring the other franchises up, by bringing 1 (or 2) down. 

Then you'll end up with 8 TWs not 8 otagos. 

i feel like i need to lodge my 'vote' on this issue

my personal opinion is that auckland and waitak should not be punished for being better both on the field and off than the other franchises.  and i include their ability to raise funds via whatever source in this statement

they are setting a standard to which the rest of the league should aspire.

i am aware of many factors which hold the other franchises back and most of them are factors over which they should have control

nzf need to run the league better.  this will give the other franchises a chance to lift their performance.

absolutely ...as long as its genuinely competitive people will qeue  to watch it ....



[ see what i done dere !]

This discussion is meaningless until someone uses the word "counterfactual".

 

Let's just make it truly equal and call every game a 11-11 draw with every player given a goal each... 

... That'll have the public flocking to games.

I believe the Auckland teams should be the minimum standard and not brought down to the rest. This year team Wellington have the players but as yet not the right combination or strategy.

As for support, lets face it, the venue is primitive. You have to be a diehard to put up with it.

They are dominant because they are trying to be as professional as they can, both on and of the field. Auckland looked fitter, more organised and better coached. Look at Tade for example, much better individually than he ever was down here.

 

How would introducing an expenditure cap "punish" Auckland and Waitakere? If anything it makes things easier for them - less fundraising required. It would also lessen the risks they currently face from relying so heavily on a single income stream. If you think that trying to create a more competitive league in which they are less likely to dominate is "punishing" them then that's a bizarre point of view, and kind of antithetical to the whole point of sport, especially when trying to generate public interest. Even at the Americas Cup they are talking about making the requirements less financially onerous in order to create more competition and interest - and those guys are total fucking capitalists!

And how would an expenditure cap lower the standard? The same talent would be there but likely to be spread more evenly around the league. Unless you think players will actually leave the game altogether?* My view on that is that if it requires the proceeds of gambling to motivate elite footballers to play at the highest levels of the game then we are well past being morally bankrupt. A more competitive league will also raise than standard in and of itself because every team will know they have a decent chance at the title and it will be what you do on the pitch that makes the difference between winning and losing. Isn't that the very essence of sport?

I agree that NZF need to run the league better. But I think that an expenditure cap and possibly centralising gaming funding are two important components of doing that.

*unless talking about imports. I don't care about them. If the overall standard of the league is temporarily reduced because of fewer imports and more Kiwis are getting a chance then great.

This me first post ..."counterfactually " i think not playing games is even easier , and thusly [ Thanks Termie   !! ] even less effort is required .....Haysus you really are a product of the " New " NZ , lets not keep score either again it just gets better and better , what about a system of handicaps ...[ already in use by some franchises ]

F M you really should follow the wanderers SPECIAL club ....

for me, the league's saving grace right now are the standards that waitak and auckland bring

however, i'd be happy to see many of the measures you are suggesting introduced, but only after the other franchises can convince me that they are doing everything possible to achieve the standards set at the top, but are being restricted in doing so because of what those two franchises are doing. 

let's assume waita and auckland are run really really well.  therefore, they get better players and more money.  let's also assume that the other franchises are run ok, or just plain terribly.  why are deserving of equality?

the issue of the morality of pokie funding is a good one.  but our sport has always relied on the immoral - tobacco and booze sponsorship - so perhaps this is an argument for another day

the league also has a lot of other issues to tidy up beforehand
- number of foreigners
- number of youngsters
- number of games
- sponsorship money

good point

There's a reason for that: opportunity. He's desperate to be included in both squad and 1st team line-up for the game in Morocco.

Well ...improving players ...that surely isnt permissable ,is it ?

To be fair Tade has got better every year he has been in the country regardless of what city he has been in. He has a great talent for banging in goals and JM is right, all he wants is the opportunity to do that. You can see how desperate he is to get the ball in attacking positions and his frustration when he doesn't put every chance away.

This is at the very heart of the issue reg22. I think you've got the logic wrong there. Waitak and Auckland don't have better players and get more money from pokies because they are run really well, they get better players and are run really well because they have more money.

There's this assumption that ACFC (and Waitak) have somehow hit on this brilliant business model and therefore their dominance is simple market economics. They are just reaping the rewards for doing things really well. But that's bullshit. All ACFC and Waitak are doing is writing lots of applications for pokie grants (the same as every other franchise is doing) but getting a much higher proportion of them approved - in ACFC's case almost without fail from a single trust over a long period of time. That is not about having a better business model or being run really well, it is just... well, let's be polite and call it lucky. It's also the complete antithesis of the kind of "work hard and be rewarded" ethic that you seem to think is in evidence here, it's actually a model based on receiving nanny-state style handouts.  It certainly points to a major failing in the whole pokie grants system, one that the DIA seem to be aware of and are making moves to fix.

Now it wouldn't particularly matter how much money ACFC and Waitak have if it didn't then cause a major distortion in the competitiveness of the league, effectively making it a two-horse race that no-one south of the Bombay Hills is really interested in.

So the proposal to introduce an expenditure cap isn't about trying to punish ACFC and Waitak, or give other teams an unfair leg up, it's just a possible mechanism for creating a more competitive and interesting league.

100% this

Seriously FU BLU you make the most illogical, incoherent posts on these forums, go back to banging on your bucket.

Anyways, people have mentioned on these forums about how Waikato haven't really cared too much about the league, and that's basically true as a sweeping statement for the past. But now under WaiBOP United I think you have the perfect example of how a franchise who don't quite have the resources of other franchises should be run - they've got an excellent media man and online presence, their game days are very well run and smoothly operated, and they are really putting in a lot of effort from the board down the staff to the players in making a real go at being competitive, and more importantly, sustainable in this league.

When you have teams like Canterbury and Southern and heck, even Waitakere and TW, who have very little consistent online content or updates or news, it's hard for fans to get involved, and I think organisers at repsective teams could actually take a leaf from their book somewaht.

FU BLU. Stay away from those pills marked "knob end - extra strength". You know you don't need to take them anymore.

FU BLU is taking a day off for his choice of language when addressing other posters.

Ah the sweet sweet sound of knitting needles....

ok termi, you've made a damn good case here, i can definitely see the validity of your point

but i will stand by my statement that the balance of the franchises, who have all contributed damaging periods of ineptitude, are as much to blame for their own dollar shortage as they are 'victims' of the 'luck' being experienced in auckland

i'll share with you a story of one franchise, who had approved funds for a specified two year project that they cancelled after one year with money owing to a vendor that they had to pay out.  NZCT were not happy.  this same franchise then forgot to apply for what had become a fairly staple annual NZCT funding ration.  one month from the start of the season and they had no cash and had to be bailed out by a charitable workings of a local business.

a very similar story was relayed to me by a board member of another franchise at about the same time

Termy, bless you for having the patience to write what I'm thinking.

What you're saying (and I 100% endorse) and what Reg is saying aren't mutually exclusive. There's no doubt that other franchises could do better, even without the resources that ACFC and Waitak have or have had. 

In a horribly circular way I do thing that the "franchise" structure discourages volunteerism. There's a sense that the franchises are something you get involved in for personal gain or kudos, rather than because of an emotional connection that you might feel for a club. The whole notion of a club is different, and involves the (notionally anyway) mutual support/connection of members. A franchise is a business term which I don't think belongs in amateur sport.

you're right mate, the two aren't mutually exclusive.  and i see now that the point against my side of the argument isn't what i thought it was.

you're bang on about the volunteer thing.  i'm not sure where i sit on the club vs franchise thing.  i was stubbornly against franchises when they first came in, but the games were of a very high standard and we had big crowds.  now, apart from the big 2, not so much.

back in the day, it was possible for some rich dude to drag a club up from nowhere and have them compete for titles (like dave cook at mt maunganui).  even a not so rich club could come up with a strategy for being the best in the land.  but now none of that is possible. 

on the other hand, none of the franchises have gone out of business, whereas that was becoming a common occurance for clubs.

Yes, I'm not defending instances of incompetence in other franchises when they have occurred.

However, I think they are still largely one-offs and an analysis of pokie money received by franchises over the entire history of the competition tells an absolutely clear and undeniable story.

Smithy, you are right about the volunteering as well. That's one area where ACFC are genuinely out on their own and deserve a lot of credit (although it's interesting to ponder the extent to which success helps drive that also).

I do like the theoretical idea of having a set of teams that represent different regions of nz though. Wellington v Auckland or otago v Waikato etc. It has more potential and is more appealing to me than a club based league with the likes of Miramar in it. 

The reality however is that it hasn't worked out that way, and it may as well be club based, and the points above are good ones too, and are certainly positive things about having a club based league. 

The frustrating thing is that it could have worked, but needs a governing body that cared enough to keep it on track etc 

i found it interesting that ivan vuksich was against the club concept.  auckland city really is just a re-branded central united and they would be able to keep operating pretty much in the same manner as they do now.  they'd  just have to earn their place, which i have no doubt they will.

one place where i don't think the franchise thing has worked in napier, brand wise anyway.  the 'napier city rovers' brand is/was a massive one.  they ditched it so that they could be inclusive with other clubs who have put in varying degrees of effort over the years

i've always thought it works well in canterbury

christchurch has historically been a one-team town

woolston were in the league for a while, but after one season i believe they turned into woolston canterbury and the next season canterbury

so they had been operating as a one-entry city for some time before the advent of the franchise league came along

i'm not sure at which point mainland football took over the running of the team

There were, and are, valid reasons for introducing the franchise concept, including trying to protect essentially social clubs (many with long proud histories) from going broke trying to fund national league football. Even at ACFC/Central you have an important element of structural separation. If ACFC went under it wouldn't necessarily take Central with it.

I think the franchise concept just needs to be tweaked so that it is better aligned with where the interest, talent etc is.

As the heading says NOT TW.  Goodnight