It didn't work last time because the population was too small. Nothing has changed in the meantime. The Fury could probably get good crowds if they had a good team for a few seasons but long term they are always inevitably going to struggle.
If the population was too small why does the NRL have the Qld Cowboys?
The population was too small to sustain an A-League team. Rugby league is far bigger than soccer in Townsville (as far as I know) and the Cowboys don't get great crowds. Central Coast are from a slightly bigger area but have been the most successful team in the history of the A-League (I think by competition points) and are close to a much bigger population base which gives them 3 local rivalries. Geelong can compete in the AFL probably because they are fanatical and they have local rivalries.
I think you are very optimistic if you think Townsville can sustain a team which can average 10,000 long term. 10,000 seems to be the magic crowd number and below that you need someone to fund you. Not sure how many of those exist in Townsville.
The Cowboys got from 9000 to 19000 depending on who they were playing last year.
Yeah. And the Fury got average crowds of 6,000 and 4,000 when they were in the A-League and never once recorded a crowd of above 10,000. This was despite having a crowd puller marquee in Robbie Fowler. Admittedly the team wasn't very good. The point is that every club has a few seasons when they aren't very good. If you average 10,000 (the hypothetical breakeven point) when you have a good team but can only average 4,000 when you have a bad team then you have to have a good team every season just to survive. And if you spend a lot of money trying to win the league then your breakeven crowd maybe goes to 13 or 14k. You get a vicious cycle where you need to spend more to get good crowds but need good crowds to spend more.
I don't know what has/will happen in football in Townsville between 2011 and 2018 to make the Fury's crowds double. Once again, rugby league is the sport in NQ and it seems strange to use the Cowboys average crowd of about 14,000 as an example. I mean the Geelong Cats averaged 39,000, do you think a soccer team in Geelong will average something similar? You have to compare apples with apples.
When you think about expansion you need to find a gap in the market. That's what they did with Western Sydney and that's what Melbourne Heart did poorly in failing to create their own identity even though Melbourne needed a second team. I don't think a gap in the market exists in Townsville which also has a basketball team. You need to look at Tasmania (which doesn't have a team in any sport), Canberra, (no summer sport), Wollongong (only gets 4 NRL games a year and has a good stadium) and places like Auckland or Christchurch (obviously issues with another NZ team) among others.
The Central Coast benefit from great ingenuity from their management and being the only team in a region of 300,000 people as well as other things I have mentioned.