David Dome and the Media

Domey's pretty straight up with the press. I like that about him. I don't think he was trying to hold some sort of gun to anyone's head here, he was just telling it like it is.

Doompost were always going to spin it anticlockwise.

If the league suffers industrial action in any significant way this season I think it will put a lot of clubs under genuine strain including ours.

There would be no smoke if Dome was not stoking the fire, once again.

people complaining about people being doomy for complaining about a doomy article - love it.

We're doomed to doomness

I'm pretty sure that Dome isn't saying this stuff on a whim and off the cuff.

You can't blame him. 

He is simply the messenger saying the owners words.

To be fair, we haven't exactly had the best support from the New Zealand media in general. From the days of "seriousinvestigative journalism" into Terry, the Media scrum over Gareth and the Cats, ACC payments. Conspiracey theorists  saw the club might be a threat to the egg ball game and it's been on the whole, pretty miniscule and or negative for the most part.

Domey is a pretty straight up sort of guy. One would think that the FFA (Whom leaked our kit early and are known for such gaffs) would sort their shark out.

This is a wonderful product and it is like they don't want it to work. The PFA need to wind their heads in too. There is not that much money being stuck into the game. They should be working WITH the FFA in trying to protect everyoens interests. There have been wealthy individuals whom have let their ego's run clubs and pulled out leaving the league vulnerable. Gold Coast being the best example, the Jets second, NQF 3rd etc. The league is over 10 years old, still in baby days on the global stage. Less ego and more positiveness is required.

The FFA need to give the Nix a 10 licence and they should also consider giving an Auckland side another go.

Increase the Salary cap by $1 million, not 3 Million and see where it goes.

The PFA need to protect their members for sure but they should also remember not to bite the hand that feeds them otherwise we will end up with strikes as seen in US Baseball and Basketball and Ice Hockey....

Rant over.

When you think about all the 13 teams that have been in the league, how many have had financial troubles. The ones I know that have are Roar, Jets and CCM at the moment, we've seen Cold Ghost, Fury and Knightz/s fold, Perth, Heart, Phoenix (under El Tel).

That leaves Adelaide, WSW (whom I think have had issues but can't remember) Sydney and Melbourne. Only the last 2 have never had any issues to my knowledge. 

When you look at it like that, in the current or previous financial models, teams do not survive. How would it go adding further strain? It's obvious that there is no further money to poor into the hole if only 2 out of 13 teams have stayed financial (and only Melbourne are said to have made a profit with Sydney having wealthy owners). Now even if you are not a smart person, that much of the above is obvious so why can the PFA not see this? Are they trying to self destruct their own league from within?

I have wondered if a little of the drive of this (and I admit I am reaching and have no foundation) is that some players would like to stay at home in a familiar environment and live a little better than having to go chase their riches in foreign countries where it is tougher competition and unfamiliar environments. At the moment, they are big fish in a small pond. Players, and we will use Burns as this one example, are successful here but feel they 'gettin' paid' if they go to richer Asian teams paying more. McGlinchey did it when he was a successful player at CCM to go do a loan deal in Japan(?) to give him a cash boost. He was no longer the big fish in the small pond though and ended up with a whimpering loan spell. If you could get paid the same cash to stay as th big fish, would you do it?

I guess when players look around at other leagues, the money is far more attractive. Only problem is, their leagues are sustainable. The HAL struggles as it is so I can't see how the players are making these demands cause it does amount to negligence.

Of the players that leave the A League to seek the riches of other leagues, how many actually make it Long term? 50% 25%? They often come back because they are not good enough to make it or Mrs Smeltz did not want to go, so their is probably a cost the players pay to stay in familiar surroundings. 

There is a reason that Players are payed a fortune to play in the Middle East. I could have gone to Dubai in Construction a number of years ago and earned a fortune but in the end home is home and places like the Middle East are tough places to be a foreigner. 

The last thing the League needs is a strike or a lockout  and the PFA and the FFA need to stop the dick measuring games, take a dose of reality and get on with it.

Adelaide have been bailed out as well, Sydney was once in Lowy's hand after financial challenges and investigations are underway into millions directed to West Sydney that were meant to be used for other use.

I have my doubts about whether, in it's current form, the A League is sustainable.

Last year (or maybe the year before) Adelaide was rumoured to be in a bit of strife, apparently they are going to break even this year though.

They're basically just pressing on in the hope of THAT tv deal which will make it sustainable. 

I thought the last TV deal was the one that was supposed to make everything rosy - considering the entire cap is covered by the TV deal..I'd say mismanagement of finances and poor stadium deals for most teams are the real issues.

We would be sweet if they could build another stadium, or westpac charged a per head rate :P

This PFA/FFA pissing contest is bad news for the league. And anything that's bad news for the league is bad news for the PFA and the FFA. Both parties want committed owners, stable clubs, and generous sponsorship and tv deals, but they don't seem concerned with their actions potentially putting off prospective owners or sponsors, or devaluing the broadcast rights. It's a lot easier to damage a reputation than to salvage one, and any industrial action will not reflect positively on the league as a whole. If it puts off owners and sponsors then there's less chance of expansion (and possibly even a chance of contraction) and both the FFA and PFA lose out.

By the same logic, the way the FFA are treating the Nix is reaching the point of cutting off their nose to spite their face. Their argument that they're subsidising NZ Football is BS. As has been pointed out before, a 9 team comp would generate significantly less revenue for the FFA than the 10 team comp does. The FFA seem to think that they can give us a 5 year license and when it's up there'll be all sorts of Aussie investors lining up to take Welnix's place but that's ridiculously optimistic thinking. Pinning their hopes on that is just meaning that they're chewing up good will. Even more than that though, what message does playing hardball with a club's owners send to prospective owners of other clubs, or of expansion clubs? That you'll pour heaps of money into a club and the FFA will still treat you like an enemy rather than a partner?

Everyone involved in this needs to stop treating these situations (the player contracts and the Nix's license extension) like zero sum games and realise that everyone wants the same ultimate goal - a stable, sustainable competition.

I think the big problem is that there are large parts of the FFA which don't think we offer anything and do not think they should be subsidising NZ Football.

Basically, the FFA is run by those idiots you always see posting on 442 forums.

But its not like we are taking money from player subs or anything, its money that is paid by Fox sports to have a ten team competition.

The only real way to resolve all these issues is for the A-League to be its own entity independent from the FFA.

Plus sponsors even for AU teams would surely pay more when its a multinational league as their shirt sponsorships are being worn in 2 different countries.

Plus Nix supporters in Aus buying Foxtel etc.

The Phoenix must be bringing more to the table than the black and white nature they are presenting it as.

Completely agree the A League needs to be its own thing.  That way its actions can be in the best nature of the league and not just to service AU football.

I don't f**king know.  Maybe I'll boycot all of the Australian teams home games and not attend a single one.

Maybe the FFA should just give our license to one of those many groups of Aussie investors who are desperately fighting to take over the Jets and Roar.

Oh wait...

If the television deal covers all the player's salaries, how do so many of the clubs get into financial problems? What other costs are there:

* ground rental

* training facilities rental/costs

* management/backroom staff salaries

* back office staff salaries

* travel/accommodation for away games

Off the top of my head, I cannot think of anything else. To counteract these costs there is gate receipts, merchandise sales and sponsorship money. Wouldn't that about balance out (considering we seem to have about 15 different sponsors).

Is it just the costs of the players outside of the salary cap that fudge everything up or am I being a bit stupid and missing some other costs.

Having a lot of sponsors doesn't mean that those sponsors are paying much though. Stadium rental is apparently a big one though, I read something recently but I can't remember where, which said that in Queensland the state government owns all the major stadiums and they make it incredibly hard for private investors to build stadiums to compete. That's one of the key reasons why North Queensland went bust apparently, and why Roar have been in the financial sharkter. Gold Coast could have been playing at a school field for all the crouds they pulled though.

Stadium rental is also one of the things that WelNix have complained about too. That's why they were talking about building their own stadium.

The FFA are saying that the jets are going to loose $1million next year with a budget of $8 million, which is below average.

I'm guessing the jets are looking to sign a marquee to get that sort of expenses, but still thats 5 or so million not on player wages.

I was trying to find the article I talked about above but couldn't, but I did find one which said that the Coffee Club's sponsorship deal with the Roar was worth $650,000 a year - that's not much at all for a principal sponsor, relative to the costs of paying coaching staff, physios, management, rent etc...

So if the Coffee Club pay $650k per year, and the other half dozen or so

(http://www.brisbaneroar.com.au/corporate/partners/1j2fyqmzteb9i1evh6fas4sn14)

pay somewhere between $50k and $100k each, that is well over $1m. Say you have coaching staff of 5 and a back room staff of another 6 or 7, all on somewhere around $100k per year, that should balance out.

I would also think that the ground rental would be somewhere around the gate receipts, and that the training facilities are all council owned and would not cost much (although that may be different in Brisbane - I am thinking about the Phoenix more specifically here) that only leaves travel and accommodation as a major expense. I can see how clubs would be losing money, but not to the extent that they seem to be (like the Jets mentioned above).

Y-League, W-League player costs etc

coaching staff for all three teams

physio

trainer

How do we know the licensing saga is just the FFA? We all know Asia does not want us.

FFA takes all the big gates from the finals remember...

There will be way more to it than meets the eye.

Office space, ticketek fees (I assume, unless the 4000 fees you pay is their only income), advertising, producing the passes etc., membership packs, more advertising, Internet pipe into the office, other IT shark, desks, transport to away games, etc. etc. etc.

And I believe the cost of operating at Westpac Stadium gets nullified at around 8-9000 seats (I think that's what I remember them saying) so most games operate at a loss.

If enough people watch matches on sky and get into the club, then jersey sales and the cost to sky could bring them up to financially profitable.

I imagine a fair amount of sponsors are contra deals, with no or very little money changing hands. 

Sounds more like Tegal is hinting that this Phoenix business is just a front to wash dirty money for the owners

for example, when Clemenger BBDO were our sponsor, I imagine that was in exchange for them doing advertising for 'free' rather than for any money. 

The radio network would be the same, they get sponsorship rights and exposure at games, they supply announcers etc for game day and advertising on their radio stations.

The silence is deafening from the "Domey should stop talking to the media feaction".. Well done Domey, well done the club.

http://www.wellingtonphoenix.com/article/record-me...