To fine, or not to fine?

Umm...

https://www.stuff.co.nz/sport/football/a-league/11...

Just heard that on rnz, wtf!?! Other teams performed way worse than we did

Welnix should forward email with attached invoice onto Sky.

And some people still question Morrison and his mate’s investment in the club. 

Perhaps they’d like to personally help out by paying the $1M from their hard earned.

Fudge me can we get FIFA to investigate the FFA im so sick of this bullshark.

It is crap I know for this to be levied, but did we sign a contract or something where this was spelt out as a consequence of these supposed metrics?

I would rather the club folded today and didn't pay the fine, than pay the fine and be kicked out at the end of the year.

Its not fine..

If it was hard to meet it this year then next will b harder.  I would understand if owners dont want to chuck away more money?

The article quite clearly explains this, doesn't it?

Anyway, for me the really interesting bit in there is this:

There is one month left until the June 30 deadline for the A-League's independence from the FFA to be settled. What it looks like or whether that deadline is met remains to be seen. The Sydney Morning Herald understands there is some reticence from FFA about full independence because it may give Fox Sports a legal opening to renegotiate the A-League's broadcast deal.

yeah seems the owners were fully prepared for this outcome. Still outrageous though considering sky sport is a separate entity to punish the nix. Feel like we've been done for racist and homophobic chants or something disgraceful. Perth only got a third of our fine for cooking the books.

FFA trying to rake in as much cash as they can before A) Independence and/or B) everything goes tits up 

Same old FFA, desperate pricks still looking to screw the Nix over. That fine must be more than Sky paid.

...and they are turning a blind eye to the massive cap breaches from Perth this season and already next.

If the FFA were serious about the Phoenix achieving their goals they'd say take the $1 million back and spend it directly on initiatives that will help you achieve our metrics

Or is this a sign that the independent A-League is imminent and the FFA are doing a money grab while it still can?

This really shows the no-win situation that the Welnix were in, and also explains why the Welnix were so aggressively targeting metrics.

God the FFA are a bunch of pricks.

It seemed unreasonable to have our licence extension attached to metrics.  A fine for not hitting metrics is a prick of a thing to do.  Both though?  Pricks.

Didn't the A League on the whole go down in Metrics?  And we fared better than other clubs.  Shows in black and white that they actually don't care about the league being sustainable because they should be chomping at the bit to hold onto a club that can and does pay it's bills.

We blooded their precious new clubs coach, we had a player score the most goals in the league, still get bloody fined.

The cynic in me thinks they wanted to get 1 club in to make an uneven competition so after next season if they manage to hold onto power for long enough they can say that 'an odd number of teams didn't work so we have to boot the Nix out'.

Must be some pretty bad news in Aus football circles due to drop that they have chucked the Phoenix under the bus again. What a disingenuous piece of shark David Gallop is.

I think that's a very optimistic view. Fox have been rattling their sabre, and everyone's a bit worried about that, not just the FFA.

But then they'll have uneven teams again when Macarthur comes in. If they (try to) kick the Nix it'll be over "metrics".

The FFA were actively working with the Canberra bid...

Fine.

Sorry. Thought it was a question from Mrs News.

Wwas always going to come, sounds like Morrison wasn't too fussed. The metrics were never going to be met and we all know they have nothing to do with how the rest of the league do. We've had a 50% increase in home game attendances and an increase in Sky viewership while most of the league at losing fans.

'Same old Aussies'......

"unique position"

The unique position is that we're growing our crowds and TV audience. No one else in the league is.

It is not a fine it is a commercial agreement made between the two parties based on performance when the licence extension was signed.

Just Gallop diverting attention away from  the Independent league work.

Sueisfine.

Isn't this just the ffas way of trying to rid themselves of us.

...which one is it?

Taking away the Sydney and Auckland ‘home’ games, how much did the Wellington crowds grow by?

Just curious.

Just using wikipedia and a calculator here, but I think last year the average was 5912 last year and 7430 this year. 

2018-19

Total: 119,455

Average: 8,553

Auckland: 23,648

Campbelltown: 5,115

Lowest: 4,829

2017-18

Total: 74,022

Average: 5,694

Highest: 8,154

Lowest: 4,312

You can see an even better break down here (Ignore the first couple of seasons as the guy added the Knights last two seasons to the Nix timeline) http://eyeseedata.com/a-league-attendance/

This is without any non wellington home games in both seasons, btw. 

Honestly.  Next time a Wellington bus is passing by on the way to the ROF, I would be delighted to put Mr Gallop in a "unique position".

I don't care that that was agreed when we got the 4+3+3. We massively increased our average attendance while many other clubs declined, TV viewership across the entire league is down and most weeks our fixtures weren't the least viewed games. We actually played nice football this year compared to a lot of other clubs, and generated publicity due to our resurgence. Kurto won the best keeper in the league and Krishna won the golden boot and the Johnny Warren. What more could we have fudgeing done this season. I'm not saying it's not legally binding because clearly it is and thats what Welnix agreed to in 2016. Doesn't mean its fair, and certainly makes it a real cod decision when the rest of the league has stagnated and we are one of the few teams who had a positive season. 

I agree. I thought it was a weird turn of phrase. Alll I have in my mind is along the lines of Mallrats

Afleck: "... I'm gonna fudge them some place very uncomfortable"

Lee: "You mean like the back of a Volkswagen?"

Some organisations would probably just pass a levy on to the players.

Imagine that: $150,000 each for the 7 of them.

if Morrison isn't bothered why are we?

one is clearly a quote from Rob, the other is the writers opinion of $1m being significant

It's wearing to constantly have bad news with things which are often out of the clubs control, even when good things happen there's usually something bad just around the corner to take the shine off it.

It's a huge amount of money.  Even if we organised a YF collection, it would not be anywhere near to even make a dent. But it might send a signal that we appreciate what Welnix has done to keep us going, despite FFA.