Sorry, in response to feverish...
well look at the number of parents paying for their girls to attend FTC and NTC camps... We know they are getting more and more expensive, diluted in terms of talent (ftcs split regionally now), harder to stay in and the coaches are usually not announced until the squads are. So players (parents) really are buying somewhat blindly into the dream of helping their daughter to become a football fern when the chances are pretty slim as we all know...
So if an opportunity came up to be part of a girls phoenix academy, with known coaches, and an obvious pathway towards something bigger I think it would be hugely successful. And like with the boys academy it would also attract international interest from parents (more $).
On an aside Sport NZ have two big reasons to invest in women's football.
It is a growth sport, with one of the highest participation rates within NZ.
It is an Olympic Sport, with the women's team slowly but surely becoming a contender on the world stage.
Well a ‘participation’ academy would be popular if you could dodge FTC. It would provide a wage for the coaches and not much more. The Phoenix could do this easily. Having a participation academy is still miles away from W League.
An academy aimed at the more elite would require some serious finance streams. Ole are reliant on huge $ from trust funding. Nix are reliant on getting an end product of a squad signing or transfer fee to make/save $.
Regarding the SNZ funding people here are relying on- it is a two year funding amount to help with a set campaign. No guarantees after that as other sports can attest to. Not a great model for an on-going league involvement. This would involve NZF placing almost complete reliance on the W League for their WC prep including demanding all Ferns are based in Wgtn for this team IMO.
Other than this happening, in order to have a team in the W League in two years like Dome said – Henry T would need to chuck $.5m at it. He has been watching local women’s footy so who knows..
You couldn’t budget much (after initial novelty factor) for game attendance revenue IMO. Blew or Ken would need to sell a lot of sausages..