AFL gets guarantees for footy to continue in soccer World Cup bid

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AFL gets guarantees for footy to continue in soccer World Cup bid

Authored by: Michael Christiansen
on Wednesday, May 12 2010 @ 04:35 pm ACST

A common attitude in Australia by the pro-soccer lobby is that they reckon the AFL is entirely to blame for what they see as a deficient bid.

Which ignores a couple of points - 1. that the bid was over reliant on 3rd party competitors from the outset
and 2. that it's not just the AFL, it's the NRL, and ARU and flow on impacts to cricket if the AFL have to start early.

The key is this is an MOU. No dollars are mentioned by the AFL. Some journo's and observors have tried to guestimate, but, that's a bit futile. For example - FIFA will get presented a list of 12 venues and should Australia win the bid to host - then, only 8 I believe are required for the tournament. That being the case - it's entirely possible that Perth might miss out for example. That's alone would be the difference between the AFL having to relocate Subiaco sell out matches to the WACA or not.

The main question mark in such a case is - that the Subiaco replacement/redevelopment has been on the books for some time and has been delayed because of WC uncertainty. Is it now 100% dependant upon a successful WC bid?? Or, can we just get it happening no matter what because it's a good idea and if WA can't fund it from their mining boom - - then, what's the point of a mining boom??

The main thing for the AFL is that they (and the NRL, and ARU) reserve the right to play on. The AFL has got a legally binding commitment that they retain Etihad. That the MCG can't be hijacked for more than 12 weeks. And that the AFL can't be excluded from host cities. These are all points the AFL wanted the FFA to commit to. Now - - being cynical, it might be suggested that blind Freddy knows the FFA could never commit to it, as, they represent FIFA and they seemingly couldn't or wouldn't raise the subject with FIFA or that FIFA would not 'clarify' the issue at this juncture.

So - the AFL has their position Govt guarranteed. It might be suggested that that was all a given anyway - - however, even as late as early March when John Brumby went public with the possibility of Geelong's Skilled Stadium being a WC venue - at that point, the FFA was STILL pushing for Etihad and in the words of Brumby were not too keen on Geelong.

And as late as last week there were reports that the AFL hadn't yet signed over the MCG because there was still no guarrantee of it NOT being claimed beyond the 10 or 12 weeks the AFL was willing to allow.

So - the AFL clearly didn't believe any verbal assurances from Ben Buckley, and clearly didn't trust the FFA (Frank Lowy??) to not shift the goal posts (both metaphorically and actually!!!!).

So, don't underestimate that the AFL in particular has got a big win here - - and that the FFA might almost be hoping NOT to win the rights to host now. Looking at GErmany 2006, which was the 'perfect' location for a FIFA WC. The German profit was relatively small after tax and after distribution back to FIFA, this left well less than 100 million Euros. Australia is hardly as ideal a location - with greater costs, and lesser capacity to generate revenue as Germany - and so, what profit might the FFA be looking at?? before compensation to the AFL and NRL and ARU if and as appropriate??? The FFA might be looking at a financial black hole. It'd be interesting to know what the actual projections are - - ignoring all those unquantifiable intangibles of 'national pride/prestige'.

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