Investments since APL split A-Leagues away from Football Australia are already paying off.
As the saying goes, you have to speculate to accumulate. Often without much fanfare, the A-League clubs are spending money on things that are already making the difference.
If the two years since the A-Leagues and Football Australia separated have gone past in a bit of a blur, a few key moments stand out to show the different ways in which the landscape of Australian football is starting to take shape and investment is bearing fruit.
Barca bonanza
When Barcelona came to town in May, there were a lot of numbers thrown about – from the value of the Spanish giants’ team to the 70,000 who came to watch. But some rather smaller numbers showed the value of reigniting the A-Leagues All-Stars concept, and investing in a drawcard like Barca to play them.
Until that game, Garang Kuol had played 189 minutes of A-League action for the Mariners, and another 90-odd in the Australia Cup. But there was something in those minutes, to the degree Kuol was picked by the A-Leagues Commissioner as one of his two picks for the All-Stars squad, and to the degree that All-Stars coach Dwight Yorke gave Kuol more than half an hour off the bench.
The fact that Kuol has since played for the Socceroos, been picked for the World Cup and earned a transfer to an EPL club shows the value of opportunity – especially an opportunity with global eyes upon it.
Investment pays
Good news generally doesn’t make headlines, and industrial harmony even less so. But the five-year collective pay and conditions deal struck by the A-Leagues clubs and their players was quietly seismic, for a number of reasons.
Partly it was the longevity, putting the annual pay fractiousness to bed for years. Partly it was the sustainable numbers it was built on. But most of all, it was the enshrining of gender equality into the training and sports science standards across the A-League Men and A-League Women, as well as double-digit rises in both the overall salary cap in the A-League Women and its minimum salary.
The deal covers areas like the number of sports science staff available to each team, the minimum medical standards, quality of gyms, travel arrangements and so on – almost the definition of a long-term investment.
That was all quite apart from the expansion of the A-League Women to 11 clubs, with a 12th on the way next season – at which point, mirroring the major competitions in Europe and the US, it will move to a full home and away season.
Antisocial action
Socceroos boss Graham Arnold made headlines at the World Cup for his attack on the “sh***” of social media, and its effects on players. But for years there has been a demonstrable effect on players of racist, sexist, homophobic and generally offensive comments – an area the tech companies seemed loathe to address.
That’s why the deal struck between APL and US company GoBubble earlier this year had the potential to change things dramatically, as it protects athletes from abusive messages and posts without infringing on so-called free speech.
Using AI algorithms, the GoBubble software doesn’t stop derogatory posts being made – it just protects clubs and players who join the screen from seeing them.
The deal struck with A-Leagues clubs and players was a first for sporting bodies in Australia.
Young, gifted and playing
The kids are very much alright in the A-Leagues – if players such as Garang Kuol and Cortnee Vine take the headlines, there are plenty more close behind. Last year, nearly half of players in the A-League Men were under 23. More than 20% of match minutes were by players of 21 or under. Under the pay deal, each club can sign more scholarship players.
The A-League Women, meanwhile, provided the pathway for every one of the current Matildas- and all but one of the Young Matildas chosen for this year’s U20 World Cup were contracted to ALW clubs. There’s a clear and identifiable pathway right there.
