I see red I see red I see red
Even in Brisbane, which had more of a pre-existing Australian football culture than New South Wales and one of the greatest sides in the history of the game within the past 10 years, ironically, crowds have dropped away enormously. So these are very fragile markets. If Tasmania is set up, it is a safe bet, whereas Western Sydney is a gamble
2.50 He indicated that while the AFL had successfully spread modified Australian Rules football (Auskick) into schools, efforts to establish a NSW state league in Sydney or provide the AFL with home-grown players had failed.[43]
2.53 The committee requested that the AFL provide statistics on participation levels in Western Sydney, the Gold Coast and Tasmania, including the proportion of participants made up of the Auskick program. Unfortunately, the AFL only provided the committee with figures for the entire NSW/ACT region, rather than Western Sydney alone. They are included in Appendix 3. These statistics are not helpful in assessing meaningful participation in the code in that area as they include far Western NSW, the Riverina, Canberra and the far South Coast of NSW, where Australian Rules football enjoys strong support and well established club competitions exist.
2.54 Information on the public record, attributed to the New South Wales Minister for Sport suggests that actual participation in Western Sydney is fewer than 3,000.[47] In contrast Tasmanian participation is about 24,000 or nearly five per cent of the Tasmanian population. In the absence of more authoritative figures the committee is inclined to accept that participation in Western Sydney is, as a proportion of its population, relatively insignificant.
2.62 There must be concern, however, that primary school-aged children participating in modified Australia Rules via school programs will not necessarily translate into meaningful support for the code. Even in general terms, caution should be exercised when drawing parallels between participation in a sport and the likelihood of people going to see that sport live at an elite level or watching matches on television. If the committee were to accept that participation were a precursor to a viable supporter base, it is of the opinion that Auskick does not represent the sort of proactive, voluntary, participation that the AFL can depend on. Australian Rules football is barely played at club level in the area, and the weakness of the Sydney competition is most forcefully demonstrated by the fact that the existing recent premiership winning team based in Sydney, the Sydney Swans, can find no suitable competition for its reserves team in Greater Sydney and choose to send that team to play in the Canberra competition. The Committee believes this fact highlights the weakness of the market for AFL in the Sydney Basin, and underlines the risks being taken by the AFL in its decision to prioritise this market over Tasmania.
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