It is great that so many European footballing sides have opted to come to Australia in their pre-season, but sadly it is not all to do with goodwill. Neither is it all as rosy a picture as many of the local government’s funding of the trips will have you believe.
For a start the reason the big clubs are heading to Asia and Australia in their pre-season is because they cannot grow their brands anymore in Europe. Club memberships, television viewerships have all plateaued. In order to increase the windfall that television rights gives these clubs they have to continue to grow their appeal and television audiences. The only market where that is currently possible is Asia and Oceania.
It is good to see these teams come to this part of the world, but by doing so are they actually helping the local game? Knowing their reasons for coming they are in fact looking to steal supporters from these markets to purchase their merchandise and watch their games on pay-TV. So is this really benefitting the local leagues around Asia? Potentially yes it can benefit the clubs in Australia.
Chelsea’s clash with Sydney FC was confirmed in the past two days for June 2 at ANZ Stadium. Negotiations for the TV rights are still ongoing, however the winning bid is expected to be over $1 million.
The Football Federation of Australia has been extremely smart and has made sure that they, rather than the individual clubs hold the broadcast rights to all the games involving Liverpool, Chelsea, Tottenham Hotspur, Manchester City, Villareal, Real Madrid, and Roma. The FFA will also take a $250,000 fee for approving each game.
The Sydney Morning Herald has reported that it has been suggested the “FFA would be able to bank some $6-7 million, despite having to cancel its own A-League All-Stars event due to the avalanche of competing fixtures.”
That is potentially great news for football in Australia, if the FFA actually invests this money or a large percentage into grassroots football. As we reported a week ago NPL clubs – a league foisted on State League clubs around the country by the FFA – are currently bleeding financially. There has been no sponsorship money filter down to the clubs nationally in the NPL, or in the FFA Cup, yet all of these clubs have seen their costs increase. If this money is to be passed onto these clubs then there really is a reason to celebrate having such big name clubs come to Australia on per-season tours, although the A-League clubs need to be wary. No doubt these clubs will have their eye on and will receive a slice of the FFA pie, but why should they? They already receive the lion’s share of the television rights pool, and the smaller semi-professional clubs receive nothing. If the NPL and state league clubs were smart they would be uniting nationally to demand a percentage now, before the teams set foot in Australia.
Beyond the football side of things we have the Politicians talking up these games in order to gain favour with the electorate. “This match will deliver about $8 million of economic benefit to the state of NSW, we’re expecting a significant number of travel packages to be sold around it,” said NSW Sports Minister Stuart Ayres to the Sydney Morning Herald.
Where do Politicians get these figures from?
Cast your mind back to 2013 Manchester United came out and took on the Foxtel All Stars. The New South Wales government claimed at the time a $16million benefit from the game, despite having invested $3million to entice the club to Sydney in the first place.
Incredibly this $16million figure was reported on the Monday after the game on Saturday night. Incredibly it was the exact same figure that the New South Wales Government had predicted they would make on the game when they announced they would be hosting it in December 2012! Their number crunchers must be superb at their job to be so spot on, and to have calculated the benefits in two days, when many would not have even been realised.
These clubs are experienced operators, they know they will fill stadia and so will play in the city of the highest bidder. Take Malaga, not a big club by any stretch of the imagination, but they managed to negotiate a game against Perth Glory in addition to their game against Adelaide United. They knew they had to come through Perth into and out of Australia, so it made sense. They approached an inexperienced Perth Glory who jumped at the chance. However the A-League club did not put in clauses related to crowds and marketing. The end result was that the game ended up costing the club, and it reaped very little benefit from the game. Mistakes such as this will not fill the Western Australian government with faith that they should work with the club to bring big name teams to Perth.
The truth is wherever you go in the world governments nationally and regionally will sell the benefit of hosting a major sporting event. In Malaysia currently there is a television advertisement trying to sell the benefits of hosting the F1 Grand Prix, it tells you how many jobs it will generate, but never says whether they are short term or long term, it tells you how many tourism dollars the event will produce; yet the numbers quoted are questionable when one hears that the F1 in Singapore has seen a decline in attendance in the past three years.
The problem is no one holds governments accountable for these figures. No one actually checks them or their claims. Although occasionally they do.
In 1997 the NSW government, the same government that was so quick to confirm the $16million worth of benefits from Manchester United’s visit stated prior to the Sydney Olympics that inbound tourism would “be a key feature of the Games and post-Games years, with the number of extra international tourists expected to reach a peak of almost 340,000 in 2001 before gradually returning over several years, towards the non-Olympics underlying trend”.
A study in 2007 by the Centre of Policy Studies at Monash University recorded that from 1997 to 2005 there was only one financial year where foreign demand for tourism in NSW grew faster than in the rest of Australia, and that believe it or not was in 2000-01! Surprise, surprise!
It is great to see top level sport, as well as top flight sporting teams and athletes in Australia. However do not believe all that you read about the profits such events will give to the local economy. Having these athletes in Australia does give the people so much more. Some many never get to Spain or England and see these teams in their home environment, so these fans will have an experience that will live with them for a lifetime. An experience that you cannot put a price on. So in that respect the Government has done something good.
The key factor going forward is to make sure that the game as a whole benefits from such visits. That means the money generated by the FFA must be spread across the country and to grassroots football. The A-League and the Socceroos may be the focus, but if you kill the supply line to these two teams you will ultimately condemn the A-League to a slow and painful death and the Socceroos to another 30 years in the wilderness. This is a wonderful opportunity, it is now up to the FFA to deliver.
If the FFA make the amounts of money quoted and they put that money into the A-League clubs then there is no hope for the game. This money MUST be invested in grassroots football. If the state bodies had any power or the ears of the FFA they would make them aware as to how badly clubs are hurting at the lower levels. Sadly my faith in the system is beginning to die. No governance at local level and none at the professional level creates a mess at all levels.