Might the AFL’s monopoly over Australian guidelines soccer be overthrown?

I do know, it sounds absurd. The AFL is the dominant sporting competitors in Australia. Its financial sources are unmatched, it retains a good jurisdictional management of the game domestically and has no worldwide rival to deal with. Not a number of oxygen for a revolution to breathe.

However to borrow a parlance from the final word murderer, Michael Corleone: “If historical past has taught us something, it’s which you could kill anybody.”

A latest reminder of this within the sporting universe got here with the Public Funding Fund’s (PIF) ‘takeover’ of the PGA tour. With the PIF now setting its sights on skilled tennis, it is just accountable (and sure, just a little bit enjoyable) to evaluate how one would possibly have an effect on a coup of the AFL.

Utilizing two case research, Kerry Packer’s World Collection Cricket (WSC) and the PIF’s LIV Golf tour, I’ve recognized 5 key steps essential to efficiently problem any sporting monopoly:

1. Having substantial monetary capital
2. Creating a superior product
3. Establishing legitimacy
4. Attaining a essential mass of in style assist
5. Having an exit technique.

Let’s begin with the first step – cash. The AFL is a monetary goliath. It has an annual earnings of about $800 million, generated via company sponsorship, gate and membership receipts, merchandise, and a mouthwatering seven-year $4.5 billion broadcasting cheque from Channel 7 and Foxtel.

Nonetheless, as a non-public firm, the AFL’s reliance on its inner income streams would possibly depart it susceptible in wartime.

When Packer took on the Australian Cricket Board (ACB) he was capable of take up WSC’s $34 million working price by drawing on the monetary would possibly of his Consolidated Press Holdings media empire. In distinction, the ACB might solely depend on fluctuating gate receipts, a $200,000 ABC broadcasting deal, and a $150,000 Benson and Hedges sponsorship to subsidise Australian cricket root and department.

The lesson is evident: if you will tackle the AFL, don’t depend on pithy gate and membership tickets to foot the invoice. Search for assist to bankroll your new competitors, somebody desperate to get a bit of the AFL pie.

Paramount+/Channel Ten misplaced out in soccer’s newest broadcasting bidding battle, so possibly go to their guardian firm Paramount World along with your pitch. Their deal with is One Astor Plaza constructing, 1515 Broadway Road, Manhattan.

Upon getting the money, be sure you use it. Neglect what the sceptics say, the AFL supplies a wildly entertaining product: quick ball motion, bone-rattling clashes, and excessive scoring, all executed by among the finest athletes in Australia. Those that watch achieve this in world-class stadiums, or within the consolation of their houses through distinctive broadcasting companies.

To compete, you will want to take a position closely in your personal belongings. Given we shouldn’t have a lot time, allow us to give attention to an important asset: the gamers. That is the place you could have to get your palms soiled, simply as different revolutionaries did.

Kyle Langford celebrates a objective. (Photograph by Daniel Pockett/Getty Photos)

Because the established overlords of their sports activities, the PGA and ACB had unique entry to top-tier expertise. The issue was they underpaid their gamers, believing they might by no means have to fret a couple of viable competitor who would possibly steal them away.

From bumper crowds throughout the 1974-75 Ashes collection, the ACB paid their stars simply 2 per cent of complete gate receipts. Or, in Ian Chappell’s summation, “fish and chip cash.”

Realizing followers would solely change sides to see the most effective, LIV and Packer covertly signed up 13 former Main champions and virtually 50 of the world’s finest cricketers to play for them. Each ended up in courtroom over this filching, so you’ll doubtless have to throw up some additional cash to defend your place.

The excellent news is, for those who win, you could additional weaken your enemies. Simply ask the Worldwide Cricket Council, who after dropping their case had been pressured to pay Packer $320,000 in prices. Ouch!

Attempt going after the large fish – Charlie Curnow, Marcus Bontempelli, Toby Greene – anybody actually who’s gifted and believes they’re underpaid. And brace for the storm of legal professionals.

The third stage of your coup, establishing legitimacy, is essential. As quickly as you make your self recognized to your enemies, they are going to come after you with all the things they’ve. WSC gamers had been slandered as ‘traitors’ to cricket, whereas the PGA attacked LIV for example of Saudia Arabia’s partaking in ‘sportswashing’ to distract from their unquestionably terrible human rights file.

These assaults could also be true or not, however that doesn’t essentially matter. What issues is that if your prospects consider your enemies’ propaganda, as nobody desires to affiliate with a product they discover morally offensive. You should create your personal counter-narrative. Rent a superb PR agency and a few journalists with an axe to grind. Attempt Michael Warner.

When you someway obtain all this, a essential mass of in style assist ought to start to bubble away. It might even are available in a rush. Having been comfortably bested throughout its first summer time, WSC exploded 12 months later when 50,000 converts descended on a Tuesday evening one-day fixture on the SCG.

LIV’s popping out celebration might effectively have been the raucous Adelaide occasion staged in April.

Brooks Koepka, Captain of group Smash and Dustin Johnson, Captain of 4Aces Bryson DeChambeau, Captain of the Crushers throughout a observe spherical forward of LIV Golf Adelaide at The Grange Golf Membership on April 19, 2023 in Adelaide, Australia. (Photograph by Sarah Reed/Getty Photos)

Tv and streaming audiences are, in fact, more true indicators of your precise recognition, however nothing will persuade your enemies of your victory greater than a packed stadium full of individuals having fun with your product.

Which brings us to the ultimate stage: having an exit technique. Given the mud-slinging the AFL is more likely to throw your manner, it will likely be tempting to throw them right into a ‘meat-mangler’, as Packer threatened to do to the ACB. This, nonetheless, can be unwise.

Except you might be an arms seller, battle is unhealthy for enterprise. Grinding the AFL down would possibly really feel good, however your backers will wish to begin seeing some revenue for his or her funding quickly. Make a deal, in any other case you could quickly end up minimize unfastened – simply ask LIV CEO Greg Norman.

Don’t get me mistaken, the peace phrases ought to mirror your victory. After the ACB agreed to permit Packer to broadcast cricket in change for a return of its monopoly, it acquired simply $2 million of the $134 million extracted from promoting income throughout the following 5 years.

Let the AFL discuss publicly about ‘mergers’ and ‘peace with honour’, so long as you each know who’s holding the whip hand behind closed doorways.

And there you may have it. A foolproof formulation to usurp the AFL. However be sure you observe it correctly. If you will shoot the satan within the again, be sure you don’t miss.