Diamond_Jim

So realistically who are vulnerable in the sliding stakes.... Would not surprise me if Collingwood struggle... they had a good September but without Sidebottom and Pendlebury firing will they be as good? Essendon.. a real unknown... performed maybe two rungs below where they should have ended last year. Could go up or down. Sydney and Hawthorn... down slightly. Who is on the up..... not sure.. perhaps Freo and Brisbane will worry a few more teams thus making them danger games. Cannot get a handle on North. So.... overall it's once again anyone's flag next year with Richmond and WCE deservedly favourites.

wow... an incredible situation

And from the AFL site... "COLLINGWOOD will be the darlings of prime time next year, with the Magpies handed 11 blockbusters matches following the release of the official 2019 AFL Toyota Premiership Season Fixture. In addition to the annual Anzac Day and Queen's Birthday matches, the Pies will feature in two Thursday night games and seven Friday night games throughout next season." Such a level playing field ....

Rotate the opposition... it's simple Why should we forever be stuck with the left overs. It's a fight for exposure.. and we're losing

why not..we drew 90+k last time we played them and we are being asked to go to a ground where there is a virtual lock out. If it's good enough for Essendon etc why are we the perpetual bunny

dudded again but hey... what's new

We're in a fight for survival with nine other Melbourne clubs. At present we sit in the bottom 4 with North, Saints, Bulldogs and ourselves. Survival means exposure in the main markets and NT doesn't deliver that in any meaningful way. If it was so good to play up there I think there might be a few other clubs going for the silver arrow but no one wants to grab the nettle. Memberships expand and contract at geometric rather than arithmetic rates. By 2025 assuming we grow by 20% we will be around 70,000 members less than Richmond if they grow at the same rate.

makes sense and you could follow it with the bye. The problems I see are accommodation costs etc (not insurmountable but not chicken feed) and more importantly the absence from the MFC home market for a three week period. If we could guarantee good FTA coverage back in Melbourne this impact could be minimised. Technically it would be two home games in a row which would then be followed by the bye and an away game (which one would hope would be in Melbourne) .. so you could go four weeks without a Melbourne based home game. BTW who gets the money from the attendance of MFC members at the so called make up games?

the Darwin and Alice grounds have a capacity of around 12 and 6k respectively so I doubt that crowd numbers drive the dollar return. It is just so disappointing that we have saddled ourselves with this five year impediment without looking at alternatives. Even if you equate the money to two game points on average per year the incremental loss from the reduction in ladder position and associated returns makes it a line ball decision. Did the club ever consider a membership levy for example... ten dollars per member or say a levy on blockbusters. Given the money people were willing to fork out on the GF tickets ballot that we never needed don't tell me members couldn't afford the extra $10 each season. Did we look at playing at Mildura and having the State government fund a game a la the Bulldogs at Ballarat. How about playing in rural SA or WA and getting money from their State governments. And of course why not just say it's Alice only to the NT government. So many alternatives and in reality so little discussion. Commercial in confidence.... from whom... don't see many competitors lining up to take the "hot dollar."

would have got a 30k crowd at least for this match at the MCG if not more. The idea that it would be loss making holds no water any more unless we are talking of Gold Coast or Freo. NT just makes no sense from so many angles.

Was assuming the Alice game would be in May like this year... By late July I am usually seeking warmer climes in Asia. Darn ... looks like no road trip or perhaps a re-org of my year ?

Looking forward to the fixture as I am going to try and make the bucket list road trip to Alice and the Rock while taking in the big clash.. (remind me what they called it ?) Now... "The Road to Alice" or similar could make a great summer time thread. Pro Hart in Broken Hill, bacon and egg sandwiches at renowned road stops... the possibilities are limitless

Understood but then again I have always enjoyed the more esoteric discussion of football politics that the lazy summer months encourage. Go Dees

The drip feed of the fixture including the hints as to who will play when (I see North are now confirmed for Good Friday against either Essendon or Richmond) is so amusing. This desire of the AFL to occupy the entire media space and more interestingly the willingness of the media to lap it up is a marketer's dream. Anyone else feel that it is just getting too over the top?

If we are serious about expansion, Carlton membership is what we have to surpass. Won't happen in 2019 but 2020 is a possibility. Shame about the prelim performance.. probably cost us 2-4k of new members immediately signing up. The other impact of the low key first round fixture is on reserved seats. No encouragement to sign up to a season of reservation as we all know there will be plenty of seats.

35-40k is the likely crowd unless we can get some hype around the game. Port supporters aren't known for travelling and the MCC/AFL theatre goers will have better MCG games to attend on the Thursday and Friday night. The last round game against GWS is perhaps a good pointer.... 37k

so we get the relatively dead non FTA TV slot against an interstate team.... Obviously the AFL love the new MFC. Amazing.. little wonder we have some trouble attracting premium sponsors

A bit of puffery from Al Jazeera on the progress of stadiums for the next World Cup in Qatar. The strange thing about Qatar as distinct from previous hosts is that Qatar is effectively a city state with most of the stadiums within a 20km radius of Doha. From an attendance viewpoint it will make the event very different. How they will accommodate the fans has not really been discussed. Qatar is adjacent to the UAE with Abu Dhabi and Dubai around 500 and 650kms away respectively. By road however one has to cross a small part of Saudi Arabia which makes it all the more interesting. Have spent 3 days in Dubai and cannot say it thrilled me. Give me Cairo or Istanbul any day. https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2018/10/qatar-2022-world-cup-stadiums-181025142408471.html

Correct me if I am wrong please but do the interstate teams play the other interstate teams twice each year. Of course they have two "derbies" a year but do they play the other six teams twice? If that is right that is fourteen games of the fixture already allocated. Many thanks

Sound familiar..... “There’s the commercial outcome but it’s also a chance to grow our fanbase,” he said. “There are so many Chinese international students in Melbourne. Monash University, one of our performance partners, has 10,000 Chinese students in its own right. “It starts to differentiate our football club in a very competitive market.” https://www.theguardian.com/sport/2018/oct/25/st-kilda-replace-gold-coast-for-afl-game-in-china

In one word .....Kochie... he did a great deal

you bet DZ.... to some extent it's funded by the Federal Government as part of a trade delegation. The Chinese funding comes from a billionaire Chinese property developer who has very very large agricultural holdings in Australia. The AFL also contributes. Gill quoted a figure of around A$4M .. not sure if that was the total cost or the AFL contribution. Peter Gordon said a year or two back that he would want a million dollars (cannot remember if that was plus expenses) to use a home game of the Bulldogs to play in China. Interesting that the Suns gave up as they are effectively an AFL run/funded club. Not a great move by the Saints just like ours in the NT. You take the money but you lose exposure in your home market. BTW anyone who thinks it's about increasing the viewing numbers in China doesn't understand the strategy. It's all about providing a corporate platform to engage Chinese government and business interests. I'm not against it but I would like to see a lot more transparent discussion about the business model. After all AFL money is "our money" in the sense that each dollar they spend lessens the dollars available for lower tier competitions, facilities etc.

The article below suggests the next two weeks: "THE AFL premiership won’t be decided later this month, but we will learn major clues as to who will contend for it. For two straight seasons the team that finished 13th the previous year has gone on to make the Grand Final - first Richmond, and then Collingwood. We’re not saying the Western Bulldogs are guaranteed to be playing off in the flag decider in 2019. But that unique statistical quirk does underline the importance of the weighted fixture. So what is the weighted fixture exactly, and what impact does it have?" https://www.foxsports.com.au/afl/afl-fixture-2019-how-weighted-fixture-helped-collingwood-north-melbourne-in-2018-and-who-it-will-impact-most-in-2019/news-story/d61d171a77108a94459b7f31d3efb9f8?nk=34fd14988ab099a0a18aab69e413ab5d-1540258246

He was played by Bell. And next time put in the fall post for context.

brilliant run by the riderless horse in the second at Caulfield Couldn't help but be impressed by the way he kicked back in the straight to come again on the line