Hoops

One Club - Euro Style

Years ago I recall an idea mooted at council level in Geelong I believe, to create a sporting hub or precinct at Kardinia Park.

Essentially they have football and cricket covered, while outside netball courts are also plentyful.

They were thinking of building an indoor stadium attached to the Geelong Football (AFL) stadium, which could cater for the Supercats, potentially event at NBL level.

What they did was build a two sided structure for viewing cricket outside the main AFL stadium onto an oval next to the car parks.

Go figure, the big three win the day, football, cricket and netball rule the sporting landscape and get all the dollars while basketball is again relegated to the backwaters...

Still, the concept would have created potenial for a super club, a super sporting hub within short distance of public transport and the city centre, am I dreaming again??

Yeah fair call, I see where you are coming from.

Im more talking about an easy partnership that could work now with existing facilities that are already in place rather than with a large investment for a new facility.

Melb United could easily partner up with one of the A league teams there and form the Melb United Sports Club with both teams obviously keeping their existing home courts but being able to share

Admin resources (Offices/marketing/sales/IT)
Training facilities (Gym/pool/support staff)
Customer Data base
Sponsorship/media deals
and then have the ability to sell a variety of packages to both corporate and individuals.

Can we see an owner of either willing to give up control of their existing club in order to create something that could be bigger than the sum of its parts?

I'm sure something along these lines has been considered but whether it will ever eventuate is highly doubtful I would have thought

I think the concept @Statman, could work with an indoor facility used by various sports if it was big enough, had enough practice courts and each entity had clear understanding of its share.

To make it viable and only at the top tier of each sport the stadium's surface would have to be easily changed to suit those different line markings, goals, nets etc...

These days I have read that they can use technology to have laser lines and all kinds of cool things show up on court, but maybe the cost of a state of the art facility would be too much, not sure...

I am not saying it wouldn't work better for basketball, netball, volley ball etc... It just needs to have some reasonable cooperation and independant leadership within the controlling body I think because seasons may cross over.

This concept has been successfully tested in the football/cricket environment for ages, would love to see it tested in ours!

I would have thought the exact opposite would make better partners Bear? If 2 sports use the same oval (such as the cricket/AFL example) then that will lead to clashes over who uses the main facility and when (such as we see at the moment with the major grounds having to utilise drop in pitches)

If an AFL (or soccer team more likely IMO) were to partner up with a basketball club then there would never be a clash over who uses their main field/court but there could be shared resources such as Gymnasium, Sales and marketing staff, Office space, IT systems, website presence plus the ability to sell to an increased customer base.

To me it seems so logical but no one seems willing to give up complete control over what they have now in order to have a partnership where they only have partial control.

Here is how it could work:

Football (AFL) and cricket share a similar size oval, their co-existance is mutual and not hampered by seasonal issues in the bigger picture. They can share the same ground and facilities because one is a summer sport, the other winter.

League (NRL) and soccer share simlar size grounds and if seasons do not conflict, at the top tier, they could cater for hockey and perhaps another sport that uses this size field.

Basketball, Netball, Volley Ball perhaps Tennis and other sports that use a similar indoor court in size and shape could also share, but seasons and availability issues will no doubt have to be sorted out to cater for each of them.

Build a complex that has enough training facilities, near shops and public transport and has both the indoor and outdoor stadium next to one another and you might just make it work!

...Now, I have just woken up to read this again, to my amusement...

The concept of consolidation requires financial benefits, incentive and above all else facilitation and cooperation.

We don't have the facilities nor the population to sustain it at the same level as they do in Europe IMO.

Some clubs already do this at local levels, I know that some Netball leagues join with their Football league. Cricket has done this for ages!

It seems to work at this level because of cooperative efforts and facilities being shared, as they do with cricket and in some cases a tennis club or other such sporting code.

At a national level however I am not so sure, but I would love to see such a concept.

The things holding it back more than anything would be a lack of cooperation and incentive, especially by the big boys who hold the controlling interest, such as the AFL (as you have already mentioned)...

There are many examples of such cooperatives working, but not at the same heights as in Europe.