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ReLoad
24-08-2014, 07:54 PM
I've just about had a gut-full of the AFL, so much so Ive cranked out the old ancient art of letter writing and sent this in the post tonight.

not that it will do any good, but I just needed to get it out there.

yeah ill still keep buying our membership, social club and reserved seat, but its out of love for the club, nothing else.

Looking forward to going to the VFL again this week and enjoying the footy for what it really is.


Gillon McLachlan
Chief Executive Officer
Australian Football league
140 Harbour Esplanade
Docklands, Victoria, 3008

CC: Peter Gordon - President Western Bulldogs Football Club, Patrick Smith ā€“ The Australian

To Gillon Mclachlan,

Please excuse this personally addressed letter, but given as I am a stakeholder in our once great game I felt it important to draw to your attention what our game has become.

Today I saw the Western Bulldogs play against the Sydney swans, and I saw a grossly uneven playing field, I saw a game where the odds were so stacked against one team versus the other that it was not indeed a fair fight, and Iā€™m sure you will agree, that all every Australian asks for is an even playing field.

This letter is not to disrespect the Sydney swans as they are a fine team of great individual players, however as you appreciate they have done this with 10% assistance (against the western bulldogs today it adds up to some 15% assistance to the tune of around 1.5 to 1.7 Million dollars worth of players.)

Combine this with a self-fulfilling negative draw (can you last remember when the Western Bulldogs played on a Friday night? ā€“ (It was Round 9 the 25th of May 2012) I ask you as a business owner why would I want to sponsor a team that plays very few premium games (i.e. none) and are restricted to Sunday late afternoon games and even forced to play home games in Cairns?

As a custodian of our game it is your duty and responsibility to look after the game and the only true way to do this is to make the game equal for all parties, something your organisation since its foundation has failed and continues to fail to do so.

I beg and implore you for current and future generations to make the game a purely fair and level playing field for all parties on all levels.

I look forward to hearing from you in writing in regards to your long term strategy for financial and fixturing fairness for all teams. (as opposed to the capped equalisation which you have recently put in placed which is nothing short of lip service to the words equalization)

Yours Faithfully,

bulldogtragic
24-08-2014, 08:04 PM
Appreciate the sentiment brother or sister. It's not so much 'any given Sunday', but 'every given Sunday' with us. I can't believe we will go 9 months without even a Saturday game. I hope he walks the walk. Please let us know if you get anything remotely interesting.

Greystache
24-08-2014, 08:17 PM
It's a noble deed but it'll fall on deaf ears. Losing patches of individuals is just collateral damage in their grander plans to manipulate the landscape to capture a new market of bandwagon fans. Losing a percentage of fans from non-integral clubs is merely a cost of doing business.

The AFL is no longer a sporting competition, it is merely an entertainment industry. I won't be renewing my AFL membership next year. I will look to see if I can't invest my money to in someway support our VFL team, maybe a VFL sponsorship or something.

Scraggers
24-08-2014, 09:19 PM
Well written ... I too look forward to hearing his reply

Nuggety Back Pocket
24-08-2014, 10:18 PM
It's a noble deed but it'll fall on deaf ears. Losing patches of individuals is just collateral damage in their grander plans to manipulate the landscape to capture a new market of bandwagon fans. Losing a percentage of fans from non-integral clubs is merely a cost of doing business.

The AFL is no longer a sporting competition, it is merely an entertainment industry. I won't be renewing my AFL membership next year. I will look to see if I can't invest my money to in someway support our VFL team, maybe a VFL sponsorship or something.

The generous concessions given to the Sydney Swans was amply illustrated today with the huge gap now between our two clubs. I met up with Simon Beasley at our game today who believes that the Western Bulldogs Melbourne and St Kilda should get two priority picks each to enable them to become competitive again. The introduction of the Gold Coast Suns and GWS has further restricted our draft choices whilst FA is designed to further strengthen the stronger clubs. The AFL's regular scheduling of late Sunday games to the Western Bulldogs is a disincentive to grow our membership base.

Cyberdoggie
25-08-2014, 12:51 PM
What I don't understand is that it seems that even when we play the big games/teams, when it is a bulldogs home game it will get a poorer scheduling than if it was Essendon or Collingwood's.

For example: This year we played the bombers twice. When it was their home game we played Saturday night, later on in the year it was our home game and it was 4.40 sunday twilight.

Even a few years ago when we were doing well, the Essendon home game would be a Friday night game, and the return dogs home game would be a sunday game.

This just tells me that it is not about getting rewarded for results, it's about the AFL maximizing profit for itself and for the richer clubs with bigger sponsors who are a more powerful lobby group to satisfy.

LostDoggy
25-08-2014, 11:40 PM
Good letter. I'm still hopeful the buddy deal is going to cost the swans in the long run. He's in devastating form now but it's a long and expensive contract. Just hoping he doesn't get them over the line this year.

But the inequity of the whole thing (that they had the cash to engineer the Tippett and Buddy deals just after a premiership) was driving me mad was I watching the game....didn't express it as eloquently as the letter in front of the TV though.