Eddie McGuire has called for the AFL to be “nimble” with its scheduling after missing a golden opportunity to have Sydney to itself.
The NRL, which has nine of its 17 teams based in Sydney, is playing its fourth annual Magic Round in Brisbane this weekend, leaving NSW up for grabs for the AFL.
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But in what could be seen as a scheduling blunder, the AFL, which hoped the GWS Giants would make inroads into the rugby league heartland in western Sydney, have not got any games in NSW either.
The Giants have a home game but have taken it to Canberra’s Manuka Oval for Saturday night’s clash with the Western Bulldogs, while the Swans will play Sunday afternoon at the MCG against the Collingwood Magpies.
Although neither the AFL or NRL like to acknowledge the other apart from making potshots, it seems like a missed opportunity to McGuire.
“This was an opportunity to get a situation where the AFL owned NSW,” he said on Wednesday night’s Footy Classified on Nine.
“If you were in Canberra and instead of it being Collingwood Vs Sydney at the MCG, it was Sydney Vs Collingwood at what was ANZ (now Accor Stadium), that would have been sensational.”
2007 Brownlow Medallist Jimmy Bartel agreed and said it should have been “one on the Friday night — Giants playing in Canberra on Friday night and have the Swans play Collingwood on Saturday night.”
As an aside, McGuire said he’d like the Giants to change their name to the NSW Giants, but he also pointed to the biggest ever crowds in Sydney.
The biggest crowd was in round 21 of the 2003 season when the Swans and Magpies had 72,393 fans at the Olympic Stadium, three years after the Sydney Games.
There have been 56 AFL games played at Stadium Australia since 2002 but before the last one between the Swans and Giants in round one of the 2022 season, the previous time was the Sydney sides playing the 2016 qualifying final.
McGuire said the record crowd was a night where it was the only AFL match of the night and while there was an NRL match in Sydney, it still attracted the record crowd.
McGuire, who was the Collingwood president at the time, said the match had a huge impact.
“I got a phone call a few days later from Bob Carr (then NSW Premier), who didn’t know anything about football, openly said that, didn’t know anything about any sports, and he said ‘I’ll offer you, Collingwood Football Club, $5 million cash and all expenses to play Anzac Day up in Sydney’,” McGuire said.
“In the end, we went to the AFL and said ‘look, there’s a real option for some things’, we got $50m out of the state government of Victoria to fix up and refurbish the MCG AFL members part of the Southern Stand. Everyone shared in it, we didn’t pocket the money and run. We didn’t want to leave Anzac Day from the MCG.
“But that’s the impact.”
McGuire added he’d spoken to the head of managing director of Seven Melbourne and head of network sport Lewis Martin and relayed that he’d said “we were happy to go to Sydney, we thought it was a bit strange as well.”
McGuire continued: “I know the fixtures come in late but you’ve got to be nimble enough when the opportunity comes.
“We should have been there and owning Sydney this weekend. You don’t have to do Gather Round, you just have to do big games.”
It comes after veteran journalist Caroline Wilson spoke on Monday night’s edition of Footy Classified saying AFL faces “significant challenges in Sydney”.
“The AFL has dropped the ball there and the clubs in Sydney are frustrated and the broadcasters are angry,” Wilson said.
“The state that has one-third of the Australian population is providing one or two per cent of the footy talent.”
`The issue has been further brought to the fore with the announcement that Tasmania would be the AFL’s 19th team.
After that announcement, Swans coach John Longmire called on the AFL to ensure the NSW clubs don’t get left behind.
“Let’s not take our eye off what’s happening here in NSW in the most competitive sporting market in the world,” Longmire said on Wednesday.
“What we’re mindful of is one third of Australia’s population is in NSW, and yet only five per cent (of AFL players come from this state).
“We’re all focused on Tasmania, which is terrific.
“But if you’ve got one third of the population sitting here in NSW and only five per cent playing AFL football, I think we need to do a bit of work in that space.”
