By JARROD POTTER AND RUSSELL BENNETT
LOCAL football is set to be radically altered with AFL Victoria announcing a major initiative to combat increasing club expenditure.
The Community Club Sustainability Program (CCSP) was announced at a press conference on Thursday morning, where AFL Victoria laid out two major changes set to dramatically affect the local football landscape.
AFL Victoria in 2016 is set to trial a player points system as well as potentially a salary cap to prevent the rampant increase in player payments.
Following emphatic support in a 2014 survey – with 83 per cent of club responses supporting the introduction of a system or regulation to halt the rise in player payments – AFL Victoria has launched the program to curb the rapid growth in player payments.
AFL Victoria Community Football and Engagement manager Brett Connell said in the spirit of improving local football, these initiatives needed to be developed otherwise clubs across the state were at risk.
“Basically, we’re saying if it’s going to be in the best interest of footy, let’s trial something, let’s test something and see how we go,” Brett Connell said.
“It’s a club sustainability model – if we keep going down the same path, we know some of our clubs will be under threat.”
The early reaction to AFL Victoria’s player points and salary cap system is mixed, with one local official referring to it as a “two-headed beast”.
Ellinbank and District Football League manager and secretary Ken Moore welcomed the concept, but added: “In theory it looks great, but there’s a difference between the real world and the theoretical world.
“If they pull this off, it’ll be a massive effort, but they’ll get a lot of critics.”
Moore said the combination of the points system and the salary cap was a “two-headed beast”, adding that he wasn’t convinced a salary cap was a necessity on top of a points system.
The Ellinbank league was one of eight that AFL Victoria did research on in drafting its new player points system.
“The guiding principles are good, and interestingly some of them regarding player loyalty, the retention of players, the evenness of competitions, and the pathways from juniors to seniors were all ideas that we used to build the points system we already have,” Moore said.
“I think, realistically, if you’ve got a good, functioning player points system, you probably don’t need a salary cap.
“If you go out and buy a string of ex-AFL, VFL and high-quality local players to try and win you a flag, you’re not going to be under the points system anyway.”
AFL Victoria has not set a steadfast number for the proposed salary cap, instead choosing to consult on a league-by-league basis “to ensure a cap meets the local conditions” with leagues recommending “the parameters for the salary cap for the competition”.
In regard to the proposed points system, players will be classified by their playing history and achievements.
Players from the AFL, VFL and other second tier competitions and TAC Cup levels will accrue the maximum possible points allocation – up to six total.
In other findings from the CCSP – South East FNL, Peninsula FNL, Gippsland FL and Yarra MDFNL have been classified as Country Premier Community Competitions while Southern FNL Division 1 and Eastern FNL Division 1 will be classified as Metropolitan Premier Community competitions.
Players transferring from Premier Community Competitions to non-premier competitions will also be added an additional point once Stage 2 begins. Ellinbank and District FL and Nepean FNL have not been classified as premier competitions under that classification.
Fines for those who breach the CCSP include relegation in divisional competitions, fines and bans from finals series.
