FFA shooting itself in the foot AGAIN

[kruddler]

the rules are the same.  The sport is the same the clubs in the top flight are not.

Im a south Melbourne fan.  Have been my whole life. When FFA disbanded the NSL clubs were invited for an A league licence.

They had already made up their mind about which clubs they wanted and didn't want in the top flight.

So pretend for a moment, instead of expanding the vfl, the afl disbanded the vfl, decided to restrict the offers to only a couple of clubs from each city, and irrespective of what offer Carlton put forward, a different flavour of the Melbourne demons are going to get one license.  At first they only take the one Melbourne club and all of us are frozen out, Carlton, Collingwood essendon and Geelong all out irrespective of what happens you're not getting in.

Time comes to expand the comp, and the process for applying is open to all parties its not, they bring in a hawthorn equivalent.  Then they open up to a 3rd club again, and instead of opening up the comp in earnest they go with the Werribee tigers instead.

In the meantime Carlton who were the most successful club, have been stuck in the vfl playing against the North Ballarat roosters. And Port Melbourne boroughs instead.

Oh and the A league was supposed to have a FIFA mandated second division with promotion relegation but they've strung this out a lot further down the road to ensure if and when the clubs actually get their chance to climb back up to the top flight they do so having lost an entire generation of fans, and the previous income streams that were associated with being an iconic club.  They'll get the chance one day, but by the time that rolls around they'll be the equivalent of Carlton post salary cap rorting, and I wonder where we would be today without our history, the pratts, chris Judd, and the fact that we were only stuck in football purgatory for about 8 years, and due to mismanagement found ourselves right back there 4 years later.

South Melbourne soccer club hasn't been involved in the comp since 2004.  We are almost 20 years gone.  What would that have done to Carlton? 

OK, thanks for explaining.

You writing that triggered something in the back of my brain which may or may not be true.
Is it possible that the reason South Melbourne were not invited back because there was a lot of trouble with those fans?
Were they the black sheep of the group (The Port Bogan equivalents - or even Adelaide fans when they noticed a victorian license plate in the car park so they spat all over it....only to later realise it was their new coach - soon to be dual premiership winning coach - Malcolm Blight!)

I may be thinking of something else, but for some reason my brain is telling me you were not invited back because you were not welcome back because of the grief you brought.