rbakersmith
Well-Known Member
This should look good on TV at the Brisbane game...
I am at the Stadium and even Santa supports #standupforthemariners
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#standupforthemariners
- Thread starter Capt. Awesome
- Start date
sydmariner
Well-Known Member
Capt. Awesome
Well-Known Member
Great article by Mike Cickeril:
http://m.brisbanetimes.com.au/sport...ications-for-the-aleague-20141221-12bnkq.html
Small clubs. Every league in every sport has them. Truth is, every sport needs them. Which is why the plight of Central Coast Mariners has far wider implications than many are prepared to acknowledge. The local community has been asked to #standupforthemariners in Gosford this week. In effect, they're standing up for much more than that.
In the Darwinian world of modern professional sport, power and wealth is being concentrated in the hands of a few at an alarming rate. Check the tables of most European leagues, and you see the handful of usual suspects dominating competition in a manner that was unheard of even a decade ago. The strong are getting stronger, while the weak are struggling to survive.
Those providing the money - sponsors and broadcasters - are not overly concerned about the re-engineering process. Fair enough, it's not their remit.
Advertisement
But those governing sport have a different, wider, charter. Protecting the interests of the small clubs is just as important as encouraging the ambitions of the big ones, otherwise the disconnect between local communities and their clubs stretches beyond breaking point.
Once that happens the business of sport consumes the sport itself. Clubs become franchises and competitions become stockmarkets. The pursuit of profit drives everything, even when the evidence shows profit is rarely there. Is that what we want for the A-League? Me? I prefer a balance.
Thus we come back to the Mariners. A club that historically has represented the traditional model of community engagement, but which is now driven by an owner who is chasing a different dream. Mike Charlesworth believes the Mariners can represent two communities - one on the Central Coast and the other in northern Sydney - and in the process improve his bottom line. They can't, and it won't.
Early this month, the football community of northern Sydney voted with their feet when just over 7000 showed up at North Sydney Oval for the visit of Melbourne Victory. Next weekend the football community of Central Coast get to vote with their feet when the Mariners host Brisbane Roar. Once the coach of the Mariners and these days the Gosford mayor, Lawrie McKinna has planned a street march and wants more than 10,000 locals to prove the club should stay where it belongs. The battle lines have been drawn, and for the fans the choice is clear.
Charlesworth, not happy with owning a small club, wants to create a big one. You can never knock ambition, but it doesn't really work that way. A respected, well-run and competitive small club with deep roots in the local community can not only survive, but thrive. Indeed, just a couple of years ago the Mariners were breaking even, and selling a production line of players to overseas clubs for big profits.
What's wrong with that?
The A-League needs the Mariners to return to their roots and once again become a role model for how a small club should be run. Why? Because the Central Coast, with a population of 350,000, is similar in size to most of the other cities aspiring to join the competition. And unless centres such as Wollongong, Geelong, Hobart, Sunshine Coast, Cairns, Canberra, Townsville and perhaps Gold Coast eventually become part of the A-League, it will never fulfil its potential.
Right now, Football Federation Australia is looking at creating extra teams in the capital cities for the next phase of expansion. The FFA is hoping to replicate the Western Sydney Wanderers success story by introducing extra teams in Sydney, Brisbane and/or Melbourne, believing the strategy is a safer bet.
"We need to fish where the fish are," is David Gallop's favourite line. Yet sometimes small fish taste better than big ones. The Mariners and Newcastle Jets have won championships, Adelaide United last week won the inaugural FFA Cup, and Perth Glory currently sit on top of the table.
That's been the beauty of the A-League - size doesn't always matter. It's what makes it special in comparison to the rest of the world. And it's why thinking small can still make a big difference.
http://m.brisbanetimes.com.au/sport...ications-for-the-aleague-20141221-12bnkq.html
Small clubs. Every league in every sport has them. Truth is, every sport needs them. Which is why the plight of Central Coast Mariners has far wider implications than many are prepared to acknowledge. The local community has been asked to #standupforthemariners in Gosford this week. In effect, they're standing up for much more than that.
In the Darwinian world of modern professional sport, power and wealth is being concentrated in the hands of a few at an alarming rate. Check the tables of most European leagues, and you see the handful of usual suspects dominating competition in a manner that was unheard of even a decade ago. The strong are getting stronger, while the weak are struggling to survive.
Those providing the money - sponsors and broadcasters - are not overly concerned about the re-engineering process. Fair enough, it's not their remit.
Advertisement
But those governing sport have a different, wider, charter. Protecting the interests of the small clubs is just as important as encouraging the ambitions of the big ones, otherwise the disconnect between local communities and their clubs stretches beyond breaking point.
Once that happens the business of sport consumes the sport itself. Clubs become franchises and competitions become stockmarkets. The pursuit of profit drives everything, even when the evidence shows profit is rarely there. Is that what we want for the A-League? Me? I prefer a balance.
Thus we come back to the Mariners. A club that historically has represented the traditional model of community engagement, but which is now driven by an owner who is chasing a different dream. Mike Charlesworth believes the Mariners can represent two communities - one on the Central Coast and the other in northern Sydney - and in the process improve his bottom line. They can't, and it won't.
Early this month, the football community of northern Sydney voted with their feet when just over 7000 showed up at North Sydney Oval for the visit of Melbourne Victory. Next weekend the football community of Central Coast get to vote with their feet when the Mariners host Brisbane Roar. Once the coach of the Mariners and these days the Gosford mayor, Lawrie McKinna has planned a street march and wants more than 10,000 locals to prove the club should stay where it belongs. The battle lines have been drawn, and for the fans the choice is clear.
Charlesworth, not happy with owning a small club, wants to create a big one. You can never knock ambition, but it doesn't really work that way. A respected, well-run and competitive small club with deep roots in the local community can not only survive, but thrive. Indeed, just a couple of years ago the Mariners were breaking even, and selling a production line of players to overseas clubs for big profits.
What's wrong with that?
The A-League needs the Mariners to return to their roots and once again become a role model for how a small club should be run. Why? Because the Central Coast, with a population of 350,000, is similar in size to most of the other cities aspiring to join the competition. And unless centres such as Wollongong, Geelong, Hobart, Sunshine Coast, Cairns, Canberra, Townsville and perhaps Gold Coast eventually become part of the A-League, it will never fulfil its potential.
Right now, Football Federation Australia is looking at creating extra teams in the capital cities for the next phase of expansion. The FFA is hoping to replicate the Western Sydney Wanderers success story by introducing extra teams in Sydney, Brisbane and/or Melbourne, believing the strategy is a safer bet.
"We need to fish where the fish are," is David Gallop's favourite line. Yet sometimes small fish taste better than big ones. The Mariners and Newcastle Jets have won championships, Adelaide United last week won the inaugural FFA Cup, and Perth Glory currently sit on top of the table.
That's been the beauty of the A-League - size doesn't always matter. It's what makes it special in comparison to the rest of the world. And it's why thinking small can still make a big difference.
nearlyyellow
Well-Known Member
So I've got a mate who's a CCM member but only a Navy 3 game ticket holder. I'm going to use one of my Gold "Bring a Friend for Free" tickets and drag him along on Saturday. Maybe we can get there early enough to take part in the march to the stadium. #standupforthemariners COYY 
nearlyyellow
Well-Known Member
Info:
Lawrie McKinna @LawrieMcKinna 2h hours ago
#standupforthemariners meet in Kibble Park at 3.30 this Saturday to show your support for the Mariners. Show our support get behind the boys
Lawrie McKinna @LawrieMcKinna 2h hours ago
#standupforthemariners meet in Kibble Park at 3.30 this Saturday to show your support for the Mariners. Show our support get behind the boys
rbakersmith
Well-Known Member
From this morning's member email:
sydmariner
Well-Known Member
scoober
Well-Known Member
I don't get it. The club surely realizes that this movement is against the direction its taking doesn't it? Not sure why they would encourage support of it. Best for them to stay quite or come out and say how dumb they have been.
nebakke
Well-Known Member
In all fairness, I think the club would be happy to stay on the coast, if they felt that it was viable. Disagree or not with their view that it isn't, it's all in their interest if we could drum up all the support for them and they wouldn't have the hassle....
The fear obviously, would be that MC keeps thinking that he's at no risk of losing the local fan base though..
It's free advertising for people to come and pay money to see there team. Win/win
I thoroughly agree. This whole thing is a reaction to the decisions by the owner and management to move games.
It' s meant to be sending them a message that if they bothered to engage the central coast community they would get bigger crowds, and then there would be no need to move the games.
Maybe they should concentrate on winning a game for a change rather than jumping on the bandwagon.
rbakersmith
Well-Known Member
But where were the bigger crowds - and more importantly, members - when they were engaging the Central Coast community? Our season average (excluding finals) has never gone above the 12,738 from 07/08, and our success in that season certainly didn't translate into higher crowds since the average dropped by over 2,000 in 08/09.
One reason would be that we lost our marquee to Sydney...
rbakersmith
Well-Known Member
Our "marquee" who was only there for part of one season?
My point is that even in the "golden age" of engagement that everyone here seems to pine for, our averages pretty much hovered around 10K, and we had bugger all in the way of members until the last couple of seasons.
To me, our club would be viable solely on the coast if we were pulling 12-13K at CCS on a regular basis - a number that would put us between the Jest and WSW. Even if the club had the perfect engagement model and ran the world's greatest marketing campaign (including SMS notifications like the one I received this morning for the Roar game) I don't think those sort of numbers are achievable.
Various quotes from the the club have the break even point at around, or even quite below, a crowd of 10,000. We are already very close to that point anyway so viability isn't that far away. It won't need much more engagement to get there.
To me the message from the #standupforthemariners campaign is that there is a lot of ill feeling towards the direction the club is taking and the club in general. The support is there, but it doesn't like what it is constantly hearing from the club.
A firm commitment to not move games would help, but it will take time to repair the damage already done.
Capt. Awesome
Well-Known Member
Central Coast Management again gleaning off #standupforthemariners . Can't say I blame them. It's the best form of community engagement the club has seen.
@ccmariners: TICKETS: If you’re planning to #StandUpForTheMariners on Saturday, don’t forget your match ticket: http://t.co/OQasyjrEgr #SummerFootball
@ccmariners: TICKETS: If you’re planning to #StandUpForTheMariners on Saturday, don’t forget your match ticket: http://t.co/OQasyjrEgr #SummerFootball
Jaundice
Well-Known Member
It also begs the question. Why was the Canberra idea even floated in the 'Golden age' if everything was hunky dory.
Jaundice
Well-Known Member
I think it was suggested around the 11k mark if we had significant improvement to corporate at a fan forum. I believe Mariners management have given mixed numbers on this though since then.
Capt. Awesome
Well-Known Member
I met up with Lawrie today at lunch to do some interviews with NBN to talk about the community rally on Saturday. It's the first time I've had a chat with him. He is putting so much time and effort into promoting the Mariners and for no financial gain. He gave up his ambassador role which he was getting paid for to stand up for the Mariners on the coast.
He believes that Charlsworth's main reason for moving games to North Sydney is to pump up the perceived value if the club to sell it. This is why he couldn't stand by and watch the Central Coast's only professional team move away to Sydney.
All I can say is he has an unstoppable passion to see the club remain on the Central Coast.
He believes that Charlsworth's main reason for moving games to North Sydney is to pump up the perceived value if the club to sell it. This is why he couldn't stand by and watch the Central Coast's only professional team move away to Sydney.
All I can say is he has an unstoppable passion to see the club remain on the Central Coast.
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