THE SPECTACLE of more than 3000 people turning out to watch an NAB Challenge match in north-western Sydney on Saturday night left NSW/ACT AFL general manager Dale Holmes delighted.
That the Sydney Swans defeated the Western Bulldogs by 27 points at Bruce Purser Reserve in Rouse Hill only added to the partisan crowd’s enjoyment and the success of the experiment.
But the man charged with growing the game in the country’s most populous state said Saturday night’s fixture was just the start of a long-term development strategy on the AFL’s newest frontier.
“It’s a seed. What it means is that we’re now able to bring out the elite level players and are able to exhibit the game at the elite level,” Holmes said.
“Three and a half thousand people from the local community get a chance to see that and feel like it’s theirs because it’s in their local area, which is different from going to a major stadium like ANZ Stadium.”
Holmes said the NSW/ACT AFL’s strategy was still focused on launching a western Sydney AFL team in 2012.
“All the plans and all the activities are focused towards 2012,” he said.
“The club will need to be able to show, a bit like what’s happening on the Gold Coast, that it can meet its corporate criteria, so we’ll go through that process over the next two years.”
The next major step towards that ultimate goal comes in July, when the national under-16 championships will be played at Blacktown Olympic Park to launch the new AFL ground at the former Olympic baseball venue.
Holmes said the under-16 titles, and another round of pre-season AFL football at Blacktown next year, would provide more opportunities to build networks in local communities.
Should the development of the western Sydney franchise proceed as originally planned, local AFL supporters will be heavily involved in branding of the new team.
“[We’ll be] giving the community the opportunity to name the team, the logo, the colours and the jumpers,” Holmes said.
“The learnings we’ve got from the Gold Coast are about how you throw that out to the community to make those decisions, and we’ll run a similar process.”
Holmes said the code’s greatest asset in building the profile of AFL in western Sydney was the local community’s appetite for playing and watching sport.
“They love their sport and they try different sports. If we exhibit our sport well and they have a great night, there’s a bigger chance that a lot of kids who came [on Saturday night] will continue following our game,” he said.
“I don’t see it as necessarily us going head to head with the other sports. We’ve just got a strategy and we’re trying to implement that strategy.
“If we do it well, hopefully we’ll be successful. It will take some time and there will be plenty of challenges, but I think it’s going in the right direction.”
