A Sydney benefactor who ploughs $1 million into the northern academies every year is reconsidering his agreement with the AFL following the league’s decision to further restrict the northern clubs’ access to homegrown talent.
Investment banker Paul Moore, who helped underwrite the Swans academy when it launched in 2010 and now invests $250,000 annually into each of the Sydney, GWS, Brisbane Lions and Gold Coast academies, said he would address his disenchantment over the new draft rules with AFL bosses next week.
“I never thought it would be this hard to invest in the long-term future of the game,” he said.
Moore’s PM Capital, which also sponsors AFL NSW and has been a long-term patron of the game in its toughest market, signed a two-year, $2 million agreement at the start of 2024 to back all four northern academies. That deal reverted to a one-year rolling contract this year.
“St Kilda started kicking up a fuss about the academies and my position was, ‘I’m not going to make a long-term contribution until I know what I’m dealing with’,” he said.
“Head office is in a bubble. They’re always saying they’re all in and this current administration has made genuine attempts to work to grow the game in New South Wales, but then they’re always compromising. They’re trying to placate the southern clubs. I’ve got a belief if the AFL want to be a truly national game and protect their heritage, they have to be a dominant code in NSW. The Victorian clubs are fighting like we’re the enemy, but they don’t understand it’s the NRL which want to kill us.
“The hard decisions are going to be about next year’s funding. I’m not about publicly making a name for myself – I’m only in this because I want to see the game grow over the next five to 10 years. But there are plenty of other good causes out there.
“I should be careful because I don’t believe in threats and when I write to the AFL next week I want to be proactive, but if my money’s being wasted I’ll go and find another good cause. If I’m not getting a return on investment, then why invest?
“I’d like to invest more, and I would like to sign up for longer, but I feel like they …keep watering down the incentives to develop talent.”
Moore’s disappointment and his decision to speak to this masthead come after the AFL Commission recently confirmed changes to AFL player movement starting with the 2026 national draft.
Football boss Greg Swann tightened the bidding system around high-end talent under the northern academy rules along with the father-sons and next-generation academies. Clubs can now only use two picks to match a bid for homegrown academy talent in the first 36 picks of the draft. Had the new rules been in place last year, it would have been significantly more difficult for the Lions to match Richmond’s No. 6 bid for Daniel Annable, and Gold Coast could not have recruited their four talented academy players along with Christian Petracca.
In announcing the changes, Swann said they were designed to ensure the draft was fair and effective in distributing talent.
“These changes follow an extensive consultation with clubs, and form part of a broader review aimed at driving competitive balance, ensuring the competition continues to be as even as possible year in, year out,” he said.
Rival clubs criticised the changes for various reasons. Port Adelaide, the club most adversely affected by the new points system as Tasmania enters the competition in the coming years, already believe they have made inroads with head office to wind back changes to the draft value index. Meanwhile, the four northern clubs have chosen to split from their previously united approach due to their varying circumstances.
Sydney chairman Andrew Pridham this week proposed that clubs successfully matching bids in future for Swans academy players should be forced to make a financial contribution to the academy. Either that, said Pridham, or the AFL should fund the Swans academy.
“We spend $3.2 million a year on our academy,” said Pridham. “We’re not a charity. We are not going to continue to contribute millions of dollars into an institution where we can’t get access to the best players. We are in a war for talent here.”
Pridham – citing the impact of recent draftees Will Edwards (North Shore) and Max King (Newcastle) and the impact their wider circle of family and friends had made upon the club – said the success of homegrown academy players was the greatest tool to increase membership, support and local interest in Australian rules from non-traditional support bases.
Giants CEO Dave Matthews said that his club would not accept being forced to match rival bids for top-end talent given the struggle to attract players in Sydney’s west.
Moore, who previously served on the GWS board, said: “We obviously don’t want anyone getting a head start but GWS has not produced one homegrown player. Can you keep your complaining until they actually get one? The Melbourne clubs have got to stop bitching every time we produce a top 10 players like Isaac Heeney. They make out as though it happens every year.”
Having met repeatedly with AFL bosses over recent years, Moore said he planned to contact St Kilda president Andrew Bassat – a vocal opponent of the academy and father-son advantages to rival clubs – to better understand his position.
Moore praised CEO Andrew Dillon, saying he had changed the league’s attitude towards growing the game particularly in NSW.
“It’s a fact of life that when his legacy is written, and when his time is done, it will focus on how he grew the game in New South Wales,” he said.
“We could all just go to the draft and get rid of all the attempts to recruit homegrown talent but the players we get in the northern clubs who come from Victoria or other traditional markets tend to want to go home after a few years or when they want to marry or settle down. We want to develop and grow talent in our own market.
“The local TV revenue is the largest across New Zealand, New South Wales and Queensland, and we will never be No.1 or equal No.2 across those markets unless we increase our focus here. I tell the AFL I want to increase my funding, but I want to see that you are equally invested.
“If they [the Victorian clubs] don’t see the inroads the NRL has made in recent years, if they don’t see how our talent is dropping off in southern New South Wales and how the NRL is working across the entire state … the NRL is working to kill them. It’s not like in Victoria where you love all sports. Up here it’s war.
“I’m not doing this for myself or the Sydney Swans or the Giants. It’s because I love the game.”
The AFL Commission meets in Sydney on Friday. AFL NSW boss Andrew Varasdi, who was prevented from talking to this masthead this week, is expected to present a detailed document addressing declining participation numbers and a new, significantly increased funding model.
With the revelation of declining numbers – particularly in western Sydney – a major embarrassment to the head office and especially game development, Varasdi is also expected to propose a better way to market the game in NSW.
The AFL was contacted for comment.
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Caroline Wilson is a Walkley award-winning columnist and former chief football writer for The Age.Connect via email.