Will Australian football sink or swim in 2020?

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A blockbuster calendar provides Australian football with huge opportunities over the next eleven months.

Last week, in what will be music to the ears of new FFA CEO James Johnson, the Olyroos passed a very important test.

The under-23 national team defeated Uzbekistan in the third-place playoff match at the AFC U-23 Championship, thanks to a solo effort from Nick D’Agostino.

Therefore, for the first time in 12 years, Australia will have a men’s football side competing at the Olympic games in Tokyo.

Discussions have already begun around who will be picked for the tournament, as Graham Arnold can also call up three over-age players for the tournament in late July.

The Copa America which Australia will be a part of this year will also factor into Graham Arnold’s decision making.

The South American continental championship also begins a month before the Olympics and the narrow time-frame between both tournaments poses a lot of questions for the Australian coach.

Will he choose a full-strength squad for the Copa America? Which tournament does he favour? Who will be the over-age players in the Olympic squad? Will the likes of Ryan and Mooy play in both tournaments? Or will their English Premier League clubs’ frown upon that?

These are good headaches to have, with exposure to these tournaments crucial for not only youth development but also to build the profile of Australia’s national teams.

Commercially, the FFA seems to be struggling in recent times with sponsors such as NAB and Caltex ending their partnerships with the governing body.

Participating in worldwide tournaments such as this can only improve the FFA’s situation, as potential sponsors see attractive possibilities.

Whilst the men’s teams may not stand a good chance of placing well in either of these tournaments, the Matildas do.

Unlike the men’s tournament, the women have no age restrictions placed on them at the Olympics, meaning Australia’s top players such as Sam Kerr, Caitlin Foord and Steph Catley are all expected to play.

Australia’s favourite national sporting team playing at the Olympics in a good time zone for Australian viewers, should lead to considerable corporate sponsorship interest.

But let’s not get ahead of ourselves.

The women’s national team are yet to qualify for the Olympics, with qualifiers for the tournament set to be held in Sydney next week.

The qualifiers were under threat due to the outbreak of the coronavirus, which was the reason the games were shifted to Sydney in the first place.

The qualifying tournament will go ahead next week, which will boost the coffers at FFA HQ, with games to be played at Campbelltown and Bankwest Stadium.

However, of greater focus to the FFA is the successful hosting of the tournament on such short notice and impressing FIFA in the year the host of the 2023 Women’s World Cup will be announced.

The announcement of the host for 2023 is due in June, with Japan, Colombia and Brazil vying for the honour (alongside Australia and New Zealand’s co-bid).

If the tournament hosting rights were to be won by Australia and New Zealand, FFA would be rubbing their hands together with glee at the long-term benefits that would have on the sport.

But first, Chinese Taipei at home on Thursday and hopefully one step closer to having both male and female teams at the Olympic Games.

And I haven’t even mentioned the road to Qatar 2022…

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Netflix’s Women’s World Cup deal puts IMG’s technology in the spotlight

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Image Credit: Shutterstock

Netflix’s first exclusive football deal will see the next year’s FIFA Women’s World Cup at the centre of it’s live-sport strategy. The US-streaming service company has appointed IMG as its production partner for all 64 matches in Brazil, as well as more than 100 hours of live studio programming. The deal includes English and Spanish coverage for viewers within the US, and English and French-language coverage for those in Canada. IMG will also support Netflix’s coverage of the tournament’s draw in December.

The 2027 Women’s World Cup runs from June 24 to July 25 across eight host cities, and will be the first edition to feature 32 teams. The scale of the tournament makes it an ambitious first foray into sports broadcasting for Netflix – which means IMG’s involvement will be of great significance.

IMG’s production engine

IMG has built its reputation on producing and distributing live sport at scale. It’s Stockley Park, London facility includes broadcast studios, production galleries, edit suites and facilities for radio, podcasting, dubbing and visual effects. The company has worked across major properties including the Premier League, Major League Soccer and other international sporting events.

For a World Cup, this infrastructure provides more than a place to make television; it creates a central point where production teams can manage feeds, graphics, replays, commentary, editing and distribution while events are taking place thousands of kilometres away.

Remote production is the key

The most important technology for a tournament spread across eight Brazilian cities is connectivity. IMG has invested in remote-production workflows that allow production teams to work across locations, rather than putting every specialist inside each stadium. Its wider production operation has used fibre, satellite, cloud and IP-based connectivity to move live signals between venues and production centres.

That model can reduce the amount of equipment and specialist staff required at every venue while allowing senior producers, directors, replay operators and graphics teams to work from centralised facilities. IMG has also demonstrated long-distance IP production, including a 20,000-kilometre link between Tokyo and London that carried uncompressed, low-latency video. For Netflix, those capabilities are particularly relevant. The platform is building a single viewing experience for audiences in two markets, but the raw ingredients will come from stadiums spread across Brazil. A resilient network becomes just as important as the cameras themselves.

From stadium to stream

The technology chain does not end when the pictures leave the venue. A modern sports production operation has to manage ingest, replay, media asset management, graphics, audio, quality control, archiving and transmission. IMG’s facilities have been built around those workflows, with master control and transmission capabilities alongside post-production and archive operations.

That infrastructure also gives IMG the ability to turn the live tournament into a wider stream of content. A goal can become a replay, a highlight, a social clip or part of a studio package without waiting for the match to finish. For Netflix, that fits a platform built around on-demand discovery as much as live viewing.

A new test for Netflix

Netflix has already made a significant investment in football through documentaries and other programming. The 2027 Women’s World Cup takes it up a level. FIFA describes the agreement as the first competition Netflix has acquired in full, making the tournament a major test of its live sports operation. IMG therefore has a job that goes beyond producing 64 matches; it must help Netflix build the technical backbone for a month-long, multi-venue broadcast, while maintaining consistent production standards across languages and locations.

The viewer may simply press play and see a World Cup match appear instantly. Behind that button will be a complex network of cameras, connectivity, control rooms, production systems, people and data. That is the real significance of Netflix’s IMG deal: the streamer is bringing the tournament to its platform, but IMG is providing much of the machinery that can make a global football event feel seamless.

Episode 4: “You could have sold it out twice”: Peter Filopoulos on why unification is the way forward

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PETER FILOPOULOS sees Saturday’s Australia Cup final between Melbourne Victory and South Melbourne Hellas as a ‘unification event’ that must be harnessed as a window to the future – rather than a means of stirring up old division – if Australian football is to progress.

“This game sold out organically, and having run marketing, corporate affairs and communications at Football Australia previously, I don’t think they would have needed to spend one single dollar on marketing,” Filopoulos told Soccerscene Unfiltered.

“You could have probably sold it out twice! This tells me it’s the sort of product the fans want; it’s authentic and taps into the new and the old, and demonstrates culture as a real asset. You couldn’t have scripted it better.

“If I was in a decision-making position at the A-League, I’d be looking very closely at why fans have responded in such an emphatic way.”

Filopoulos has seen it all across his near-35 year career in sports administration, which by his calculation has been split evenly inside the Australian football tent and outside it – but when outside, always with at least one eye glancing back.

Fifteen years across AFL clubs Hawthorn & North Melbourne as that code moved from a financially traumatic 1990s into a wealthier new millennium; five years at Football Australia: ‘easily the most transformative period for Australian football in its history’; stints with Etihad Stadium and even a period ‘completely out of my comfort zone’ at Swimming Australia.

There’s been crisis management, stepping in as Perth Glory CEO after the 2015 salary cap scandal; he’s seen the A-League’s boom times under the Lowys & Fox Sports’ 2018 broadcast deal; he’s enjoyed the euphoria of the 2023 Women’s World Cup in Australia and New Zealand.

But all stems back to the National Soccer League and South Melbourne Hellas, and his bold decision to take on the Club’s inaugural general manager position in December 1993, aged just 25.

“I wasn’t ready… but what it taught me is when an opportunity is presented to you, just say ‘yes’ and work out how to do it later. I’ve used this throughout my career, and that was one of those instances where I threw myself in the deep end.

“I had my career mapped out, and was working quite happily in accounting. But I was a passionate fan and having grown up at the old Middle Park, it was a natural ‘yes’ – and I was young enough to take a risk.”

With today’s A-League financially ailing and great clubs of yesteryear enjoying what Filopoulos terms a ‘renaissance’ – and agitating as vociferously for a return to the top flight as at any point since the demise of the NSL – he feels it is again time for bold leadership, and a little risk.

“You can have all the ambition in the world, and in being part of a club, you’re a custodian. But as I’ve always seen it, you need a sustainable commercial model: sound ownership, sound facilities, revenue, etc…

‘But you also need to understand how to tap into that asset of culture. What we’re seeing with the Australia Cup final is a result of culture, right? You need to create it amongst your fans, and know who your fans are, and tell them what you’re striving for. Bring them along on the journey!”

Catch the full chat with Peter Filoupolos on Soccerscene Unfiltered: from ‘eyeballing’ Frank Arok and backing Ange Postecoglou, overcoming resource challenges at Football Victoria, to the rise of the Matildas, and plenty more…

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