Football (soccer) media: Good, Bad and NFI

[Brenton T]

Any nominations for the Good, the Bad and those with NFI in the local football (media/journo) circles?

[Journeyman]

Cumberland have all 3 covered

Good...junior sides winning all 3 cup finals, Excellent effort
Bad...senior players lack of loyalty to the club and their poor performances culminating in their relegation
NFI...the now departed president

[Brenton T]

A tad off topic however, I like your reply.

1 and 3 I agree.

The second and the "loyalty" thing is something I do not agree with. Why should the players be held to account (loyalty) when Cumby went off the rails ages ago and along with the infighting and personality clashes led to the demotion. The players loyalty was shown to me and many other opposition teams each and every week. They never gave up. It's a wake up call to the club. If Fulham don't get their collective S%^T together they will be in the same boat as Cumby in 2019. Loyalty is a 2 way street.

[Journeyman]

A tad off topic however, I like your reply.

1 and 3 I agree.

The second and the "loyalty" thing is something I do not agree with. Why should the players be held to account (loyalty) when Cumby went off the rails ages ago and along with the infighting and personality clashes led to the demotion. The players loyalty was shown to me and many other opposition teams each and every week. They never gave up. It's a wake up call to the club. If Fulham don't get their collective S%^T together they will be in the same boat as Cumby in 2019. Loyalty is a 2 way street.

Apologies if this was not the response you were looking for and is deemed off topic.

As for loyalty, I think you have described above 'commitment' from the players. I don't doubt there commitment this season and over the last 2 or 3 years, however, you could quite easily field a team of ex Cumberland players that would comfortably go close to winning the WNPL who are now playing at other clubs. I see 3 or 4 ex players at City, another handful at Metro, West and Uni, not to mention the Cumberland players in the NTC side.

I did see a bit of loyalty this season from a Cumberland player. Loyalty to her coach when he got asked to go as opposed to her team mates with whom she'd been playing with for numerous seasons.

[Brenton T]

Thanks for the considered reply.

Yes I agree that you could field a very strong Cumberland side that would be in contention of winning the WNPL league. The issue is why did things degrade to the point that they have now been relegated. RE: ex-Cumberland players in other teams there are many players of note that have left their clubs for greener pastures. The questions isn't so much about a lack of loyalty by the player but a lack of loyalty by clubs to the players and supporters with a lack of direction and investment on a football program from juniors to seniors to ensure competitiveness. Loyalty comes from top down.

Good clubs rarely lose good players.

I hope it's a quick return to the WNPL for Cumberland.

[juniorsupporter]

Is the original question about the quality of the media coverage for the WNPL this season? If so, I think it’s great that there’s much more coverage to discuss than in past years. Even though there’s a way to go, I think the amount of coverage is much improved. Especially from outlets that have traditionally only covered the men’s game. Radio in particular. The quality of course depends on the outlet. Some reporters do their homework on their interviewees, which is a sign of respect and interest in the game. Others not so much. Quality of all coverage is uneven on the whole, but quantity is much improved IMO.

[Brenton T]

I think if we continue to make excuses for where things are at and accept that it is better than it was, then that's the standard we will continue to receive.

My discussion is about mainstream media in that has NO problem reporting incessantly of a very poor women's sport AFL-W and a well entrenched women's' sport in netball and basketball however, does not afford the same courtesy to women's football (soccer). We're led to believe that soccer is the fastest growing women's sport in Australia and the World. Given the successes of the Matildas, I'd have though SA women's soccer would get a fair write up. Chids had her first training session with a Spanish team. Not a word.

Even the Messenger, which is much more community focused, has a very poor (blink and you'll miss it) write up about the previous week's game and very little about the week coming up. FFS we just had the Cup final. We're now in the middle of the final four series and a GF next week.

It is appalling.

[Lucas Leiva]

I think if we continue to make excuses for where things are at and accept that it is better than it was, then that's the standard we will continue to receive.

My discussion is about mainstream media in that has NO problem reporting incessantly of a very poor women's sport AFL-W and a well entrenched women's' sport in netball and basketball however, does not afford the same courtesy to women's football (soccer). We're led to believe that soccer is the fastest growing women's sport in Australia and the World. Given the successes of the Matildas, I'd have though SA women's soccer would get a fair write up. Chids had her first training session with a Spanish team. Not a word.

Even the Messenger, which is much more community focused, has a very poor (blink and you'll miss it) write up about the previous week's game and very little about the week coming up. FFS we just had the Cup final. We're now in the middle of the final four series and a GF next week.

It is appalling.

To be fair, how many people read the paper anymore anyway? Chids' training session (the pics of it at least) was tweeted, retweeted, and shared quite a lot (I reckon I saw that come from 5 different sites / sources that day).

I think for me the issue is that in the lead up to events, there's always good coverage, but it's post-event that the coverage drops off a cliff (ie previews are good, summaries are bad).