SYDNEY -- So farewell the Sydney Super Cup, for now. We barely knew thee.
The men's slate of the preseason football jamboree on the east coast of Australia came to an end in front of over 80,000 at Accor Stadium on Saturday as Tottenham Hotspur beat Chelsea 2-1 in a surprisingly feisty game.
Earlier in the week, the Sydney Super Cup saw both London giants take on the Western Sydney Wanderers and Sydney FC before meeting each other on Saturday evening. The final leg, in 10 days' time, will see Chelsea take on an A-League Women All-Stars team.
But what did this tell us? What did we learn?
First things first: football as a sport in Australia is in rude health. Off the back of a record-breaking FIFA World Cup for viewers, nearly 150,000 fans turned up -- at significant ticket prices -- over three games to watch barely constructed A-League Men teams and Premier League youth squads supplemented by a smattering of first teamers. That's pretty damn good.
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Both clubs took the opportunity to get amongst fans Down Under, particularly Tottenham. Spurs House was set up in Sydney as a place for supporters to gather and meet players. Tottenham legend Ledley King ran a football clinic with Football United, and both teams held well attended open training sessions, although charging $15 a ticket felt a little on the nose.
Both A-League teams gave excellent accounts of themselves, particularly for this early in preseason, with squads threadbare. The Wanderers were genuinely exciting going forward, and Sydney FC frustrated Spurs for long periods in gaining their draw. Sky Blues boss Patrick Kisnorbo spoke glowingly of the opportunity to face Premier League opposition.
However, this is Australia, and things are ... well ... complicated.
While the crowd at Homebush was huge, the turnout for the midweek games was more modest, and a marked reduction on previous Premier League vs. A-League clashes of the past. Cost of living pressures, and the carrot of an all-Premier League clash a few days later no doubt playing a role, plus the midweek school-term kick-offs. The crowd and atmosphere at the Sydney FC game was further compromised by The Cove, the Sky Blues' active support group, disengaging with the game in a protest at the ticket pricing for these types of matches.
And while these games provide a revenue uptick for the local teams involved, the focus is definitely more on the visitors to Australian shores.
Can this interest in football in July be harnessed for the local game? That's the biggest issue, as they say on 'Sokkah Twitter': "WHY DON'T THEY COME TO THE A-LEAGUE?"
In three weeks, those same 80,000 fans in Spurs and Chelsea shirts can settle down in front of Stan in eager anticipation of the new Premier League season. For Sydney and Wanderers fans, the Australia Cup is on, but with a clutch of A-League sides already out, the next meaningful football for them is mid-October. Two and a half months away. That's too far away and the league season is too short.
Stan themselves made sure to buy up commercial time in the SBS World Cup broadcast, pitching the World Cup stars coming to the platform when the Premier League starts. The A-Leagues broadcaster was nowhere to be seen, as the season itself is nowhere to be seen. Expansion is failing with Western United in cold storage and Macarthur FC under a new cloud, and we need to find a way to shorten a five-month offseason, which is the ultimate momentum killer.
While Socceroos World Cup players are headed overseas -- like Patrick Beach switching Melbourne City for Ligue 1, or getting big money moves to England like Lucas Herrington -- the recognition for A-League players outside of the hardcore support remains frustrating low; matches at this time of year with squads still taking shape don't help the name recognition index. It shouldn't matter and doesn't to fans of those clubs, but it's a reality. Stars dominate football. Australia's stars' time in the local league is fleeting, and it's hard to market a future star until they make it big.
There's also the infamous "Eurosnob" factor. Those who will forever look down their nose at the local leagues. The classic Aussie sports fan persona, is someone who only wants to watch the best. AFL is "the best". NRL is "the best". For years the Wallabies and Super Rugby teams were "the best". For those people, the A-League doesn't cut it on reputation alone. The Premier League is "the best" -- they "don't need" to watch it to know.
Australian football's great advantage, multiculturalism, plays a role, too. Generations hand down support for clubs from "the old country," or from their old NSL/now NPL sides. That's hard to change, and nor should it necessarily change. Football support can mean many things, and it's for no one to else to decide how fans here should follow the game.
It's the generation of kids and teens attending A-League games now, however, that can begin to influence the future, and form the basis of generational local support. English teams have a 100-year head start. The A-Leagues are 20 years old, and while everyone wants things to move at 100kmph, things take time.
And there is hope in that next generation. I was at both Tottenham games, as I am a Spurs fan. On Wednesday I took my kids. My son is 14 and a Tottenham and Sydney FC fan, Spurs through me and Sydney because he lives here and we go to games.
He was desperate to get some autographs and had a Spurs shirt ready post-game but the team didn't come around. However, one Sydney FC player did: Wataru Kamijo. My son picked Kamijo over a year ago as his favourite player after watching him in an Australia Cup match. He watched NSWNPL games on YouTube and even set up a fan TikTok account about him, and got a Sydney shirt with his name on the back. Kamijo saw my son and his Kamijo shirt that he took along, came over, signed the shirt, had a picture and spoke to him. And now, having just been to see "his team" Tottenham play, he's only talking about meeting "his favourite player" Kamijo.
That is the power of football. Regardless of the teams, the leagues, the reason people go or don't go, everyone is there because they love the game itself. Twenty-two people kicking a ball for 90 minutes. Almost 150,000 people did that last week.
And that can't be a bad thing. Right?