Professional Footballers Australia (PFA) co-chief executive Beau Busch has called for a renewed, whole-of-game approach to the introduction of Football Australia's national second tier (NST), saying that players "haven't been involved" in the process.
The NST, which will operate at a level between the A-League and the state-based National Premier League (NPL) competitions, continues to be dogged by uncertainty with the proposed launch season in 2025 creeping ever closer.
Following a Football Australia board meeting in July, ESPN reported that the federation was moving away from a previously announced home-and-away format, resolving to pursue further conversations with clubs and other relevant stakeholders surrounding formats and season timings. Sources have since told ESPN that a potential shift to a spring staging, following the September conclusion of NPL seasons, has been discussed as a potential option.
With Football Australia chief executive James Johnson having returned from the Paris Olympics, in-person talks over the NST's future will take place in coming weeks, with the federation remaining adamant that it will launch, in some form, a "sustainable" competition in 2025.
Speaking to Soccerscene last month, APIA Leichhardt president Tony Raciti said that a potential delay in a home-and-away launch didn't represent "a bad process," but was indicative that "clubs care enough about the league that we want to do it right." It's a view on 2025 believed to be shared by at least two other NSW-based clubs.
Tension over formats, however, remains, with Nick Galatas, the chair of the Association of Australian Football Clubs (AAFC), who counts the eight foundation NST clubs as partners, tweeting following July's reports "The so-called Champions League model is not moving closer to happening because the top clubs won't participate. It's the LEAST financially viable model."
The so-called Champions League model is not moving closer to happening because the top clubs won't participate. It's the LEAST financially viable model. It's NOT a nat'l 2nd tier. All cost/no revenue. All in AAFC's report. @FootballAUS@joeylynchy @espnhttps://t.co/2tFrXpdX3a
— Nick Galatas (@NickGalatas) July 19, 2024
In an exclusive interview with ESPN, Busch reiterated the PFA's support for an NST's introduction but observed that greater collaboration and "absolute clarity and certainty" of purpose needed to be emphasised in the coming process, especially given that the financially struggling A-League clubs, which are operated independently of Football Australia, are pursuing expansion of their own.
"It's going to need players," he said on why the PFA should have a role. "That's a reality associated with this competition.
"We can work through and collaboratively design something we're all behind from the very start, or we can sort of have a more sort of traditional industrial discussion at the end that may sort of fracture things and make things a little bit more difficult.
"What I would say is the key parts of the NST being successful is having a level of collaboration with the A-Leagues, at a minimum, making sure that they are working together to be able to boost the entire professional game in this country. And making sure the players are on board, the member federations, and others."
Alongside then-Football Federation Australia (at the time still in charge of the A-League), the AAFC, and member federations, the PFA collaborated on a 2019 white paper on a national second division launch. However, Busch said that the player's union's last formal involvement in the NST's development came in 2020.
"Ultimately, we've had no invitation to participate," said Busch. "We've asked for updates and tried to find out more about that, but outside of what we've read in the media, and sort of one briefing that we had with Football Australia a number of years ago, where they updated us on progress, we haven't been involved.
"We conducted a comprehensive survey with players in the NPL to understand their expectations and the idea of that was to deeply get a sense of what would and wouldn't work for them and what their current workplace experience was like so that we could positively contribute to that. And the players in that process were overwhelmingly in favour of our involvement. So I think about 90% of players that participated in that -- there were about 400 people players participated rather in that survey -- were clear that the PFA being involved in that process would be important."
Member federations and NPL clubs themselves are eagerly awaiting clarity on the NST process, with the format of promotion and relegation in the NSW and Victorian NPLs unable to be confirmed until the 2025 status of the eight NST foundation sides -- five from NSW and three from Victoria -- are known. Sources have told ESPN that Football Australia is seeking to provide clarity to member federations on this by the end of the month, with NPL squads needing to register players for the start of their own 2025 campaign before the year is out.
A spokesperson for Football Australia told ESPN that the federation would not be commentating until the federation had met with clubs.