Saturday games ‘not under threat’ despite club concerns
South West Football League general manager Simone Nani has moved to quash rumours the league will reduce Saturday matches.
A popular rumour in football circles recently suggests the league would fixture less than 30 per cent of matches on Saturday for the 2020 home and away season.
The SWFL believes gate revenue is bigger on Sunday fixtures but Harvey-Brunswick-Leschenault president Craig Carbone said evidence from his club showed otherwise.
“We’d prefer to have all of our games on Saturday. I’m of the view that all SWFL games should be played on Saturday with juniors on Sunday,” Carbone said.
“We lose at least $2000 over the bar alone when we play Sunday games. Getting sponsorship off businesses is very hard in a tight market and the SWFL is effectively choking clubs and in essence sending us broke.
“We need Saturday games because it’s the best to raise revenue.”
Despite his concerns, Nani said reducing Saturday games was merely hearsay.
“We are having a committee meeting ahead of the annual general meeting on Thursday night and we will have a fixture towards the end of the week,” she said.
Augusta-Margaret River Football Club president Andrew Hunter said the Hawks wanted to play all home games on Saturday and did not want long road trips to Collie or Harvey on Sundays.
“Give our players an opportunity to rest on a Sunday so they can recover before going to work on Monday,” he said.
Carey Park president Wayne Stewart said Saturday games were better for both players and financially for his club.
“Most of the players would prefer to play on Saturday. We’ve had no explanation why they have been indicating Saturdays would be cut back,” he said.
The SWFL annual general meeting will be held tonight at Hands Oval.
Get the latest news from thewest.com.au in your inbox.
Sign up for our emails