Leading American Football in Australia

🕐 6 min read

The seven years I spent leading an amateur gridiron league in Australia and the extraordinary growth of the sport downunder

In 2009 I was elected Vice President of Gridiron Victoria, a volunteer position with the amateur football league back home in Melbourne. Having just started playing in the five team competition I was keen to get involved.

7 years of growth for Gridiron Victoria

In 2011, I was elected President (also a volunteer position) where I would serve for 5 years before moving to the United States. Over the course of that period the league grew massively. Let's dive in to some more detail...

Tripled player numbers (300% growth)

Through a TV (yes tv!) advertising campaign on One HD when the new free-to-air channel commenced we saw a wave of interest and grew from approx. 250 players to almost 850 in 2016.

Established the women's competition

Thanks to hard work from the first women's team, GV supported the establishment of a women's full-kit, NCAA compliant competition which grew from one team to six in 2016.

Increased juniors (under 19's)

In 2011 we had 4 junior teams. By 2016 we had 10. We also added an Under 15's competition for girls and boys.

TV advertising

Perhaps the most monumental decision in the digital era was to embrace TV advertising. One HD had started televising NFL games nationally on a Monday morning and 30 sec spots were dirt cheap. So we ran an ad for 2 years, then when the rights were sold to channel 7 we advertised there and on 7 mate including through the playoffs.

One of the ad spots we ran for an NFL season I produced myself complete with my terrible voiceover, until I got a professional narrator.

Easily my proudest moment was establishing our amazing & vibrant women's competition

We did this as one league

Let's face it. The sport is pretty tribal. The league is governed by representatives of each club which leads to biases and self serving interests. My goal was to govern for the greater good.

I organised a league summit, convening an all day workshop committed to a long term plan. We ran a retro, brainstormed priorities for the league and voted on the plan as a group. It was straight out of the UX design playbook and helped establish key priorities for the organisation and a 5 year plan.

Michigan camp

Through connections, we hosted the Michigan Wolverines Division One NCAA football program. Our young players turned out in their droves to be put through their paces by professionals whilst ESPN journalist Gene Wojciechowski and crew watched from the sidelines having flown in from the states for the camp.

Equipment programs

For 3 straight years we gifted each club with 5 brand new helmets, purchased down markers and chain sets for the league and invested in training and coaching programs.

GVTV: Gridiron Victoria Television

I created a TV show. All praise to Danny who lead the charge, filming and editing every week, interviewing players and assembled graphics. It broadcasted once a month on community television in Melbourne with up to 10,000 viewers each week. Special shout out to Danny, Rory, Jamie, Allie and the late great Eric Williams for all they contributed to the show.

You can check out episodes along with the more than 100 videos I either filmed or edited over the years:

Gridiron Victoria YouTube channel

Major events & the Vic Bowl

We hosted several major events including a partnership with the Bendigo and Latrobe councils to host our Vic Bowl at their regional centers and broadcasted the games live.

In 2011 we hosted the Vic Bowl at the old Moorabbin grounds, the first Vic Bowl somewhere other than a local suburban ground in decades. We attracted a huge crowd, including Australian Football legends the Riewoldt brothers and incredibly, I landed the Consul General of the United States of America who attended with two burly security guards whom I suspected were packing heat.

Subsquent Vic Bowl's were in Bendigo, Latrobe and streamed live to thousands of people in Melbourne. In 2016 we returned to Melbourne with the Vic Bowl hosted at Lakeside Stadium in front of thousands of people.

We also got plenty of Super Bowl attention

Melbourne evolved to almost 100 bars and pubs showing the big game on the first Monday in February. We attended a lot of parties, spoke on stage and I had the top ranking google result for Super Bowl Party Melbourne.

Established our online presence

Built a new website focused on timely results and content, with game scores posted within 1 hour of the match finishing. Created the first social media footprint, growing the GV FB page to more than 6,000 likes over 5 years.

In additional to digital advertising and building a highly engaged social audience, we also printed our results in the metro newspaper each week.

Created endless content

I also wrote more than 300 pieces for the website, including coverage, profiles and some rather aloof April Fools Day 'jokes'. My piece about former player Adam Gotsis bringing his (at the time) Georgia Tech Yellow Jackets to Melbourne to play our Australian national team went so viral his parents contacted me about the story.

I also wrote a piece about the Federal Government building a new stadium on an island , reducing the 4 down distance from 10 yards to 9 , and my all time personal favourite that took the piss out of the misogynistic, sexist, bullshit clown-show-masquerading-as-sport: the Women's Lingerie League. I created the All Male Underwear League in the name of equality.

Secured sponsorship investment

Secured sponsorship from several companies in Melbourne including TGI Fridays, Top Notch Trophies with multi-year committments helping alleviate the cost of playing amateur football.

In the end, we charged players $100 annually to be part of our league which included their indemnity insurance, promotion, advertising, some equipment and the officials. Players were also charged $10 per game.

My thanks

Of course I didn't do all this alone, and in the spirit of saying thank you more often, thank you to these people:

Life Member Dan Levin; The late great Mark 'Penguin' Levin; Richie Garraway; Michael Krischunas; Dave Barker; Mick Santinon; Garry Wilson; Cat Bouwhuis; Paul Mercer; Sean O'Kane; Danny and the whole GVTV crew & everyone who volunteered, sent us score updates, chipped in at events or generally supported what we were about.

Any regrets?

In 7 years running the organisation you always have some screwups. Besides my zero-tolerance approach to dissent on social media, there are a few plays I'd like back:

• How we broke away from Gridiron Australia
• That we didn't invest more in Flag Football
• The way representative football was impacted at state & national level
• Too many new clubs too quickly without shoring up their fundamentals

During this whole time I was also involved with a club....

Croydon Rangers Gridiron Club

I was part of the Croydon Rangers for 8 years (2008-2016), playing for 7 of those years. In that time I served 2 years as Vice President,

As a member of the Rangers played a total of 70 games:

• 2011 - 2014: Club President
• 2010: All Victorian Team - Right Tackle (LOL!!!)
• 2010 & 2011: Gil Boyd Memorial Shield Winner
• 2014: 50 Games Played
• 2015: Vic Bowl XXXI Champion

That's it. That's all the stats.

Thanks to Barend, for the gridiron photos