Game stirs talk of third AFL side

Joondalup Mayor Troy Pickard, together with West Perth president Brett Raponi, pushed the idea of a

Joondalup-based team back in 2009-10. The excitement came off the back of AFL chief Andrew Demetriou suggesting WA as a possible base for league expansion by 2030.

Since then, the talk has quietened but it hasn’t ceased.

Mr Pickard last week said the AFL pre-season match ‘demonstrates the confidence the AFL and the West Australian Football Commission has in Joondalup to host football at an AFL-standard.’

Comparisons between Greater Western Sydney and the local district, comprising the cities of Wanneroo and Joondalup, have also emerged.

They’re easy to make, with both regions home to a high concentration of international residents ” a market the AFL is keen to crack.

But coincidentally, it’s former GWS coach Kevin Sheedy who detractors to the idea may echo. In 2010 he said a third AFL team in WA ‘would push the WAFL back to somewhere nearly being like the Sunday amateurs.’