'Melbourne Victory fans were provided with their normal active zone seating, North End and South End. 'Our fans were shunted in a corner of a stadium like any other 'away game' and at one stage even had the big FFA Cup balloon hovering in front of them so they couldn't see the teams walk out. Glory, who also reached the final a year earlier and had to play in Adelaide (where they also lost), were also upset that there appeared to be little attempt to present AAMI Park as a neutral venue.Īlthough Melbourne was the host city, Glory pointed out, this should not have been a Victory home game but an FFA-run event. 'In our view, your venue selection criteria is skewed towards the larger clubs and cities and other considerations should also be given weighting other than just 'commercial outcomes'.'

Perth would have provided a better option as a venue clean of any competition entertainment options provided the ticket pricing was thought through more carefully. 'It is clear that what wasn't taken into consideration in your decision to host the final in Melbourne was (1) ticket pricing and (2) the financial fatigue of consumers on the back-end of a busy spring racing carnival week in Melbourne. 'It was a missed opportunity to engage and re-engage a strong football community in WA over a city which is well accommodated by two A-League teams and hosted an A-League grand final only a matter of months ago,' said Filopoulos, who pointed out that Perth attracted 19,000 fans to nib Stadium for the Socceroos match against Bangladesh – hardly a top-drawer attraction – in the World Cup qualifier in September.

Download perth glory soccer