What comment?
The retention allowance has merit. There are inherent imbalances in the AFL competition that favour Victorian based teams. Less travel, a talent base that is mainly located in one state, the majority of the media being based in Victoria (meaning the vast majority of media opportunities are in Victoria - no one seems to care that after signing with Collingwood, Cloke gets a nice healthy contract from Channel 9), the Grand Final always being played on the home ground of several Melbourne teams, etc.
All these things make list management and player retention more difficult for the expansion clubs. And with free agency coming in, that's only going to increase. So that's the problem, this idea that doing nothing = equality is silly, because the entire structure of the competition has inherent disadvantages.
The smaller Melbourne clubs feel it too - they have to try and increase their exposure and their fanbase (which means more money, which means more money in the football department), but they never get any high drawing fixtures.
Sydney is not a hole of a city that players want to escape as soon as possible. Who has Sydney lost due to homesickness? Honest question, I can't think of any.
Anyone would think we're forcing youngster to travel halfway around the world away from their home state to play.
Some clubs will always have more money than other clubs. It's up to all clubs to maximise their revenue as they see fit. That's why it's important to have a strong board.
What the AFL should be doing is getting every club on an even footing. That means the same salary cap. That means the same draw.
I'm a big believer in a rolling draw. You play all teams and then start again at the beginning this time vice versa for home and away.
Over the course of a season and a bit you play all teams home and away.
The AFL have got themselves in a knot because of trying to get equalisation but then on the other hand give hands up all over the place.
Anyway, good on Sydney for having the allowance. If it was my club I'd be for it as well but I don't believe I'd be deluded into thinking it was making things fair
If you can give me a reliable source for the Swans "enquiring" about Franklin I would be very interested, because that seems like the biggest pile of bullshit I've ever heard.
I don't have anything publically available. Could be scuttlebutt, might not be.
It fits into my CoLA theory though so I say it's true