http://www.triplem.com.au/sydney/sport/afl/news//blog/jb-wants-proper-ta...
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North Melbourne president James Brayshaw has told Triple M’s Rush Hour that the Kangaroos will only play premiership matches in Tasmania if a serious partnership between the club and the state can be formed.
According to The Mercury, the AFL has offered Tasmania eight matches a season from 2012 with the matches to be divided equally between Launceston and Hobart.
JB revealed North Melbourne is prepared to play as many as seven games a year in Tassie.
Hawthorn’s four-game-a-year contract in Tasmania expires at the end of next season and there are suggestions that the league might want to install North Melbourne as the Apple Isle’s principle team.
But JB insisted his club won’t get involved in a half-hearted deal with an interstate market again.
“North Melbourne in the past have done piecemeal deals with Sydney, with Canberra, with the Gold Coast, where you fly in and you fly out. It doesn’t work,†JB told Triple M’s Rush Hour.
“The only way it works is if you do a proper long-term partnership where everyone mutually benefits.â€
“We told them we’re happy to look at playing seven (matches in Tasmania) ... but we’re only interested if it’s part of a proper partnership.â€
As part of this proposed partnership JB would like to see, amongst other things, an academy set up in Tasmania that would be linked with North Melbourne, a stand-alone North Melbourne VFL team topped up with players from the state and potentially a Tasmanian representative on the Kangaroos board.
Hawthorn president Jeff Kennett accused JB on Triple M’s Rush Hour back in July of planning to relocate North Melbourne permanently in Tasmania.
But JB flatly denied this on Thursday.
“(We will be) based out of Arden Street, stay as the North Melbourne Football Club, none of that’s got any danger about it at all,†he said.
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Could this be on the cards for 2012?
