MELBOURNE will put its hand up to play for premiership points in Alice Springs again next year if the AFL decides to play another game in Central Australia.
The AFL remains in discussions with the Northern Territory government about playing one home and away game a season in Alice Springs until the current broadcasting deal finishes at the end of 2016. Negotiations are believed to be progressing well.
No agreement has been reached as yet but Saturday's clash between Melbourne and Port Adelaide was considered a success, despite the crowd of 5655 being marginally below the expected figure of 6000-7000 spectators.
The financial benefit Melbourne will reap from Saturday's game against Port Adelaide at Traeger Park Oval is understood to be the equivalent of the two clubs drawing a crowd of between 55-60,000 to the MCG.
That is a massive boost given that the two clubs have drawn, on average, a crowd of 19,748 at the MCG in the nine matches they have played there since 1998.
Both Melbourne coach Paul Roos and his Port Adelaide counterpart Ken Hinkley praised the state of Traeger Park Oval, saying that playing football in Alice Springs was a positive experience overall.
Melbourne CEO Peter Jackson told AFL.com.au playing at such locations was important to the club.
"It's important for us where we are at the moment," Jackson said. "We have a good partnership with the Northern Territory government in Tourism NT. That is going well, so we're happy and they're happy so we hope it keeps going that way."
Melbourne has played home games in Darwin every year since 2010. It will play Fremantle there in round 16 this season.
The Demons have conducted training camps in Darwin and supported several community programs in the Northern Territory.
However any agreement to play home and away games in Alice Springs needs to be between the AFL and the Northern Territory Government.
Jackson said the Demons' football department had no problem playing home games in Alice Springs.
"This [playing in Alice Springs] is not a hell of a lot of different to flying to Brisbane and playing a game there, climatically and distance wise," Jackson said.
The next challenge for all parties will be to measure the economic impact of playing an AFL game in Alice Springs.
Jackson said it was a satisfying experience from Melbourne's perspective, and hoped the AFL would include Melbourne in future games, despite the result.
"In the end it is frustrating to get beaten, which is a good thing that it is frustrating. We had our chances," Jackson said.
"The [venue] looked all right from where I was sitting. That ground was in fantastic condition. The weather was just about perfect for playing footy, it was nice and cool and the town got right behind it so it was a good thing."
