I couldn't agree more on the crowd thing. Australian basketball fans dont know how to form a crowd. Usually it feels like a bunch of individuals, clapping and cheering politely at the appropriate stimulus but rarely ever creating that sense of unity that comes with what you see in soccer. Interesting crowd chants. Drums. Streamers. Ways to get the crowd involved and make them a part of the show are all great ideas. Adelaide does a decent job pre-game but it falls off a bit as the event progresses.

Point 2 isnt going to happen. Euroleague teams wont come here either. Nothing to gain.

Sponsor changes wont be happening but more originally on the courts is sorely needed.

Nice topic, here's my thoughts:

1. The music and MC works well in basketball. The chanting, drums etc that you see in soccer don't necessarily translate to basketball although drums have been used and is a nice addition to the atmosphere. What I'd like to see is improvement. MCs need to not yell, music doesn't need to be played so loud and so much. Tweak that, and its fine.

2. It will be nice to see an NBA team come over here during the preseason, but probably won't happen. The NBLxNBA concept is only good of the MSM get right behind it, which they kind of don't.

3. Agree - need more of a home court feel with the decals. Every NBL court looks the same, and they're pretty ugly to look at. Need sponsors everywhere because the NBL can't survive without them, however, reversed logos can be adapted (eg the logo in white or mono, and placed on a transparent background. It will look nicer, more professional and not overbearing. Not sure if sponsors will like that though as their logos won't be screaming at you visually. Also doesn't help that the NBL attracts sponsors with awful logos. Just can't quite get the big corporations that have nice slick logos, and have to settle for lots of cheaper small companies, making everything look busy, cluttered and shit. As for the courts again, I would love to see painted keyways again. Make the court look a little more complete too.

" The chanting, drums etc that you see in soccer don't necessarily translate to basketball"

The euro bball teams is full of this, it works in college bball too.

Why wouldn't it work in Oz? By virtue of less fanatical fans? That’s the only reason I’d see

You can hardly get into that joint the kings play out off, Qudos, with a woman's handbag, purse size only, no drinks food or anything, drumbeat kits, trumpets would be great but ain’t happening.

I'm with WC95 on an improvement in music and MC to begin. Along with reduced volume, and the MC not attempting to steal the spotlight with their overbearing voice, it could be a quick fix and make games enjoyable. This isn’t just an in-game experience but also for the broadcast where it does come through — I literally see the Wildcats MC guy running up and down the court, waving his limbs about, during a critical possession late in a game. Seriously, c’mon.

Also, the MC / Music operator needs to have a feel for the progression and energy of the game and time everything play-by-play. Yes, it’s a lot, but having a Darude Sandstorm (why?) play between possessions just makes everything feel cheap and scripted.

Oh it totally works in Europe and College and your reason for it not likely to work in Australia is correct. We aren't fanatical enough.

Also, in Europe, the basketball clubs are linked to the soccer clubs, so they would have the same or similar supporters going and they bring a soccer environment. They are there to support the club, not necessarily because they are basketball junkies. It's awesome to see (watch the Greek league fans go nuts its crazy). But I sense a lot of it is because of their connection with their soccer club. A negative point of view would be that they don't actually watch the game and are there to just chant and make noise.

In college, it's a deep rooted connection with their passion for their university. Not necessarily a basketball thing, but rather the fans go nuts simply because their representing their college and they would do the same for all the sports.

The NBL are privately owned franchises. The passion just isn't there. Our league is more centred around how the NBA do it as far as fan engagement goes.

Not FIFA but light a beam when the team wins aka Sacramento kings style. And before the AFL steals the idea.

Honestly, it would be a better result on the decals just to remove the background colours for a start. Although eventually Monochrome needs to happen.

It's been said many times, but removing vocals from songs during play would be a good thing for a start.

Could be good to have some sort of pre-season invitational tournament. Invite a couple European teams and maybe a couple of the stronger Asian teams to play the top 4 NBL squads from the prior season. If you can get an NBA team as well, even better.

The thing that makes the World Cup/ FIFA so valuable is that the players dont play in the Olympics

BA could institute a transfer fee type system to bolster club basketball. Southern Tigers could be getting benefit from Joe Ingles as an example. $100k per annum to them would be huge money for infrastructure and development.

It's been said many times, but removing vocals from songs during play would be a good thing for a start.

"With all due respect to Goorjian, I doubt an Asia version of the Euroleague would be competitive"

I don't think the sole incentive should be a short-term fixation on 'competitive games'.

As many in the Socceroos camp have expressed, notably with Japan just beating Germany in the FIFA WC, Asian countries are spending a lot of money to improve their soccer programs.

It's to be expected their basketball programs will be too. One of they ways they become more competitive is to play strong teams, say those based out of Australia.

That should be the NBL's fixation, to get a piece of that pie. NBL teams do not get any central grants right now, a TV deal out of Asia gets them say $500k each, up goes the quality of imports.

With that, up goes the quality, greater excitement and perhaps some extra Australian TV money to be distributed.

All of a sudden we could be finding teams with +$1.25 million in revenue.

No way should the NBL be pursuing something other than getting $$$ out of Asia.

I find the NBL game-day experience great. Good standard of play, great facilities, fun day out. As long as the stadium is reasonably full you get a good atmosphere, especially in a close game. Certainly less passionate than in some parts of Europe, but plenty of positives to make up for it. Game-day experience in Europe is over-rated as we tend to only see the best (or worst!) examples. Plenty of anonymous mid-week games in there too