Canterbury has Collingwood in its sights

Last week the Sydney Morning Herald reported that Canterbury Bulldogs legend, Steve Mortimer, had declared that in the very near future the " Bulldogs will overtake Collingwood ".

Obviously such a bold declaration is intended specifically for a Sydney audience. Nevertheless, the claim is there and it does warrant some further investigation.

Firstly, let me begin by stating unequivocally that all Australian sporting clubs and competitions have every right to aim high, and for professional clubs in particular, we would expect no less.

On this occasion, one can rightfully wonder whether it's just an off the cuff remark, to be taken with a grain of salt, or whether someone like Mortimer, no stranger to the broader Australian sports market, truly believes Canterbury can catch Collingwood, within three to five years no less.

Collingwood is the best known club in Australia's premier football competition. No other club has achieved as many wins in the past 114 seasons, made the most finals or the most grand finals (unfortunately for them, they have lost more than they have won, giving rise to the now iconic Colliewobbles).

Some clubs will lay claim to higher numbers in certain metrics. Essendon and Carlton have achieved one more premiership than Collingwood. For a short while, Hawthorn achieved more memberships. There have been seasons when the Eagles and Crows have posted larger profits.

It was recently reported that the Swans have the highest level of sponsorship of any sporting club in Australia.

But no one else has the cachet of Collingwood, garnered over a period of 120 years, built on making it their business to get up everyone else's collective nose.

That's in the AFL.

Looking more broadly across the football codes, the annual sports surveys reveal a higher level of popularity for teams such as the Broncos and Swans, one town teams in their respective leagues.

Even the Storm challenges on this count, surprisingly.

But when we start looking carefully at the metrics that matter, those that have dollar signs attached to them, Collingwood leaves everyone behind.

Some Australians might be surprised to hear that Collingwood sits right up there amongst the most famous clubs in the world in terms of average attendances, 63,256 in 2010: marginally below a famous club such as Bayern Munchen but above even more famous clubs such as Arsenal, AC Milan, Internazionale, Celtic, Manchester City and Benfica.

This season, Collingwood is on track to sell well above 60,000 memberships, maybe even breaching 65,000, easily the highest of any club in the land (in fact, some leagues in aggregate struggle to reach this mark).

It's not surprising to discover that Collingwood has one of the largest revenue bases of any sporting club in Australia, with 2010 revenue reaching $75 million.

The highest NRL revenue figure was the Broncos with $22 million. Don't worry about any of the A-League clubs, they're a few tiers below that again.

In the meantime, with Collingwood seriously staring at a 65,000 membership figure in 2011 (50k+ already sold), Canterbury have sold about 9,000, and will be lucky to make 14,000 for the season.

Average attendaces last season for Canterbury were around the 20,000 mark, very good for the NRL, but in all honesty, Collingwood is in an altogether different league.

In the next three to five years, or even in the next 10 years, it's impossible to imagine any team outside of the AFL getting anywhere near these numbers. If it were to happen, I doubt it would be Canterbury.

If Collingwood win a consecutive premiership this year, you can probably forget about it for at least the next 25 years.