2000 A-League Site Reviews
by John Hall
We all know that the Web is the best place to follow the A-League. Nearly every team has a Web site, and most are pretty helpful, with news and information, scores and statistics. But which teams have the best sites? Which teams let you buy merchandise or tickets from the convenience of your Pentium III? In this article, I'll try to identify which teams provide the best information and convenience to their fans on the web.
To force myself to be somewhat subjective, I visited each team's site and tracked seven specific features. These features and included:
 | Fan Pages - chat, polls, games, etc. |
 | Match Reports - the more up-to-date the better |
 | Merchandise - online ordering, please |
 | Up-to-date News - something from the offseason |
 | Match Web-cast - only three teams have this feature |
 | Statistics - I love stats |
 | Online Ticket Ordering - am I the only one who uses this feature? |
Now remember, I tried to be somewhat subjective, but I'm sure I overlooked some things and misunderstood others. Here are the results of my search.
[Editor's Note: Obviously, this is a bit out of date ;-). If someone is willing to step up and do another round of site reviews, it would be greatly appreciated.]
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The Atlanta Silverbacks have put together a flashy site that provides up-to-date news, ticket information and on-line ordering, a team roster, front office contact information, and links to sponsors. A nice feature of the site is the location map and stadium directions. While there is no game report page, game results are reported on the news page. The most notable shortfall of the site is its lack of a statistics page. Overall, this is one of the prettiest A-League sites. It could, however, use some additional information.
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Bay Area Seals
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There's not much to say about the Seals' site -- because there's not much there. It's just a splash page warning that the site is under construction.
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The Boston Bulldogs have put together a great looking site that has online ordering for tickets and merchandise. The site features something called "Kid Zone" that lets kids find themselves in game day pictures to win prizes. The only thing that this site lacks is RealAudio.
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This has got to be the most complete A-League site on the Web. You can buy tickets and merchandise here or find stats dating back to 1994. This site also features RealAudio broadcasts of game day action and hosts archives of the Soccer Focus radio show. The only thing wrong with this site is its use of frames, something that most web designers would consider a little passé.
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I was initially impressed with the Riverhawks Web presence. But as I dug deeper into
their site, I found that there was a lot missing. For example, the statistics page is from 1998 and the schedule page still holds the 1999 schedule. Recent news was non-existent. Last year's schedule does have links to match reports, which is nice. While this site looks pretty good, it doesn't offer much for the curious fan.
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This site looks pretty bad but
holds a decent amount of information. There's news from the draft,
a 2000 schedule, standings, stats, and driving directions. The most annoying
thing about this site is the number of "Under Construction" links.
There's nothing more annoying than clicking on a link
that says "Gear" and having it take you to a page that says those two
cursed words, "Under Construction".
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The new Patriots site is scheduled to make an appearance on, or around, February 9th.
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After some
searching, I found a Web site for the Mariners. However, the latest news
on the site was September 8, 1998, so this site doesn't count. The
one thing this site is good for is a picture of the new
stadium.
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The nice looking Hershey site is hosted by Hershey Entertainment and Resorts. I like the site interface, but compared to other A-League sites, this one doesn't have much information for fans. The Game Summaries link connects to the USL site, as does the Game by Game link. The latest news is from October 12.
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This is another complete site. The Blast's news section is up-to-date and is second to none in terms of the amount and quality of information provided. You can easily order tickets and gear online or learn about upcoming camps for the kids. The only thing I'd like to see is a more sophisticated design.
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One look at this attractive site and you'll feel like buying a pair of Tommy Hilfiger jeans. Fans will notice, however, that there isn't much in terms of news on this site. There's also no ticket information or ordering. There is a merchandise page -- but you can't order online. Hey, this site looks pretty cool, but there's not too much in there.
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I love the design of this site, but the statistics are from 1998 and the last news item was added on April 5th. I'm giving them the fans icon because there is some information about a kids club on the site. Other than the kids club, there's no reason for fans to visit this site.
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The Thunder are one of the A-League's premier organizations -- and their Web site shows it. While there's no merchandise or online ticket ordering, there is plenty of news, game info, and stats. And as we all know, there's plenty of chatting.
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The old Montreal site continues to be out of service. Hopefully, we'll get something before the season begins.
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New Orleans Storm
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The Storm's sleek Web site is hosted by InsideNewOrleans.com. There's not much news here or even a team roster! But you could purchase a team shirt online.
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Orange County Waves
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The only Orange County Web site that I could find was for the Zodiac (who were those guys?).
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The Riverhounds are one of the more promising young teams in the league -- and they have a nice Web site to prove it. While simple, they do have online merchandise and ticket ordering. Plus, they have contests and games for the kids. Their news is up-to-date and I expect that the match reports will be posted once the season begins.
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Raleigh Express
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The Raleigh Capital Express have a well-designed but incomplete Web presence. The last news release is from December 16th and the posted schedule is for 1999. There is a PDF ticket order form that doesn't have electronic form fields and a PDF merchandise catalog. There's a link for the team's Kids Club -- but the page just contains a scanned newspaper add and form for the club.
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Richmond has definitely put together a nice site with lots of news and team info. The archives contain a club history, including their 1995 U.S. Open Cup victory. You can visit the merchandise page -- only to find out that it's coming soon. You can't order tickets online, but some of the other features of this nice site kind of makes up for that small drawback.
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I've always been a little disappointed with the design of this site. When it first came out, I wrote the webmaster and complained that the site crashed my Netscape 3.x browser. He told me to change browsers -- not exactly the accommodating response I expected, and not good web design practice. This site has a lot of features, including a link to RealAudio broadcasts of home and away games.
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This isn't the greatest looking site in the world, but there's plenty of info here. The site even has ticket information "en Espanol" and a trivia game. However, this site lacks a merchandise page and online ticket ordering.
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The Sounder's new site is very nice with up-to-date news, online ticket ordering, and youth event information. Oddly, I couldn't locate team or player statistics. The merchandise page says that it's coming soon.
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Tennessee Rhythm
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There's some news on this colorful page, as well as '99 stats and the 2000 schedule. I like the fact that you can order tickets online. However, I couldn't find any information on clubs or clinics, something every A-League Web site should have.
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The Toronto Lynx's site doesn't appear to be in operation. Too bad for them!
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The 86ers have a great site. It has an online order form for tickets, plenty of news and statistics, and a page on the stadium and the supporters, club. Like most sites around the league, this site lacks any merchandise.
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Summary Overall, I was pretty impressed with the A-League's Web sites (although there's significant room for improvement). The best sites, in terms of content, belonged to Charleston, Indiana, and Vancouver. These sites each contained a wealth of information that makes following the A-League a breeze. The best sites, in terms of design, had to be Atlanta, Boston, and Long Island. Boston's site had that special designed-by-a-professional-web-designer appeal.
Before we get to cocky about the quality of these sites, let's consider some sites from teams around the world (you know, benchmarking). One of my favorite sites has got to be Stade Rennais of the French 1st Division. This site has a great design and includes interactive features like shopping and chat.
"But what about 2nd division teams?" I hear you ask. For design inspiration, take a look at Salernitana's site. Salernitana currently plays in Serie B.
As people around the world become more comfortable with Web-based commerce, those online shops will become an increasingly important source of revenue and advertising for teams, which will help us all get what we want: a thriving and profitable league (where my team wins the championship).
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