Next season could be the longest in A-League history - or the first to feature an unbalanced AFL and NRL-style draw - with Football Federation Australia trapped between a rock and a hard place as they ponder the structure of an expanded competition.

Expansion is still a live possibility for the 2019-20 campaign with the new FFA board set to assess the six remaining bids - and potentially select the two successful ones - at their upcoming meeting on December 12.

Food for thought: Sydney FC chairman Scott Barlow and FFA chief executive David Gallop. AAP

However, no decision has been taken yet by FFA management on how many rounds the A-League should run for with 12 teams and there are split views amongst various stakeholders. There appear to be three options and none of them are ideal.

The first is to play 22 games, with each side playing each other twice. For a league aspiring to be one of Asia's best and with many players harbouring international ambitions, it is simply not enough football.

The second option is to play 33 games - six more rounds than the current competition. Fox Sports are understood to be somewhat resistant to this as it would lead to further costs in broadcasting the additional matches and more overlap with the winter codes.

Previous experience also suggests it could lead to audience fatigue. A-League crowds have never been lower than in the 2010-11 season, when there were 11 teams playing 30 games apiece. The average attendance figure was 8749 - the lowest on record, with games played midweek to accommodate the additional fixtures.

The third, and most controversial, option is to keep the season at the current length of 27 games. The catch is that not every team would play each other the same amount of times, with derbies and other rivalry matches likely to be prioritised to fill out the fixture as is the case in the AFL and NRL.

It's an awkward situation and underlines why FFA is keen to move to 14 teams so that a straight home-and-away season of 26 games can be locked in.

"In a 12-team competition, we can't get to that point and we don't want to see our players playing less football - but certainly with 14 teams, the competition structure is far easier to put in place without the repetition of the third round," FFA chief executive David Gallop told Fairfax Media.

Sydney FC chairman Scott Barlow said there were a number of competing factors. "Clearly the off-season at the moment is long, probably one of the longest in professional football," he told Fairfax Media. "The broadcaster is a consideration, what works for them. [We also want] an evenly balanced competition."

"It's a good question, I don't have the answer to it, I don't have a strong view on it. At some point, we'll need to consider if a two-round competition is the right model for the A-League with an expanded number of clubs."

A 33-game season would give clubs more scope to take matches to different markets. For instance, Barlow suggested the Sky Blues would be open to playing some fixtures at WIN Stadium, having signed a memorandum of understanding with the Wollongong Wolves on Tuesday.

There is also the small matter of how to fit the expansion clubs into the FFA Cup. The new teams may not necessarily play in next year's tournament, which would give them a few more months to get their football departments in order ahead of what would be their debut A-League season.

But a neat way of fitting the new A-League sides into the round of 32 draw without reducing opportunities for NPL teams would need to be found. One option under discussion is to have only the A-League's top 10 clubs qualify for the FFA Cup - providing an extra incentive for teams to avoid finishing in the bottom two, in lieu of relegation.