ADELAIDE United chairman Greg Griffin has revealed the cost of playing in the AFC Champions League has forced his club and Brisbane Roar to consider withdrawing from the tournament.

With Adelaide still in the hunt to progress, Griffin said the club may incur losses of more than $200,000 by the time its Group H sixth match is complete on May 9 at Hindmarsh, against China’s Jiangsu Suning.

Griffin slammed the Asian Football Confederation’s financial support and Football Federation Australia’s unwillingness to contribute to funding the three Australian clubs, including Western Sydney, in the 2017 version of the tournament

“Brisbane Roar rang me and said ‘why are we doing this?’’’ Griffin said before Adelaide returned from a 3-3 Champions League draw with Gamba Osaka in Osaka on Tuesday.

“It’s a disaster, there’s an FFA contingency fund, Brisbane were going to go to the FFA and say ‘that contingency fund should be applied $100,000 Brisbane, $100,000 Adelaide and $100,000 Western Sydney.’

“Because we are all bleeding cash representing Australia.”

Griffin said UEFA’s Champions League model was ideal and should be a blueprint for Asia.

The 32 clubs that took part in the group stages of the 2016/17 Champions League received $18.5 million each, with this year’s winner tipped to earn about $145 million.

“The European Club Association takes 93 per cent of the revenues generated by the UEFA Champions League,’’ Griffin said.

“We don’t know what the percentage of revenue is in Asia.

“There is no Asian Club Association but up until the European Club Association was formed they (participating clubs) got hardly anything as well.

“There is a general consensus there needs to be a complete revamp in how the AFC funds and deals with prizemoney in the Champions League.”

With Adelaide not getting a cent from FFA for winning the championship or the Premier’s Plate last year, the AFC does offer clubs a $40,000 travel subsidy for each away clash. The AFC also hands clubs $66,500 for winning a group stage match, $13,300 for a draw and nothing for a loss.

The cash incentive can peak at $4 million for the winner of the Champions League but clubs must also shell out cash apart from their usual game-day overheads when hosting a home match.

Griffin said A-League clubs competing in in the Champions League were spending between $200,000 and $500,000 this season.

“The subsidy from AFC doesn’t cover the cost of transport to away games,’’ Griffin said.

“It costs us a lot on top of the airfares and hotels. . . we get $US 10,000 in prizemoney from AFC (for a draw). That trip to Osaka will cost us more than $60,000.”