Truth is, the AFL has never made a habit of collaborating with anyone, least of all football. As historians like Roy Hay and Ian Syson are slowly revealing, the 18-a-side game has been trying to destroy the 11-a-side game for more than 130 years. And I do mean destroy. The way Andrew Demetriou tried to sabotage the World Cup bid amply confirmed the innate level of paranoia about a sport the AFL loves to categorise as un-Australian.

So we can safely assume McLachlan doesn't mean what he said. That's not what makes it so surprising. It's what he didn't say which was the revelation.

McLachlan was even asked about the Wanderers at a function hosted by the Giants tells us just how much the A-League team has blindsided the grand plans of the AFL to develop a second team in Sydney. The fact that McLachlan was forced to grudgingly acknowledge a rival code suggests the spin doctors at Docklands are struggling to control the narrative. Even in their Melbourne heartland there's been a wave of positive publicity over the first few weeks of the A-League season. Which is definitely not part of the plan.cLachlan

The AFL has enjoyed dominant position in Australia for the past 30 years. It's a position it has ruthlessly exploited. Winning friends has been a lot less important than influencing people. This is a wonderful sport, with a wonderful grassroots culture of tribalism, and community. But those that run the game have done it a great disservice. They have lost sight of their charter in the obsessive chase for wealth, and power. It has bred an arrogant, and nasty, streak within the administration, which football has come to know too well, especially in Victoria. The AFL expects to get its own way, and generally does.

But the explosion of interest in the Wanderers - a team established after the Giants with a fraction of the resources - is a potential game-changer. Football has begun mobilising itself from the ground up, which is the AFL's worst fear. Whether it becomes an isolated example, or whether the A-League in general manages to start eating away at the AFL's market share, remains to be seen. But in David Gallop - as opposed to his predecessor, the former AFL player Ben Buckley - the FFA has someone who's up for the fight.