D'Arcy Waldegrave: The A-League Grand Final promises so much

All hail AKLFC. The Auckland football side have gone one better than their inaugural season by booking a place in the A-League final.   Arguably they have trumped last year’s season already. Trumped as in surpassed, not as in the tangerine coloured, tiny handed narcissist.   They’ve packed out Mt Smart Go Media Stadium for the final, which from tonight on will be known as The Go Media Port after the intense fan base the team has whipped up. They've put football on the lips of sports fans across the motu, they’ve created an energy around Australasian sport that Super Rugby must be crying over, a vitality that the Warriors have finally tapped into and The Big Bash, aahh, yeah, nah, not yet.    This is not only a triumph for football, but a resounding celebration of the power of money. So it is a bit Trumpy, right?   The team hit the ground running, with the flames at their feet, propelled by the required largesse of a billionaire. It has yet to be determined if titles can be bought here but following in the footsteps of many a hugely successful football team, the smell of an oily rag will not fuel any team on the road to the promised land.    This is not a negative thought. This is steeped in the reality of professional sport. It’s not title buying, it’s arming your team with as much hi-tech ordinance as possible. The A-League salary cap is one thing, an archaic, creaky and vaguely efficient mechanism to ensure on-field parity, but the real financial flex comes with the ability to fund everything else. Well-resourced if you will. Staff, equipment, facilities. Although as chief payroll executive Bill Foley found out, much to his surprise (not ours), no amount of money can oil the wheels of Auckland city’s stadium development vehicle.   All of that aside, the game promises so much. Victory is the only acceptable outcome, but to not enjoy the fixture for whatever it brings, regardless of the result, is insane.   Revel in it, roll in it like a pig in mud, cheer, laugh, scream.   Have fun, because sport is far too important to take seriously. See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.