The AFL’s radical initiative to start the season in the northern states for the first time? That’s not enough for the voracious expansion franchises who, despite approaching the 2024 season in imposing form, are calling for unfairness in the competition to be addressed.

The chief executives of the AFL’s latest two expansion sides, Greater Western Sydney and Gold Coast, have called for “Opening Round” – which sees the northern clubs enjoy a home fixture before the traditional season start in Melbourne next week – to be made permanent.

And both officials believe more can be done to ensure the AFL realises its ambitious growth targets by further investing in the traditional rugby league states.

Suns CEO, Mark Evans, said the anticipation around this week has given the league’s upstarts a vital leg up. “Opening round has sharpened the focus on Queensland and New South Wales, and we’ve had record levels of media exposure, sell-out crowds and record membership levels,” he said.

“Not only should the AFL enshrine opening round in the annual fixture, we should look at more ways to drive the growth in Queensland and New South Wales.”

The league’s much-anticipated competitive balance review is underway, and Evans believes overlooked disadvantage faced by northern clubs must finally be recognised.

“If you have two MCG tenants playing each other at the MCG in the grand final, there’s no difference in benefit,” he said.

“There is a difference in benefit if you have a Victorian team versus a non-Victorian team, it’s much harder for the non-Victorian team to be successful. We should at least acknowledge that.”

The review was secured by players as part of the latest collective bargaining agreement, and terms of reference are to be agreed by 30 June. The AFL sought input from the clubs earlier this year ahead of a deadline to complete the work by the end of 2024.

It comes as the Suns appear to be entering a period of optimism, with four players from the club’s academy selected in the first round of last year’s draft, and the recruitment of premiership-winning coach Damien Hardwick.

The club is expecting this Saturday’s match against Richmond at the Suns’ 27,000-capacity stadium to be a sell out. It would be just the club’s fourth in its 13-year history.

“I think we should have all things on the table, including the fixture, the number of ‘travels’ and the difficulty associated with that, the ability to attract trade and free agent targets, as well as father-son,” Evans said. “There’s a lot of things here that can be thrown into the mix.”

The Giants facetiously posted travel tips for Collingwood on social media on Tuesday noting the Pies played 17 games in Victoria last year. It highlighted a major imbalance in the competition, given the Giants played just 12 out of 26 matches in Sydney or Canberra.

Giants chief executive, David Matthews, said he wants others around the league to recognise that increasing the level of support for AFL in New South Wales and Queensland will mean everyone benefits.

“First and foremost, [opening round] is something that’s meeting the objectives of the Giants and the AFL,” he said.

Competitive northern clubs mean higher television audiences and therefore greater broadcast revenues, as well as a better share of talented athletes, he argues.

“The reality is that there’s a correlation between the health of the game in New South Wales and Queensland and then the benefits that would will and do ultimately flow through to every club, including Victorian clubs,” Matthews said.

The Giants are anticipating reaching 30,000 members by the end of the week – the quickest they have ever reached that milestone – and for the match on Saturday night at the 23,000-capacity Giants Stadium against Collingwood to sell out.

GWS lost to Collingwood in last year’s preliminary final by a single point.

Brisbane Lions chief executive Greg Swann said on Tuesday he had already been hearing of “pushback from Melbourne” this week about opening round.

“It’s interesting, they’ve just started to talk about, ‘oh, it doesn’t quite feel the same’,” he said. “But for us, I’ve been here, we’ve had great publicity. We’ve had great exposure to the game, and the code.”

AFL chief executive Andrew Dillon is looking to double the code’s 500,000 registered members by 2033, and has said much of the growth must come from the northern states.

“Where we’ll grow doing that will be in New South Wales and Queensland, particularly New South Wales, it’ll be women and girls continuing to play and it’ll also be people playing footy in different formats,” he told the Dyl & Friends podcast this week.

At AFL level, the Giants and Suns have benefited from larger financial distributions than other clubs as well as draft and other concessions to help them become competitive. But the league’s commitment to emerging markets continues to be underpinned by investment in grassroots.

The AFL has quarantined 10% of revenue for development and an expansion hub has been introduced into Western Sydney to help build participation and convert fans to customers. A similar model is being rolled out in Queensland this year.

Queensland and New South Wales are already leading the way in the women’s game. AFLW premiers Brisbane are the powerhouse of the competition, thanks to a largely homegrown list. The Swans topped the competition’s attendances last year in just their second year in the AFLW.

Evans said Queensland has led the way on female participation for 20 years, sand many community clubs have equal numbers of boys and girls teams.

“It always starts with participation. Higher level of involvement leads to higher levels of support for their AFL team, and that then flows into greater following on social media, more watching of broadcast and attendance of matches,” he said.

“But to start with participation is exactly the way to go, particularly if you’re starting with kids, ages five to 12. They’ve got 60, 70 years of support for the code still to come.”