Jesse Randall of Auckland FC
Photo: Andrew Cornaga/www.photosport.nz
Auckland FC are set to lose several players for next season as new A-League salary cap rules come into effect.
The team made history on Saturday, becoming the first New Zealand side to win the A-League men’s title with a 1-0 win over Sydney FC at a sold out Mt Smart Stadium.
They did it in just their second season.
But they appear likely to part ways with a number of their playing squad for next season and they won’t be the only club forced to tighten their belts.
The Australia Professional League (APL), who run the A-League, want to set spending limits and reduce the number of players who sit outside the salary cap in a change that executive chair Stephen Conroy has previously said would “ensure a competitive balance and to build long term foundations for growth that helps unlock the full revenue potential of each club”.
Auckland celebrate winning the A-League final.
Photo: Shane Wenzlick / Photosport.nz
For the 2026/27 season there will be a hard cap of $A3 million, plus one marquee player whose salary sits outside the cap.
Before the start of the 2027-28 season there will be even more changes, with caps relative to clubs’ revenue set to be put in place.
Under the current rules expansion clubs, like Auckland FC, have been allowed to spend more than the cap for two seasons.
This concession was to make up for the salary cap exemptions that new clubs could not take advantage of that were based on the length of time the club has been in the league (loyalty player) or an existing academy (homegrown player).
It’s believed Auckland FC have spent nearly twice as much as the Wellington Phoenix on their squad over the past two seasons
Cam Howieson of Auckland FC celebrates his goal.
Photo: Andrew Cornaga/www.photosport.nz
Auckland FC likely won’t be able to spend as much on players in their third season and chief executive, Nick Becker, told RNZ’s Morning Report that while he hoped the “majority” of the squad would remain, there would be some players leaving the club.
“There’s always some changes. We know there’s Jesse Randall, for example, he’s heading over to Dundee United after going to the World Cup with the All Whites. Football is very different to other codes in the sense that there are always quite a lot of change season to season.
“We’re now coming into our third season. A lot of the boys signed on for two year contracts right at the start. So there’ll be some conversations and some changes. We don’t quite know who that is and what that looks like right now, but everyone will go off and have a little bit of a break now and come back on July the 8th.”
Becker said the club will then turn its attention to their pre-season clash with English top flight side Tottenham.
“We’ve now got a massive pre-season match against Tottenham Hotspur, who stayed up in the Premier League overnight. So we’ve got a Premier League team coming out to play Auckland FC late July. And so that’ll be the key focus.”
Becker said many of the current squad would be involved in that match.
“We’ll definitely have a lot of familiar faces back for that.”
Sign up for Ngā Pitopito Kōrero, a daily newsletter curated by our editors and delivered straight to your inbox every weekday.