The decision last week by the AFL to allocate around $30 million a year to the relative novelty of AFLW salaries is exactly the same sort of figure that could have gone to righting the decades-long historical wrong of a heartland footy state being denied a team in the big league.

It's one of the portents that doesn't bode well for those who want or hope for a stand-alone non-relocated Tasmanian team in the men's competition.

That Gil McLachlan is about to exit stage left and that Peter Gutwein already has - perhaps even more so.

Nothing kills off a decision better than when no one in the room was there when supposedly it all was previously agreed, with just a rubber stamp required down the track.

This can is well-worn - having been kicked down a very long road until the next D-day passes because the planets just didn't quite align.

It seems that this time it will be the AFL club presidents who provide the collective boot to ensure an extension of the roadway - and without any maintenance on the can.

The AFL has given itself a massive out on every bit of comfort it has bestowed on the advocates for a Tassie team by outsourcing the decision to the one group which is surely more conflicted than any other entity within the sport's governance structure.

And the jungle drums are beating that whatever the majority required from the 18 existing club leaders, it's just not there.

Just in case the problem was an uneven number of teams in the roster, the possibility of the Northern Territory coming aboard at the same time got floated.

But that only seemed to have those drums beaten that little bit harder.

Which brings the whole thing back to money - the priorities for spending it within the sport at elite level and how much more of it will flow into the coffers from the highly anticipated new broadcast deal.

The existing clubs are almost unanimously of the view that they don't have sufficient funds to continue operating in the style to which they have become accustomed and the manner in which they believe the AFL and the fans expect them to.

Unless the new money is sufficient to allay those concerns, as well as satisfy the participants in the game at the highest level of their financial expectations, then there simply may be nothing left to invest in a new venture.

The other issue for a Tassie team is just how many dollars are floating around in the state and from afar to meet Tasmania's share of the investment and contribution to perpetual operational costs.

And that's not simply to run the team because there remains the obsession that, for some grandiose reason, it's necessary to build a state-of-the-art facility in which it can train and play.

The JackJumpers have stolen a march on an AFL equivalent through a mix of experienced leadership and backing from Team Kestleman and actually establishing a new-age Tasmanian national league basketball team.

Anecdotal reports would indicate that the first-season finalists have scooped up a fair proportion of the local discretionary spend on sport sponsorship, and that success would increase their chances of doing ever better in the immediate future.

Tasmania had its chance in 2010 to have North Melbourne re-locate to Tasmania.

There was many a guise under which this plan was presented but in essence the AFL wanted to solve a problem with the club and the lack of a team in Tasmania in one fell swoop.

Politics and parochialism saw that plan morph into a token presence through the club playing games in Hobart, and perhaps coincidentally a previous exit-stage-left by another Tasmanian Premier.

While the alternate dream has been treading water, that full circle has only taken 12 years to complete.

By the time, if at all, the AFL presidents are asked to cast their votes, the Kangaroos will surely be back on the table as option one.