Forget all the doom and gloom, the A-League is due for a watershed moment in its short history on October 2nd, 2010.

For the first time, there will be a true cross town derby when new boys Heart host Melbourne Victory at the stadium that has, perhaps ironically, been tagged 'built for Victory'.

So we should have the stage set for something special, right? What could possibly go wrong?

After consulting with the FFA, our voyeuristic friends Hatamoto and AAMI Park - the Heart administration have completely defied logic and allocated a sum total of 366 seats to ‘active' supporters of Melbourne Victory. With over 2,200 ‘MVFC Active Supporter memberships' in total, and at least 500 Active North Terrace supporters alone, the maths on this paltry offering does not add up.

Additionally, the traditional colour and noise of Melbourne have been shunted into the corner of the ground on the same side of the ground as the FoxSports cameras, effectively nullifying any match day coverage the groups of Active Melbourne supporters may have received.

In a release, Melbourne Victory have stated that they had requested the entire North End for its active supporters for the derby. A fair request, many would say, as Heart and their rather small membership base being more than catered for on the two wings and South End, where the fledgling ‘Yarraside' have set themselves up.

Heart have denied this request, as ‘Simon' from the club confirmed via email, because:

"We did offer Melbourne Victory the opportunity to reserve active areas behind the goals at the Northern End for the October 2 match at AAMI Park, in exchange for reciprocal rights when the two sides meet at Etihad Stadium.

However, Victory rejected this proposal, stating that Heart fans would not be afforded the same rights we offered their supporters."

Adam ‘Tunna' Tennenini, face of the Blue & White Brigade, dismissed Simon's statements and suggested that it has much more to do with the broadcast of the match than any reciprocal agreement that was unlikely ever to have occurred.

Although the various groups of the North Terrace were not directly involved in the discussions around match day arrangements, Tunna amongst others has confidence that Victory administration had "the supporters best interests at Heart (pardon the pun) by requesting the entire end". Tunna also went on to say that "the two clubs met early on in the planning and it was suggested that fans of Victory would be afforded the entire North End of the stadium. Later however Heart altered the entire seating plan. By releasing the whole of the North End to MVFC members would have meant a much safer outcome for supporters."

Even more concerning as of Tuesday is the information that tickets for the front 6 rows within Bay 38, the traditional home of North Terrace groups at AAMI Park, had been opened to the general public and selling out fast. That's right, thanks to Heart and Ticketek the bay that houses the brightest and loudest supporters in the nation will now be filled with neutrals and smatterings of supporters from both clubs blindly buying ‘best available' tickets through the online ticketing process.

The result could be messy, and the result could be dangerous - both for fans and the image of the league that is already up to its armpits in bad press as it is. You have to wonder how much common sense has been employed by Heart and the FFA by blatantly ignoring the ‘Fan Made' marketing line that has been nothing less than hypocritical up to this stage.

"I am in no way suggesting that there will be trouble on the night" mentions Tunna when we discuss the implications of what the Heart have put forward, which is essentially the equivalent of poking a bees nest with a stick just to see what comes out, "but from a risk management perspective I would have thought it would be whole lot easier to manage having all supporters from the one club standing together at the one end of the stadium."

Still, despite Heart's attempts to make Melbourne support as disjointed and uncoordinated as possible, the groups making up the North Terrace will do their all on the day to show the boys that they are behind them 100%, or as Tunna says "We'll take it in our stride and continue to do what we do best. If anything, this adversity will spur us on and hopefully give the boys the lift they need to win the first derby between the two clubs."