We all know the A-League cannot match the high profile European competitions in terms of attendance, revenue or prestige but I am starting to suspect the gap might be closing quicker than most people believe.

Now before you rush to the comments section and call me naïve, stupid or even sort of funny looking, I wish to point out that I am not referring to the standards on the field – although the last two seasons have clearly been the best in a technical sense since the league’s inception.

Instead, I am referring to the standards in the stands, since it seems that the A-League is now considered of such quality by its supporters that some are beginning to snub their noses at those competitions in the second tier of Australian football.

To be clear, what I’m saying is that Australian football now has a subsection of A-League snobs on its hands who feel disconnected and superior to the state leagues that have sustained this game since well before the National Soccer League was even a rough idea jotted on the back of a beer coaster.

Now let me point out that I don’t make this accusation lightly; that I happen to know more than my share about snobbery.

This isn’t because I am a snob myself – at least I sincerely hope I don’t give that impression – but rather because I had the mixed blessing of attending one of those striped-tie GPS schools that was overpopulated with overprivileged pricks who sought to berate, belittle and otherwise bludgeon the peasantry out of any awkward adolescent that slunk through its ornate gates.

In turn, it has been my experience that all snobbery ever lead to was rather ugly people wearing some very beautiful clothes. This statement holds true for the classical ‘Euro-snob’ too – a person who’ll proudly wear their big brand Premier League, La Liga or Serie A replica shirt while (figuratively) spitting on the A-League badges of their fellow football fans and countrymen.

It’s an attitude that other bloggers have addressed on this site before and the general consensus – at least as I inferred it from the comments of readers - has been that supporting football in this country is more important than blindly following a team of overpaid superstars from a city many Euro-snobs have only ever seen in a Michael Palin travelogue.

So imagine my shock when I could not convince anyone – not my friends, not some lesser acquaintances, not a few select neighbours and not even that pretty blonde barista who serves me cappuccinos – to join me at the season opening Veto Brisbane Premier League fixture weekend before last.

By way of background, this particular fixture featured two of Brisbane’s most important, traditional football clubs in Brisbane City and Queensland Lions. Both had once upon a time represented our fair and flood-prone city in the NSL. And this was their first meeting in the River City’s top flight for many years.

Of course, I’m not deluded. I didn’t expect that every person I asked would say ‘yes’. And it certainly wasn’t the fact that everyone said ‘no’ that concerned me. It was their additional comments that I found a little unsavoury.

These were utterances along the lines of – “What would I wanna watch that for?”; “You’re kidding me, right?”; and “The local leagues are shite!”

It was obvious that these declinations had nothing to do with any fervent dislike for the teams that were competing, nor did these people have prior commitments.  They simply perceived the whole league, and hence any viewing experience it may possibly offer them, to be of a vastly inferior standard to the A-League matches they regularly attend.

To them it mattered not that the captain of Brisbane Roar was himself a local league battler a mere three years ago and that perhaps the next diamond in the rough could be unearthed before their very eyes for little more than the few gold coins that would otherwise sit abandoned in their car ashtray.

The minds of these people were firmly set despite not one of them having ever attended a Brisbane Premier League or Queensland State League match in their lives.

It begged the question - how can anyone judge a league without having actually seen it?

Now of course, had they accepted my invitation, watched the game, gorged themselves stupid on the local delicacies and were then of the opinion that the local competition just wasn’t for them – well fair enough.

But to dismiss it without even giving it a chance is the same snobbish attitude that many of us have fought in trying to bring the A-League to the wider audience of Australian football fans who believe they know better by exclusively supporting foreign clubs.

The fact is though that they don’t know better. They don’t know anything because they haven’t given it a chance. They are snobs and some A-League fans would do well to avoid such ugly attitudes towards the clubs and competitions that feed the plastic fantastic franchises in the Australian top flight.

Of course, these second tier clubs will continue to survive without their support – they always have. And I’m certainly not asking anyone to support a club they don’t want to. Personally, I have no allegiance to any of the clubs competing in the Brisbane Premier League and yet I will still attend the odd game when given the chance.

All I’m saying is that nobody should knock the local product until they’ve seen it for themselves. Because to my mind, snobbery is something that the game in this country at all levels could well do without.