Campbelltown-based Macarthur FC will join the A-League next season as the 12th club in the competition, giving the Wanderers a year to regroup in their new Bankwest Stadium and focus on winning football again.

Tsatsimas insists the club never pushed for that delay in Macarthur joining the league – despite rumours WSW demanded a year of clear air – but still questioned the new club's existence.

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"I want to set this straight," the CEO tells the new FTBL Podcast. "And I've had this conversation with [FFA Head of Leagues] Greg O'Rourke - we never asked for Macarthur to be delayed.

"What we did say was that we didn't believe Macarthur should be admitted at this particular point. We believe other markets should have been looked at.

"There is already another team in Sydney and there are other challenges in terms of that."

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Tsatsimas said he believed it was an area of the A-League to move into eventually – but it wasn't ready for it now.

"The amount of work we've done in that area, the amount of games we played in that area – I think we were in pole position to assess the viability of a club going there," he tells FTBL Podcast

"That's not to say it won't be a viable club – far from it – but I think there is a time for it, and there's an opportunity for Macarthur to come in at some point."

He added: "We didn't want to spoil the Macarthur admission based on sour grapes. If they were admitted, then - great.

"But our position was that only six years earlier, the FFA had advocated that we were the team for all of Western Sydney – and Macarthur was one of the Town Halls that we attended to...

"I found it very very difficult and very hard to reconcile that six years later you go to the people in Campbelltown and say, 'Actually, that model we offered you back then? Well, we're going to have to change your colours now...'

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"I'm not a subscriber to that. I think football is tribal. If you're talking about tribal culture, setting standards and developing history, and you say to a region, 'This is your club' – and then six years later you say, 'Actually there's a new club. We just need to get another team in here...'

"Well, I struggle with that."

Tsatsimas – former chief executive with Newcastle Jets before joining WSW – admits he would rather have seen the A-League expand elsewhere within the country before Macarthur.

He wouldn't reveal his preferred alternative – but he admitted he believed Canberra needed to be a part of the A-League as soon was possible.

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"I still struggle with the fact that our capital city is not represented in our elite football competition," he tells FTBL Podcast. "I think that needs to come in sooner rather than later.

"And once we have that then we can start to identify other areas. But I think Canberra needs to be in, especially with its close proximity to Sydney and relatively close to Melbourne.

"It can add certain unique values that transcend city regional elements. A great number of Canberra youth players have come through and represented on the national stage and internationally.

"So I think we need to give them the respect that, as well as the other regional teams, they have made a significant contribution to this game."