FFV today announced it received 44 expressions of interest – nine from regional areas and the rest from metropolitan Melbourne including the majority of current VPL clubs.

The national second tier league has already kicked off in NSW, Queensland, Tasmania, ACT and South Australia with Victoria and Western Australia slated to jump on board next year.

But heavyweights Melbourne Knights, Green Gully and Hume City – all currently playing in the top league – have snubbed the elite format.

Bentleigh Greens submitted an expression of interest but indicated they won’t take it further, while last season’s champions, Dandenong Thunder, are also wavering, leading to claims the competition will be “substandard”.

Several clubs have raised financial concerns, complaining that youngsters will be priced out of the game and clubs stripped of the right to chart their own destiny.

However, FFV CEO Peter Gome said the number of EOI responses was a huge vote of confidence.

“Interest from such a large pool of clubs ensures Victoria will get the best possible competition for development, entertainment and competitiveness,” Gome said.

“Now the business end of the process is about to begin and FFV will assist clubs prepare their applications.

“The NPLV exists to better connect talented player development and the wider football community and with 44 EOIs we have the made the best possible start.”

FFV conducted 15-state-wide forums on its model but the Knights dismissed them as “presentations” rather than consultations.

Club board member Pave Jusup said there was a small sliver of hope the impasse could be resolved but it required genuine negotiation on the part of the federation.

“It’s not over, the FFV can turn around tomorrow and say look we made a mistake let’s got to the table again and chat,” Jusup told au.fourfourtwo.com.

“We’re ready for that – every club is – but at the end of the day the FFV won’t accept that they’ve made a mistake.

“They won’t accept that a league without the Melbourne Knights and Green Gully and the other big clubs is not the best of the best which the mantra was at the beginning.

“They’d don’t accept that, they’ll push on, and they’ll have some substandard teams from substandard clubs playing at substandard facilities and it will not look like a national premier league.”

The FFV has so far held its nerve in the face of some high-powered opposition.

“There will be no eleventh hour changes to the model,” CEO Peter Gome said in an earlier statement. “It would not be fair to all interested clubs for us to now make changes to the model. The model is staying as it is.”

He added: “In some cases current top tier clubs will be the best option for an area while in other cases it may be lower tier clubs or even new clubs altogether. We’re developing a competition for the benefit of football in Victoria and Australia.

“Football Federation Victoria is confident it will have enough applicants to launch the league in 2014.”

Jusup said as many as six or seven of the state’s biggest clubs are preparing to snub the new elite framework.

“This new criteria is going to put the poorer kids out of the game and for our area that’s really alarming because we’re probably the most hard-on-the-luck area in Melbourne,” he said.

“But in football where the strongest region and that sends a really clear message to FFV that the strongest region within your constituency is not accepting your criteria because they can’t afford it.

“It’s expensive to play soccer as it is why are they making it more expensive? And it really gets my blood boiling that they’re going ahead with something without the support of the people they’re meant to be serving.”

Jusup said the Knights were prepared to play in the community league if that’s what it takes.

“Just because the FFV has stated that this is the top league doesn’t mean the best players are going to be playing there and it doesn’t mean that it’s going to be the best league,” he said.

While the NPL represented an important step in making Australia a world class football nation, the federation said it remained strongly focussed on community football.

President Nick Monteleone also expressed pride that Victoria was the only state to have included women and girls in its NPL model, but even that has drawn flak.

Jusup maintained it could have dire consequences for clubs focused on developing elite women teams if they could not field a top mens side.