Much like the uber-successful GWS Giants academy in Wagga, the Sydney FC partnership will help identify precocious talent and nurture it.

For the A-League club, it’s a no-brainer, giving them unfettered access to the best and brightest emerging Wagga City Wanderers players.

For Football Wagga, it helps bolster the soccer brand and provides a rare pathway for young talent.

In sport, as in life, the difference between mediocrity and greatness is so often opportunity.

By inking this deal, Football Wagga is helping provide that opportunity.

The deal is also a public relations golden goal for local soccer.

For decades, rugby league, Australian rules and soccer have been jostling for the crown of largest junior base.

In boardrooms and change-rooms across Wagga, that code war remains as ferocious as ever.

We might be the city of good sports, but there’s nothing sporting about the intense code rivalry.

When the AFL launched Auskick in Wagga in the 1990s, it saw a landslide of junior players shift to the sport.

The AFL has continued to invest in the Riverina, bankrolling a host of full-time development officers and other staff, and running regular clinics and top-class pre-season matches.

It’s also fiercely protected the game’s image.

When a wild brawl broke out at last weekend’s Ganmain and Leeton first grade Riverina League match, administrators moved swiftly to protect the league from a black eye to its image.

On Monday, it sent an email out to all sponsors, apologising profusely for the melee and promising to clamp down on the culprits responsible. It’s hard to imagine Group 9 rugby league doing the same thing.

Rugby league might be the “greatest game of all”, but its administrators should be alarmed by how other codes are muscling in on their turf.

In a sporting landscape as diverse as Wagga’s, every code should be watching its back.