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Lachlan Mackintosh, Rebecca Levingston and Alicia Nally

Queensland Football Club merchandise makes Melbourne surgeon Ken Sakata extra cash

Melbourne doctor Ken Sakata started the Queensland Football Club fashion label. (Supplied: Queensland Football Club)

Thousands of people across the world are sporting Melbourne-made, Queensland Football Club-branded jerseys, hoodies and T-shirts. The thing is, the team doesn't exist.

Melbourne surgeon Ken Sakata said he was in a strange headspace when he started selling sports merchandise bearing images of himself wearing a Gold Coast Suns jersey during the height of the COVID pandemic.

But by the time the AFL issued a cease and desist letter, Dr Sakata had already sold $2,000 worth of product and couldn't entirely walk away from such a lucrative idea.

"There was a big virus a few years ago and all elective surgery was cancelled and I was redeployed effectively to the frontline," Dr Sakata told ABC Radio Brisbane Mornings host Rebecca Levingston.

"It was pretty stressful work at the time and I was really losing my mind and I needed to get my frustration out somewhere."

He said he created a persona online of a guy who was really frustrated with his job and wanted to be a footballer.

"It was clearly a joke and it had a bit of a following and I had this opportunity to create merchandise for this player I had become," he said.

"I renamed it Queensland Football Club and I sell a whole range of stuff now, hoodies, sweatshirts, T-shirts, some soccer jerseys and footy shorts, all made in Melbourne.

"It's enough for me to cut down on my work as a doctor."

Dr Sakata's idea was in the same vein as merchandise for the fictional AFC Richmond football team from TV show Ted Lasso and the satirical news outlet Betoota Advocate's range of shirts and stubbie coolers.

He said there was an amateur indoor soccer team playing under the Queensland Football Club name somewhere in Victoria and wearing the retro-looking pieces which came in a variety of designs.

"I would say 0 per cent of people thought it was a real club. It's a very Australian sense of humour," Dr Sakata said.

"It has a big following in the US and Europe, particularly in Scandinavia.

"The internet is quite a strange place."

'Part of a club'

Public relations specialist Jo Stone from Sticks and Stones PR said it was unfair to call Dr Sakata's fashion label fake.

"They're very upfront about it being a "fictional" sporting club so there's absolutely nothing misleading about the brand or the advertising," she said.

She said it would only take a quick internet search to find out it was a clothing label not a sporting club.

"I think it's actually very clever marketing and branding," she said.

"We all love the feeling of community and being a part of a club — real or otherwise — especially when there's a trending hashtag to go with it. Sometimes that's all it takes for a brand to become a run away success."

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