just to name a few:
anzac day
kings b'day
no saturday nights in melb
no thursday nights in melb
gold coast during school holidays
easter thursday night in brisbane
6 of the last 7 years play friday night opening round
14 games at the MCG
As you can see there aren't many spots left, so why would Coll hand in a fixture request? Year after year of the AFL giving them everything they want means there's no reason at all to hand in a request. They've got the AFL trained like little puppy dogs.
Now Coll want to hijack the opening game of the season by having a stand alone game in Sydney, one week before all the other games. They were angry that the AFL wouldn't give them Coll/Rich to open every season on a Friday night back in the day, so now they think they are being upstaged by Carl/Rich and want an entire round to themselves in Sydney.
Now if the AFL don't approve it Eddie and the Coll media machine will get on the front foot with their usual nonsense. They will then cry like babies year after year until they get it.
They will also have an on field advantage of having an extra week to get over niggles before they play their second game.
If the AFL's goal is to make Collingwood the super club of the competition they should just come out and say, if it's not they should tell them to bugger off.
