The SANFL Bye gives me the shits

[Drugs Are Bad Mackay?]

How many times does the bye crop up at the most inconvenient time?

Brodie Martin on the comeback trail from knee surgery... needs game time... can't play. Chris Knights the same... can't play. Hentschel and Burton trying to resurrect their career... can't play.

And then you hear Fremantle brought Haselby to Melbourne with the 22 because his WAFL team had the bye. Someone pulled out and he was in, even though they had been going to rest him this week for soreness.

It's been like this forever. The Northern Territory idea fell over. For some stupid reason we haven't ditched South Adelaide. The problem is still there. Time to fix it.

The WAFL have nine teams. The SANFL have nine teams. The two bye teams should play each other. Wins count. Each club would fly 1-2 times per season.

Cost? The SANFL are supposedly swimming in money pocketing the millions Port bring in every home game due to the stadium deal. They can chip in. We'd also bugger off any SANFL vs VFL or WAFL games, save some money there. The AFL can pony up some dough. The Crows, Power, Dockers and Eagles should be all over it, they can contribute. Find a sponsor, Indian Pacific Rail whatever.

Fly in Saturday morning, play Saturday night, fly out Sunday morning. One night's accommodation. Skeleton support crew. Worth a crack I reckon. Rather than having our players sit out for a week or front with a different club reserves team.

 

[Drummond]

That's actually not a bad idea.

Yes I hate the bye and what I have even more is this complete and utterly ridiculous split round they've introduced this year. Norwood play like twice in four weeks, good stuff SANFL...

 

[relapse]

The apathetic nature of the SANFL really annoys me at times, the bye is not ideal and I heard Basheer say about 15+ years ago that the SANFL had planned to eliminate it ASAP. Yet 20 years down the track we have no 10th team, we had teams that wanted to join but the SANFL were not prepared to make those teams actually affiliated SANFL teams

 

[RoosterLad]

The split round is an absolute joke. We already have 3 byes so why the need for another week off at this time of the year?

 

[Brown_DOG68]

Rumour on the radio the other day that Goodwood are preparing a proposal to join the SANFL......

 

[spexau]

That would be great. BYE's suck..

 

[Smoooothy]

Rumour on the radio the other day that Goodwood are preparing a proposal to join the SANFL......

really??

 

[SugarShane]

The split round is an absolute joke. We already have 3 byes so why the need for another week off at this time of the year?

I always thought the AFL split round was brought in to give the players a break they would normally get from a bye, a pseudo bye i suppose. When you have byes the split round serves no purpose except to piss footy fans off.

 

[Brown_DOG68]

really??

Was it really a rumour discussed on the radio? Yes

Is it really happening? who knows

 

[neddy36]

Remember guys the majority of SANFL footballers are not full-time athletes, unlike their AFL counterparts. Some juggle full-time careers, studies, training 3 times a week and gameday Saturday/Sunday.

It's easy for you lot to say it's not good enough when you are only exposed to what you see on gameday. There is a lot of time and sacrifice that goes on away from the eyes of the casual supporter.

 

[manureid]

I was amazed to hear the other day that SANFL reserves guys are getting (for the club I heard it about) around $75 a game. Now I know it is reserves, but weigh this up against a guy who was at this club in the reserves, left to go to a country team, where he is getting $1200 a game, and does half the training......amazing.

 

[Drugs Are Bad Mackay?]

Biggest elephant in the room in footy is player payments for country/amateur players.

What a waste of money.

All this money going to win an A Grade flag or to get a club promoted. Money that could be spent getting more schools playing, better coaches for juniors, better facilities for players and spectators, keeping kids away from soccer, getting more ovals up to scratch, introducing migrants to the game and a million other things that would actually benefit the game in the long run.

And of course the same clubs all whinge about how they never get given any money and all the AFL development funds are channelled into QLD and NSW.

 

[brucetiki]

The split round is an absolute joke. We already have 3 byes so why the need for another week off at this time of the year?

The split round was only brought in this year because there's no state game, and the SANFL didn't want to start the SANFL season a week later than the AFL season.

Personally, I would have preferred they just start the seaston a week later as a split round is pointless when each side already gets 3 byes a year.

As for the bye, I don't mind it. it gives the players (who are semi-professional and have other jobs) 3 breaks during the season, and are invaluable for player management.

 

[neddy36]

I was amazed to hear the other day that SANFL reserves guys are getting (for the club I heard it about) around $75 a game. Now I know it is reserves, but weigh this up against a guy who was at this club in the reserves, left to go to a country team, where he is getting $1200 a game, and does half the training......amazing.

Yeah but included with the $75 a game is a chicken parmi in the clubrooms, a pint of TEDs and $10 to spend on the pokies!!

 

[manureid]

Yeah but included with the $75 a game is a chicken parmi in the clubrooms, a pint of TEDs and $10 to spend on the pokies!!

Wonder if i could get a game.......parmi is good!!

 

[sigur]

I was amazed to hear the other day that SANFL reserves guys are getting (for the club I heard it about) around $75 a game. Now I know it is reserves, but weigh this up against a guy who was at this club in the reserves, left to go to a country team, where he is getting $1200 a game, and does half the training......amazing.

And the AFL want to cut the SANFL salary cap. Pretty soon they'll be playing just for the parmi.

 

[Magma]

I don't mind the byes, but the scheduling has been awful this year.

 

[Drugs Are Bad Mackay?]

What are you bye apologists on about?

We had 10 teams and NO bye for however long and all these part-time footballers got along fine.

If Port Adelaide Magpies decided to pull the pin next season there is no way teams will be having 3-4 weeks off during the season to keep up these 'necessary' free weekends they are getting now.

 

[ashley88]

Can't some of the AFL guys get a run in the reserves?

 

[Vader]

Can't some of the AFL guys get a run in the reserves?

They usually only do that if the player is returning from injury and they want to give them one game in the SANFL before bringing them back into the seniors.

 

[Drugs Are Bad Mackay?]

They usually only do that if the player is returning from injury and they want to give them one game in the SANFL before bringing them back into the seniors.

They also don't want to abuse the privilege.

It would have been a big ask to drop Hentschel, Burton, Knights, L Thompson, Riley, Martin, Cook, McKernan and all the guys we wanted to have a game on the bottom reserves team's doorstep and say play these guys.

 

[jackster83]

Biggest elephant in the room in footy is player payments for country/amateur players.

What a waste of money.

All this money going to win an A Grade flag or to get a club promoted. Money that could be spent getting more schools playing, better coaches for juniors, better facilities for players and spectators, keeping kids away from soccer, getting more ovals up to scratch, introducing migrants to the game and a million other things that would actually benefit the game in the long run.

And of course the same clubs all whinge about how they never get given any money and all the AFL development funds are channelled into QLD and NSW.

The sad thing is that parents have to cough up a fair bit in fees for their kids to play. In the HFL, my parents also had to pay to get in to watch me play.

 

[Drugs Are Bad Mackay?]

The sad thing is that parents have to cough up a fair bit in fees for their kids to play. In the HFL, my parents also had to pay to get in to watch me play.

Some of the Hills clubs are the worst, if you believe what you hear (and I always do). Mt Lofty, I'm looking at you.

I heard one club was budgeting for $90,000 in player and coaching payments this season which seems amazing to me but may be par for the course. Credit on one hand to these clubs for running themselves as a business and generating that sort of income but gee that's a lot of cash to win a cup.

 

[brucetiki]

What are you bye apologists on about?

We had 10 teams and NO bye for however long and all these part-time footballers got along fine.

If Port Adelaide Magpies decided to pull the pin next season there is no way teams will be having 3-4 weeks off during the season to keep up these 'necessary' free weekends they are getting now.

Player management wasn't much of an issue pre-1990 though. These days players associations (I believe there's an SANFL Players Assosciation) would insist on split rounds if there were an even number of teams in the competition.

Port Magpies have enough finances to get through 2011 so they won't be pulling the pin next season.

 

[Drugs Are Bad Mackay?]

Player management wasn't much of an issue pre-1990 though. These days players associations (I believe there's an SANFL Players Assosciation) would insist on split rounds if there were an even number of teams in the competition.

Port Magpies have enough finances to get through 2011 so they won't be pulling the pin next season.

You're right.

The AFL season is 23 weeks long.

An eight team SANFL competition is 21 rounds so there would be three split rounds required to keep the same set up where we start the same week and finish a week later.

I don't think there should be split rounds in the SANFL or AFL by the way. If resting players is so beneficial then the clubs should be resting them systematically throughout the season, like they do in soccer overseas. They manage their squads throughout a season rather than just playing their best team every week. But that's another issue altogether.

Good news about the Magpies for 2011. It wouldn't be the same without them.