Here's your 'Survey' AFL - Why dont you go anymore?

[NaturalDisaster]

One thing going unmentioned is transport, a lot of people take trains and atm there are major project works going on on all train lines. People hate delays, replacement buses etc. COVID has made a lot of people too impatient for this sort of thing.

Thursday night there were buses replacing trains between Caulfield and Westall, which was the main reason I did not go because I just cannot be stuffed taking replacement buses at that time of night when I work in the morning.

and driving to/out of the MCG is a pain, even on the odd occasion I'm a passenger I get annoyed at it, can't imagine what it would be like driving.

 

[Partridge]

I don't go to sporting events to watch umpires pay trivial 50m penalties because a player sneezes.

• Protected area 50 metre penalties
• Stand Rule - netball on grass
• Dissent rule (only rescinded this week).
• unnecessary contact if a player brushes someone
• Standard tackles are now "Dangerous tackles"

The game is like Scarecrow Tiggy where players aren't allowed to move while players just run past them.

Game is almost where they wanted it - AFLX.

Won't return until the new CEO gives us our game back - and fwiw I have barely missed a game since 2009 when I first got an AFL Silver membership.

They're all excellent points, but the one in bold in particular. The last two games I've been to this year (only in the last month), you basically give up on watching any contest between a key forward and key defender because unless it's a mark a free kick will be paid for something. And it's always something incredibly minor or (mostly) non-existent.

Add a few others including one of my new pet hates:

• Player gets tackled, spun around, gets off a perfectly legal handball = holding the ball. What the flying feck???
• Players allowed to get away with a blatant push in a back (put my hand up, Hawkins is one of them) and seemingly more morons than ever actually think it's ok
• The deliberate out of bounds atrocity
• Lack of curtain raisers
• Too many - far, far too many - alternate jumpers

The other points have been well covered. The relentless advertising. The insipid and truly horrible "host" trying to gee up the crowd, it's not a shite sport like basketball where you need to wake the crowd up, we're perfectly fine thank you.

Thankfully, by attending less games, and very selectively, the amount of money I give the governing body is now less than ever. Feck them.

 

[theyellowsash]

Pretty much this thread just sounds like a bunch of old farts grumbling because they got older and CBF going anymore.

Oh, don’t me wrong, I'm one of you. I certainly enjoyed it a lot more when I was younger. Now it just feels like a hassle, which is dumb because I can just walk across the road to the gabba... might go to a friend's place on the other side of the stadium next time. Can just watch the game from her balcony instead.

for me those things dont stop me going, theyre just the things that annoy me the most.

the 'other' is my real reason. having fewer people to go with (with friends and family having moved away), as well as not finding as much time. still get to probably 3-4 games a year, but thats down on the 5-6 pre covid and 8+ about a decade ago.

 

[pjcrows]

Umpiring/rules
Integrity/consistency/corruption

 

[NaturalDisaster]

Pretty much this thread just sounds like a bunch of old farts grumbling because they got older and CBF going anymore.

Oh, don’t me wrong, I'm one of you. I certainly enjoyed it a lot more when I was younger. Now it just feels like a hassle, which is dumb because I can just walk across the road to the gabba... might go to a friend's place on the other side of the stadium next time. Can just watch the game from her balcony instead.

I do think a lot of it is because people simply enjoy things more when they are younger and look at it through rose coloured sunglasses.

I am sure in the "glory days" of the 90s and 2000s there were older grumps going on about how the game isn't the same and preferring to stay at home etc.

There's a lot wrong with the game now, but it wasn't perfect back then either.

 

[Nostradumbass]

Cbf

 

[LoungeLizard]

We have a loser for a coach

We have an Idiot for a President

Come on Papa G, you can do better than that.

What about the sport is corrupt, ran by corrupt Victorians?

 

[Lets Roar like '44]

Other: The s**t time the games start.

 

[Aristotle Pickett]

Night games start too late.
Games should not be starting after 7pm.

 

[Lets Roar like '44]

The issue with the umpires is, you know they’re going to ruin the game with s**t decisions/ non decisions but you either have to just accept it, due to the AFL telling us that’s what we must do, or just not go (which then they just blame covid) and watch it on tv and see the same thing. I mean s**t game times plus s**t umpiring…people leave the footy at the end of the game not talking about the footy, they leave talking about umpires. It’s s**t.

 

[Aristotle Pickett]

I think the umpires have an impossible task. They have to know a heap of different rules plus run 10 to 15km .
When a new rule is brought in, they are told to umpire it to the letter, then the AFL steps in and waters it down, but the umps get the blame still.
It used to be a 50m penalty for grabbing a guy after a mark, now that rule has dissapeared because the AFL told them to ease up.
None of the armchair critics could umpire any better.
Plus TV viewers get a different angle to the umpire which may be a better angle.

 

[Alex09]

The constant in your face moving digital adverting screens all around the boundary have even kind of ruined watching games on TV..

 

[nineteen eighty]

I'm annoyed by the rule changes, bullsh1t crowd atmosphere theatrics etc but not enough to stop me from going.

Having said that, what has stopped me is quite simple...I can have a great time watching a game on the big screen at home. Whether it be with mates or alone. I can have a scotch, bottle of red, beers, all of the above and not cost me an arm and a leg. I can make myself something to eat, at any time, whatever I want and it not cost me an arm and a leg. I can talk to my mates without being drowned out by stupid music blaring.

So customer experience pretty much sums up all these points. The AFL have lost control of the end experience back to the fans. And it has come home to roost. The fans have spoken. And I don't see things changing until the AFL admits there is a problem and does something about it.

 

[La Dispute]

Would rather just watch on Kayo. Going to games is such a hassle for a disappointing product, not to mention the cost of going.

Most games (even featuring my own team) bore me so much I end up changing over to something else before half time. The Eng vs NZ test match was better viewing than any game last weekend.

Then there's the issue of the league being a morally corrupt piece of s**t.

Pretty much this, and I'm actually piggybacking on my old man's Kayo subscription too...

I've been to plenty of games this year, but when it comes down to a choice between staying at home with a 6 pack or paying $25 for an away game and spending $40 on 4 mid strength beers it's actually a pretty easy choice.

No commute in and back.

It's objectively better being there - there atmosphere, seeing each team set up and having a complete picture of the play unfolding, but is it worth the extra $70-80? It's a comfortable trade off.

Also wonder about the general impact of COVID. Companies are having difficulty getting employers to leave their homes and return back to the office. I think there is a similar effect when it comes to attending televised events - we've become increasingly nested and hesitant to leave our homes.

 

[Blackhawk42]

I'd go every week and likely to games Hawthorn aren't in if I didn't live 4 hours from the closest major city.

I understand certain frustrations, but I hope you all realise how lucky you are having access to the great game live whenever you want it.

 

[kaiserchief13]

Prefer watching on TV because for the price of 1 game - ~ $100 if you include food, drinks, train ticket, admission ticket you can get 4 months of Kayo

 

[The Passenger]

I must say I don't understand the gripe about digital ticketing ?

 

[Great8]

My team is utter crap. It’s finally got to the point where I’m not wasting time and money on something that will never give me any enjoyment

 

[teknodeejay]

Used to go to 25-30 games a year under AFL Membership but they have stripped it back so much in terms of access that I haven’t bothered to switch back from Full Member absentee since COVID seasons because it’s a horrible product on top of the largely boring nature of the game - mainly due to all the umpiring / rules bollocks. I’ll just watch it on Kayo these days and save myself the annoyances. Plus I can have my own choice of beers, a proper steak sanga at 1/4 the price.

 

[Partridge]

I do think a lot of it is because people simply enjoy things more when they are younger and look at it through rose coloured sunglasses.

I am sure in the "glory days" of the 90s and 2000s there were older grumps going on about how the game isn't the same and preferring to stay at home etc.

There's a lot wrong with the game now, but it wasn't perfect back then either.

I don't think it's that at all. For one big reason.

The way the rules are constantly tinkered with is starting to change the basic fabric of the game. It's not that you get a rough deal from the umpires - as you said rightly, that has always happened. It isn't that. It isn't the weather and it isn't always the commute.

What does annoy people - at least me - is the rule encroachments are changing the sport in a negative way. 50 metre penalties are now given away for the most trivial offences, or no offences at all. That's new. Players having to stand still like netballers, which is a ludicrous change to solve a non-existent problem. That's new. Players getting penalised for raising their arms. That's new.

The game wasn't better or worse in the past, it was different. But it was clearly recognised as footy. Now it's becoming (if it hasn't become already) Auskick for adults. With the odd netball rule thrown in. All new, and none for the better. That I think is turning off far more fans than anyone would care to admit. The manufactured garbage at the grounds - advertising, music, idiots with a microphone talking to the crowd - that's just the extra layer of garbage on top.

 

[underthestars]

where's 'the loud, awful music'

 

[seasonedsainter]

They've cooked the goose. It's hard to fathom how bad some of the new rules are, the dissent rule in particular is a cruel joke. Haven't been to a live game in years as based overseas but sounds like they've brought across all the 'activations' and other garbage done at T20 cricket games and the like. I was wondering why it gets dark at Docklands after a goal, when streaming games. And the music fmd. All that s**t is ultra-cringe for any self-respecting adult.

Here the most popular local sports are Gaelic Football and Hurling. I don't get the appeal of the football and they're apparently wrecking that with rule changes too. But hurling is just beautiful and the game-day experience is akin to attending VFL in the 80s/90s. There's literally just none of this modern crap we see in sport these days. People, terraces, a game - that's about it! Kids and everyone else can still go on field after the final whistle too. When the players give out to an umpire he just proudly ignores them like they do in EPL and play continues, it quickly sorts itself out! Regularly shots flying high over the posts (the ball is just slightly larger than a cricket ball), there's no video review, no nothing just a portly bloke standing down there who makes the decision and signals it so - wide or over!! The sport itself is super fast paced and skillful, also a nice bit of aggression in it. Whether watching on TV - they have good professional coverage, the commentators actually call the game, too! - or in person, it's a wholly more human and 'organic' experience. There's no confusion over the rules, everyone knows what's what and if the ref makes a mistake every now and then, so be it! Back on the commentators they can at times be hard to understand with the speed they're talking and the accents, and they are prone to flights of patriotic fancy ("what a game, what a contest and you know what? It's our game, it's Irish!" This was last weekend during the Munster Senior Hurling Championship), but I'll take that any day of the week when compared to the platitudes, egos and boys club mindlessness served up amongst the AFL commentating ranks.

Realising hurling is an 'amateur' sport and AFL is 'professional', but god strike me what is the benefit of being a professional organisation if the result is what we're served up today? A luke-warm impression of a once great spectacle, covered head-to-toe in needless bells and whistles and officiated to within an inch of its life.

Talk about neutering the game, AFL.

--

 

[raymond35]

Agree with most comments here.
Worst of all for me is at the gabba they have a girl literally screaming into a microphone non-stop during every break in play with helpful comments like MAKE SOME NOOOISE!!
Just unbearable.

 

[Phipppppa]

Agree with most comments here.
Worst of all for me is at the gabba they have a girl literally screaming into a microphone non-stop during every break in play with helpful comments like MAKE SOME NOOOISE!!
Just unbearable.

Sounds like GMHBA

 

[Collingwood 4 eternity]

IMO it started when the reserves match was done away with before the main match , which coincided with Terry Wallace bringing in team pre match full ground “warm up” when he was at the doggies in the late 90’s

Having the reserves match in progress gave people who wanted to get in early , 11am for 11:10am start leading into the 2:10pm seniors , something to watch.

The build up to the main game was great as the crowd rolled in , at all the grounds , and the crowd did get involved in some great close fishes , with it finishing 1:40- 1:50pm then , the seniors would come on.

You could see your reserves players in action and debate and judge with your group of mates or family or friends on the team and players progress.

As there was then no real incentive to get their early , people would all arrive on mass just before the main game and their would be huge queues

Which led the to the term “Arrive Early” , for what there’s nothing on