News ‘Would be unreal’: AFL to consult clubs over addition of ‘wildcard round’ to finals

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Just watched the sell on 360.

In my opinion it deflates the excitement of a team needing to win in round 24 (or the last round) and how other results could affect its fate.

You could still loose (or play dead) and then still have the opportunity to contest against a team that busted its guts to get into the final eight.

It is unjust but hey, the AFL have demonstrated over a long period of time that fixing unjust in the competition is not their priority. Money (and long hair, open neck executives) is!!
The excitement would just shift down to the team striving for ninth and the eighth team striving for seventh to avoid the wildcard.
 
Don’t finish 7th or 8th. You are worse off in this Final Ten.
7th and 8th enter an extra Round of cut throat finals, just to keep alive the teams who finish 9th and 10th.

1,2,3,4 need 3 finals wins for a Flag
5,6 need 4 finals wins for a Flag
7,8,9,10 need 5 finals wins for a Flag.
 

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I like the idea of a final-10. Ten teams clearly works. In 1994, the AFL introduced a final-8 into the then 15-team competition, and it worked well.

Ten teams means essentially the top half (nine) and the best team of the lower half. Makes sense, and importantly it keeps the season alive and creates less dead rubbers. If 8 finalists was acceptable in a 16-team league, then 9 (or 10 because you round up to the next even number) is obviously acceptable in an 18-team league. It’s not a 16 team league anymore, remember.

The problem is this wild card idea the AFL promote is a 5-week finals system, which is too much. It means potentially a 28-match season for a team with the addition of gather round.

The best way to make a final-10 work is for it to be completely knockout. As I've said for many years, the top-4 teams under the CURRENT system can be eliminated after one loss in the Prelim or Grand Final, so it makes no sense that double chances exist. Finals are about performing on the day, not getting second chances for losing. That's the whole point.

FINAL TEN

Week One
:
1st Elimination Final: 7 v 10

2nd Elimination Final: 8 v 9


Week Two:
1st Semi Final: 1st vs Lowest ranked winner from week one (eg 1 v 8)

2nd Semi Final: 2nd vs highest ranked winner from week one (eg 2 v 7)

3rd Semi-Final: 3 v 6

4th Semi-Final: 4 v 5


Week Three:
1st Preliminary Final: highest ranked team vs lowest ranked team (eg 1 v 4)

2nd Preliminary Final: 2nd-highest ranked team vs second-lowest ranked team (eg 2 v 3)


Week Four:
Grand Final
 
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The positive from it for me is it plays a role in equalizing the H and A draw in a small way. If you play heavy weights twice for example and lose and finish 9th lets say, it gives you some leverage at least compared to a side who plays a lower team(west coast/north as this years example) twice and wins both and squeaks into 7 or 8.

Not sure if I articulated that as well as I could, but hopefully someone gets my drift.
When you say "equalising" what you're really talking about is invalidating the entire home and way season.

The exact same logic you've used can be also used to extend the finals to every single team, thus ensuring that no team ever misses out due to an unfair fixture. 9 or 10th might only be out of the 8 due to the fixture. But then, with a final 10, 11th or 12th may only miss out due to a harder fixtrure. But then, with a final 12, 13th or 14th may only miss out due to a harder fixture...
 
When you say "equalising" what you're really talking about is invalidating the entire home and way season.

The exact same logic you've used can be also used to extend the finals to every single team, thus ensuring that no team ever misses out due to an unfair fixture. 9 or 10th might only be out of the 8 due to the fixture. But then, with a final 10, 11th or 12th may only miss out due to a harder fixtrure. But then, with a final 12, 13th or 14th may only miss out due to a harder fixture...
And here I was thinking teams miss out on the top 8 because they aren't good enough. Silly me.
 
When you say "equalising" what you're really talking about is invalidating the entire home and way season.

The exact same logic you've used can be also used to extend the finals to every single team, thus ensuring that no team ever misses out due to an unfair fixture. 9 or 10th might only be out of the 8 due to the fixture. But then, with a final 10, 11th or 12th may only miss out due to a harder fixtrure. But then, with a final 12, 13th or 14th may only miss out due to a harder fixture...
The AFL does not have a 'valid home and away season'. That would require 38 rounds, home and away. So the fact that is unequal is why adding another inequality doesn't really change anything. So, yes, you could argue the same reasoning could be applied to every team, but that's obviously not going to happen, so really, it's just whether the arbitrariness of the draw or eighth having to play ninth bothers you.
 
this is what they're suggesting (still rubbish):
17-6 fixture revamp
Every team plays each other once before the ladder is split into three groups of six.
The top-six play each other, the middle-six play each other and the bottom-six play each other over the remaining five rounds.
The middle six compete for seventh and eighth spots in the top-eight.
It means the last six rounds of the fixture result in more even games.
A rivalry round may also be incorporated to include secondary local derbies and showdowns.
Any changes may be three years away.
 
I like the idea of a final-10. Ten teams clearly works. In 1994, the AFL introduced a final-8 into the then 15-team competition, and it worked well.

Ten teams means essentially the top half (nine) and the best team of the lower half. Makes sense, and importantly it keeps the season alive and creates less dead rubbers. If 8 finalists was acceptable in a 16-team league, then 9 (or 10 because you round up to the next even number) is obviously acceptable in an 18-team league. It’s not a 16 team league anymore, remember.

The problem is this wild card idea the AFL promote is a 5-week finals system, which is too much. It means potentially a 28-match season for a team with the addition of gather round.

The best way to make a final-10 work is for it to be completely knockout. As I've said for many years, the top-4 teams under the CURRENT system can be eliminated after one loss in the Prelim or Grand Final, so it makes no sense that double chances exist. Finals are about performing on the day, not getting second chances for losing. That's the whole point.

FINAL TEN

Week One
:
1st Elimination Final: 7 v 10

2nd Elimination Final: 8 v 9


Week Two:
1st Semi Final: 1st vs Lowest ranked winner from week one (eg 1 v 8)

2nd Semi Final: 2nd vs highest ranked winner from week one (eg 2 v 7)

3rd Semi-Final: 3 v 6

4th Semi-Final: 4 v 5


Week Three:
1st Preliminary Final: highest ranked team vs lowest ranked team (eg 1 v 4)

2nd Preliminary Final: 2nd-highest ranked team vs second-lowest ranked team (eg 2 v 3)


Week Four:
Grand Final
I like it, cut throat makes the finals much more exciting and meaningful. It makes it more likely for teams outside the top four to win it, which makes the home and away season games feel a lot less like dead rubbers.

Under the current system, I don't see the Bombers v Dogs game this Friday night for example as anything special. Neither side will make the top 4 and is very unlikely to do damage in finals, given they'd have to probably win in Adelaide or Brisbane to make the GF.

So the race for spots 5-8 are rarely that interesting, in my opinion, especially interstate sides vying for finals spots that are not going to win 3-4 consecutive away finals to win the flag.

Your system could also be expanded to a top 12 system 50+ years from now if we ever get to 24 teams playing each other once a season.

5 v 12, 6 v 11, 7 v 10, 8 v 9

e.g. 1 v 8, 2 v 7, 3 v 6, 4 v 5

and so on
 
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I like it, cut throat makes the finals much more exciting and meaningful. It makes it more likely for teams outside the top four to win it, which makes the home and away season games feel a lot less like dead rubbers.

Under the current system, I don't see the Bombers v Dogs game this Friday night for example as anything special. Neither side will make the top 4 and is very unlikely to do damage in finals, given they'd have to probably win in Adelaide or Brisbane to make the GF.

So the race for spots 5-8 are rarely that interesting, in my opinion, especially interstate sides vying for finals spots that are not going to win 3-4 consecutive away finals to win the flag.

Yes, knockout is the only way to go. I've been on abut this for years and am more convinced than ever.

My logic is that if a team, under the current system can be eliminated after one loss in the PF or GF why do we even have double chances?

And also, if you look at the finals system that I proposed, the top teams can't be eliminated in week one - they can only be eliminated in week two onwards which is exactly how it is for the top-4 teams now under the current system.

And as for those that think 10 teams is too many. We had 8 teams make it in a 16 team comp for years. We have since expanded the league to 18 teams, therefore under the same ratio 9 (half) is the same as 8. Given 9 is an odd number, we just go one more to 10. There is nothing wrong with that in an 18-team league.

The way I look at it is it's the best 9 (top 50%) and the single best team in the lower half.

Do it AFL. Just don't make it a 5-week finals series. Just make it a straight knockout final-10 over 4 weeks.
 
Never thought I would agree with a Geelong Coach on something but he nails it on the head here:

Just another money making idea for the AFL.


Geelong coach Scott calls AFL 'compromised' competition​

Story by Oliver Caffrey and Shayne Hope • 1h ago

Geelong coach Chris Scott believes the AFL is already a "compromised" competition and a proposed wildcard round would only further hurt the league's integrity. A day after his twin brother, Essendon coach Brad Scott, slammed the concept, the reigning premiership mentor went even harder.
"We just have, in elite sport by global standards, one of the most compromised competitions that you can possibly imagine," Chris Scott said on Wednesday.

"Uneven numbers (of games against opponents), let's just throw in a Gather Round, compromise the competition even more, if these things are really, really important... they are worthy of thought. "I would just ask the integrity of the competition is given as much thought."

Incoming AFL boss Andrew Dillon raised the idea of an American-style format after the home-and-away season when he met with the league's chief executives this week. The NBA introduced a play-in tournament in 2020, pitting teams ranked seventh to 10th in each conference against each other for the last two spots in the top-eight for the playoffs.

It comes as just one-and-a-half games separate fifth-placed Geelong and Gold Coast in 13th as teams outside the top four scrap for the remaining four positions in finals. The AFL increased the season this year, adding in an extra game for each club to accommodate Gather Round in South Australia.
Scott believed it would be unfair for teams outside of SA to have to play Adelaide and Port Adelaide in Gather Round on a weekend that is supposed to be neutral.

"Maybe when you're administering a competition the integrity of the actual, and the fairness of the draw, should be pretty close to your number one priority," he said.

"Usain Bolt doesn't start at a 10-metre disadvantage in the Olympics final just because he's better than everyone else, but we're sort of forced into that situation because it's probably right that if Collingwood win the premiership that they shouldn't have the easiest draw the following year."St Kilda coach Ross Lyon sat on the fence, saying the club is yet to formalise its position on the matter.

"I heard Brad Scott's response about inequity and I don't know, I think if you're the club that gets a wildcard at the end you'd be rapt," Lyon said. "And if you're the team that sits in the finals and the wildcard team beats you, you'd be flat as a tack."
 
this is what they're suggesting (still rubbish):
17-6 fixture revamp
Every team plays each other once before the ladder is split into three groups of six.
The top-six play each other, the middle-six play each other and the bottom-six play each other over the remaining five rounds.
The middle six compete for seventh and eighth spots in the top-eight.
It means the last six rounds of the fixture result in more even games.
A rivalry round may also be incorporated to include secondary local derbies and showdowns.
Any changes may be three years away.
Why don’t they do a weighted fixture like they do now for the final six games?

Top six plays two teams each from the top, middle, and bottom six. And so on.

Easy to fixture in 2x derbies etc, 1 home and 1 away.

7th-12th can still make the top four etc.

It still works even with 19 teams, just five return games instead.

With 20 you’d probably have every team plays once plus you play one team each from 1-5, 6-10, 11-15, 16-20. Four return games.
 
"a fair fixture with integrity"
Double up games are only worth two premiership points. Solved.
Teams must play all others home and away over a three year period.Solved.
All teams travel to places like Geelong Tasmania and not just some. Solved.

No white shorts away. Solved
 
this is what they're suggesting (still rubbish):
17-6 fixture revamp
Every team plays each other once before the ladder is split into three groups of six.
The top-six play each other, the middle-six play each other and the bottom-six play each other over the remaining five rounds.
The middle six compete for seventh and eighth spots in the top-eight.
It means the last six rounds of the fixture result in more even games.
A rivalry round may also be incorporated to include secondary local derbies and showdowns.
Any changes may be three years away.

So it's really 17-5? If you ad the rivalry round it would mean teams could play each other 3 times. So this year Freo would play West Coast in the normal rounds 1-17. Again in rivalry round and again in the split as they are both bottom 6. We don't need teams playing each other 3 times.

Other problems are, if the split happened this week after 17 games, the bottom 6 are all eliminated. GC and Sydney can still make finals with the current system. With the split they have nothing to play for.

Also do we really need the top 6 to all play each other right before finals? Does that improve the final series?

Then there is the final ladder could have the team finishing 7th end with 5 more wins than the team in 6th.

Then even if it worked somehow, it would all be gone once the 19th team joins anyway.
 
Draws aren’t equitable though so the 10th team might be better than the 8th team for instance.
And 12th might be better than 10th, so if you have a final ten you then need to extend it to a final 12 ....

If you aren't in the top few, you don't deserve a chance at the premiership. Most years there aren't more tan three, maximum four, realistic shots. So, a top four would be reasonable. Add two for the fixture inequities and luck and a top six is around the right number for the league we currently have. Eight more than caters for the luck factors and generally brings in a few bog-average nothing teams.

That is, if the primary purpose of finals is a system to determine a premier. If its just a money making gimmick, go for a top 14.
 

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