!! If we'd had a Final 9 !!

[Wallaby]

The fairest system the AFL ever had was from 1972-1986. 12 teams, 22 rounds everybody played everybody else H&A.

Final 5 - reward the team that finishes on top.
Team that finishes first has to win 2 matches and HAS to beat the second best team. Must beat at least 1 of 2nd or 3rd. Has double chance.
Team that finishes 2nd has to win 3 matches and somewhere along the way HAS to beat 1st and 3rd along the way. Has double chance.
Team that finishes 3rd has to win 3 matches and somewhere along the way HAS to beat 1st and 2nd along the way. Has double chance.
Team that finishes 4th has to win 4 matches - must beat 5th, 3rd, 2nd and 1st. If they do that, they deserve to win.
Team that finishes 5th has to win 4 matches - must beat 4th, 3rd, 2nd and 1st. If they do that............

It possible gives too much advantage to the side finishing top - but with a fair draw (everyone plays everyone twice) - that's fine.

 

[Vassp]

My take for fareness...1st auto into the GF with a weeks rest.

2nd play 3rd winner into GF.

So shorten the finals series and extend the main season so more teams can play each other more than once.
Rub out the pre season comp for AFL players and only have a comp for up and coming players/rookies.


I do like finals as it is, it’s fun and many teams get a go.

 

[Stopher]

The ladder is my argument, that's why there's percentage.

It's stupid to make a team who rightfully finished 8th have to play again to keep that spot in the finals because the team that finished 9th either didn't win as many games or kick points for/stop points against.

I agree with you on principle, however the compromised fixtures we get currently muddy the waters somewhat.

 

[Stopher]

The fairest system the AFL ever had was from 1972-1986. 12 teams, 22 rounds everybody played everybody else H&A.

Final 5 - reward the team that finishes on top.
Team that finishes first has to win 2 matches and HAS to beat the second best team. Must beat at least 1 of 2nd or 3rd. Has double chance.
Team that finishes 2nd has to win 3 matches and somewhere along the way HAS to beat 1st and 3rd along the way. Has double chance.
Team that finishes 3rd has to win 3 matches and somewhere along the way HAS to beat 1st and 2nd along the way. Has double chance.
Team that finishes 4th has to win 4 matches - must beat 5th, 3rd, 2nd and 1st. If they do that, they deserve to win.
Team that finishes 5th has to win 4 matches - must beat 4th, 3rd, 2nd and 1st. If they do that............

It possible gives too much advantage to the side finishing top - but with a fair draw (everyone plays everyone twice) - that's fine.

Yep, as close to perfect as you could get.

 

[Stopher]

So infact, in the majority of those 20 years there has been a differential of at least one win, sometimes more, between 8th and 9th. And at least a draw differential in all but 4 of those years. Now. What's the average differential between 9th and 10th? 10th and 11th? 11th and 12th? Should we reward 12th place this year because just about everyone was able to beat the bottom four?

Any more than a final 8 rewards mediocrity and is utterly unnecessary.

In the absence of relegation, the best they can do is keep the mid-lower teams somewhat interested in actually giving there best to finish the season. It's not perfect (like the top 5) but if it keeps a few more teams interested for a bit longer (yet still makes them massively long odds to win it) then that would do me.

At the very least, you could say that teams finishing 9th generally have positive W/L records and as I showed earlier, there is historically very little between 8th and 9th, especially once you consider the amount of compromises in the draw.

 

[footyfan1978]

The fairest system the AFL ever had was from 1972-1986. 12 teams, 22 rounds everybody played everybody else H&A.

Final 5 - reward the team that finishes on top.
Team that finishes first has to win 2 matches and HAS to beat the second best team. Must beat at least 1 of 2nd or 3rd. Has double chance.
Team that finishes 2nd has to win 3 matches and somewhere along the way HAS to beat 1st and 3rd along the way. Has double chance.
Team that finishes 3rd has to win 3 matches and somewhere along the way HAS to beat 1st and 2nd along the way. Has double chance.
Team that finishes 4th has to win 4 matches - must beat 5th, 3rd, 2nd and 1st. If they do that, they deserve to win.
Team that finishes 5th has to win 4 matches - must beat 4th, 3rd, 2nd and 1st. If they do that............

It possible gives too much advantage to the side finishing top - but with a fair draw (everyone plays everyone twice) - that's fine.

You got it.
What was so pure about that system was the fact no team could leap frog others or avoid another team on some other side of a draw like we have now with a tennis tournament style finish to our final 8.

If you were the 5th team , the only way to win the flag was beat every other team in the finals.
If you were 4th the same, if you were 3rd you had to beat 2nd, to rise a ranking and then beat 1st to reach grand final, then you had to beat another challenger on grand final day to take the premiership title. It was perfect for a 12 team league with each playing the other twice before finals started.

As beautifully pure as it was a final five for an 18 club league is just not the right fit now, sadly. A 12 club league was easily the best fit for our game but it is never coming back now we expanded to 18. If anything we more likely to get to 20. A final 8 is about right for number of clubs we have taking part. I think we just need to tinker with home and away series more to make it more balanced. It is too easy now for some sides to get a much easier draw than other and possibly benefit with a better ranking spot going into finals than they probably deserve.

We have got to get back to starting point of at least all having played each other once and last 5 rounds done in a way that is an even as possible across the board for all 18 clubs in last 5 weeks. Computer modelling done at end of July to work out the last 5 weeks is surely how it needs to be done to achieve that. I do not think it would be that hard to achieve. It would be good for tv execs too as the computer model would spread out the best quality games to be spread over 5 weeks so every week is interesting and those games then programmed for the live FTA games.

Then we just go with the final 8 we have now.
The top 4 all get 18.75% chance of flag in this system.
6.25% chance to teams 5th to 8th.

The Final Five had the distribution as follows:

Top team 37.5%
2nd team 25%
3rd team 25%
4th team 6.25%
5th team 6.25%

 

[scotty13]

Stuff a finals 9 system.
Should be top 2 plus a wildcard. At the start of the season a team is randomly pulled out of a hat and are the wild card team. Then they + the two top teams (not including them) play a finals series with 2 potential options for it to work.

1. Top place (or wild card) goes directly into the GF, and the other 2 teams play each other for the other spot in the GF.

2. The footy field is reformatted to be more triangular in shape (with rounded corners) and 3 sets of goals. It is a free for all and whoever scores the most with the premiership.

 

[Ouvriers]

The ladder is my argument, that's why there's percentage.

It's stupid to make a team who rightfully finished 8th have to play again to keep that spot in the finals because the team that finished 9th either didn't win as many games or kick points for/stop points against.

I would agree with you if it was an even home and away season. But since it isn't, who knows who had a better year between 8th and 9th?

If they accept that the AFL is an entertainment business and not a sporting league (which it is sadly) then I guess they should make as many quirky ideas up as they can to attract the common masses.

 

[speedpeck23]

The fairest system the AFL ever had was from 1972-1986. 12 teams, 22 rounds everybody played everybody else H&A.

Final 5 - reward the team that finishes on top.
Team that finishes first has to win 2 matches and HAS to beat the second best team. Must beat at least 1 of 2nd or 3rd. Has double chance.
Team that finishes 2nd has to win 3 matches and somewhere along the way HAS to beat 1st and 3rd along the way. Has double chance.
Team that finishes 3rd has to win 3 matches and somewhere along the way HAS to beat 1st and 2nd along the way. Has double chance.
Team that finishes 4th has to win 4 matches - must beat 5th, 3rd, 2nd and 1st. If they do that, they deserve to win.
Team that finishes 5th has to win 4 matches - must beat 4th, 3rd, 2nd and 1st. If they do that............

It possible gives too much advantage to the side finishing top - but with a fair draw (everyone plays everyone twice) - that's fine.

It is so fair that you can run a strong argument for having no final series at all and awarding the Premiership to the Club which finishes top after the home and away season....as in the EPL. Having a final series just gives all the other teams a second chance of winning the Premiership over the team which clearly was the best performed for the whole season.

 

[Wallaby]

It is so fair that you can run a strong argument for having no final series at all and awarding the Premiership to the Club which finishes top after the home and away season....as in the EPL. Having a final series just gives all the other teams a second chance of winning the Premiership over the team which clearly was the best performed for the whole season.

Absolutely. A fair home and away fixture is a good way of deciding who the best team is without the need for a finals series.

However, if you do choose to have finals, the Final 5 is in my opinion the best possible system. It gives the best chances to the teams that finish higher up, but does allow for lower teams to have the 'dream' run due to a sudden spike in form.

A finals system also means more teams are trying to play their best as the season draws to a close, since all the finals contenders are still going 100%. If you don't have a finals series, sometimes the winner is declared 2-3 weeks before the season ends - and only one or two teams have any chance during the last 5-6 weeks (not unlike 2018). So you never get a situation where all teams get a 'fair' fixture.

Or you could have a situation like this years NRL, where at the end of the season end, one win separated 1st from 8th. So then it gets down to percentage, or points difference, or away goals or whatever tie-breaker is used - and they have their own problems, and no one is ever completely satisfied.

Interesting, the European soccer leagues now have a system whereby there are rewards for finishing in various spots in the Top 8 or so of the table - European and Eufa Cup spots. So they get that extra interest where clubs with no chance of winning the overall title are still involved in crucial games right to the end.

 

[GhostofJimJess]

If we had a top 9 North would be playing finals, and seriously, thats ridiculous.

I we had a Top 9 North would've made the finals three times more in the last nine seasons.

 

[Chuckie357]

What’s the next thread going to be...’if we had a final 16?’

 

[Hird Is Scum]

Sweet 16 tournament or gtfo

Only if 17th gets to play 16th in the bye week to see who qualifies for the 16th spot.

 

[DidakDelight]

How about a final 10
week 1
7th vs 10th in Elimination Final 1
8th vs 9th in Elimination Final 2
week 2
1st vs 4th in Qualifying final 1
2nd vs 3rd in Qualifying Final 2
5th vs the winner of Elimination Final 1 in quarter final 1
6th vs winner of elimination final 2 in quarter final 2
week 3
loser of Qualifying final 1 plays the winner of quarter final 1 in semi final 1
loser of qualifying final 2 plays winner of quarter final 2 in semi final 2
week 4
winner of qualifying final 1 plays the winner of semi final 2 in preliminary final 1
winner of qualifying final 2 plays the winner of semifinal 1 in preliminary final 2
week 5
Grand Final

Bring it on!




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