The Decagon should replace the Oval as the shape for an Aussie Rules ground.

[Shane Hird]

Okay, we all know that people hate ovals. It's obvious that the concept on a sports field just doesn't work. For starters it's impossible to make the curvature absolutely accurate. Even if you think it's a genuine oval shape, it can never genuinely be accurate, because human error comes into play.

That reminds me of a funny situation we had at our local footy club this year.

Half way during the season I was out early on a Sat morning marking out an
U12s ground on one of our senior ovals- we have two- and while I was in the centre of the ground working out where the goals should go I happen to look at our main posts at both ends of the ground. After about 10 minutes of thinking I was going mad I got some other coaches to stand there in the centre square and have a look as well.

We all soon agreed that unbelievably, they weren't lined up properly.

At the club's request, the council had moved the posts in by about 10 mtrs at one end over summer but obviously they didn't put them back in the right place and didn't line them up with the opposite goal posts..they were about 5 mtrs out of wack!

No-one at the club had noticed this discrepancy. Not the coaches, umpires or club officials. Even after dozens of games had already been played on the ground.

So it just goes to show human error can happen on an oval...

 

[Kanga man]

These are all valid points Kanga, and I find the argument for an icosogan quite compelling. Channel 7/10 could even draft Larry Emdur in as a special comments man, and to aid the other commentators during the tricky transitional period.

Or possibly Ian Turpie. I've heard Turps currently hosts a successful trivia night every Wednesday at the Bat and Ball hotel in Surry Hills, Sydney, so he is apparently looking for something more substantial. Emdur currently has his hands full on the 'Sydney to Hobart.' If it would help Turps to come back, maybe John Deeks could be enticed to replace Craig Willis as the voice of the AFL.

However the icosikaihenagon is not without symmetry itself.

The Number 21 factors as:

21 = 3 x 7

The Numbers 3 and 7 are a kind of division of Unity in the sense of 10 = 3 + 7. They play an essential role in Creation. Most notably in the value of Genesis 1.1:

Sum Genesis 1.1 = 2701 = 37 x 73

You're obviously as passionate about this as me. I take it Shane Savage is your favourite Hawk?

Oh and forgive my churlishness, but 21 is one more than 20.

And here's where the debate truly lies. Is 21 being one more than 20, more than enough to make up for the fact that 20 is double the number 10 and fits the simplistic decimal system better than 21?

I think you'd need a shape with an exceptionally large amount of sides to make up for the disadvantage of that shape being less suited to the decimal system. If you go down that route and have, say 30 sides (a triacontagon)
, we are getting dangerously close, visually, to a circle, and we don't want that.

 

[Darkness Falls]

Why don't we play AFL on race tracks? The way our game is evolving, eventually all players will be as fast as cars anyway and the game will be completely about speed. Different stadiums can have different shapes and to kick a goal, your team has to do one whole lap around the track without the other team touching the ball, and then kicking it into a central hoop that both team uses.

 

[Dont be a lemon]

Can we have a field with multiple dimensions like in the movie Cube?

 

[kane249]

Stop thinking about the exterior of the playing field and let's look at the interior of it, ladies and gentlemen I give you the solution

 

[TP86]

To entertain this concept...

The AFL did recently try to muscle the Wallabies and Socceroos out of their QANTAS deals by attempting to make an exclusive deal with the airline.

Why not try to muscle out every other sport in the country by playing on a unique surface, totally unsuitable to every other competing code?

Yes, it may sound ridiculous, but no less ridiculous than saying to QANTAS "dump the Wallabies and Socceroos or we're leaving you".

 

[LIONOFZION]

I think there have been way too many BF posters who got drugs for Xmas.

 

[Cuzz09]

Stop thinking about the exterior of the playing field and let's look at the interior of it, ladies and gentlemen I give you the solution

Think you picked up a copy of Wooshas gameplan

 

[Spluff]

Whilst I admire the steps you have taken in pursuit of the perfect playing field, I can't help but notice you are using Euclidean geometry. Lesser sports such as Rugby may be happy to settle for their archaic Euclidean systems but I feel that the AFL deserves to have its playing field perfected with the use of non-Euclidean geometry.

 

[Rustof]

Maybe the golden ratio would help too.

 

[AndSmithMustScore]

Straight lines are for squares.

 

[DeadlyAkkuret]

Stop thinking about the exterior of the playing field and let's look at the interior of it, ladies and gentlemen I give you the solution

Nice try, but that's just a black & white picture of Priddis' hair.

 

[Byron_Clanger]

 

[Pie eyed]

Why don't we play AFL on race tracks? The way our game is evolving, eventually all players will be as fast as cars anyway and the game will be completely about speed. Different stadiums can have different shapes and to kick a goal, your team has to do one whole lap around the track without the other team touching the ball, and then kicking it into a central hoop that both team uses.

Yellow flags will spell the death of this idea.

 

[Vinnie Vegas]

Play the game on a mobius strip and be done with it!

 

[Yianni]

These are all valid points Kanga, and I find the argument for an icosogan quite compelling. Channel 7/10 could even draft Larry Emdur in as a special comments man, and to aid the other commentators during the tricky transitional period.

However the icosikaihenagon is not without symmetry itself.

The Number 21 factors as:

21 = 3 x 7

The Numbers 3 and 7 are a kind of division of Unity in the sense of 10 = 3 + 7. They play an essential role in Creation. Most notably in the value of Genesis 1.1:

Sum Genesis 1.1 = 2701 = 37 x 73

The Number 2701 is the 73rd Triangular Number, and both 37 and 73 are prime. In fact, they are palindromic primes.

Therefore, if we build the icosikaihenagon our footy arenas would become legitimate places of worship, as well as screaming parochialism. We could do away with churches forever. How awesome would it be to get married at the footy, catered by four 'n' twenty and carlton draught!?

Oh and forgive my churlishness, but 21 is one more than 20.

I am also going to throw my hat into the ring for the 21 sided icosikaihenagon, as - given the new substitutes rule - it will be one side of the field per player.

Since all league teams inevitably try to copy the game style of the premier and Collingwood is known for it's boundary hugging style, we will most likely see each of the 21 players and their direct opponents manning one edge of the ground, thus rendering the corridor redundant.

Rather than wasting this space, it could be used to play a concurrent game of 20/20 cricket, although in honour of the number 21, we would obviously change it to be 21/21 cricket.

21 overs per team. Each of the cricket teams is paired to one of the football teams. Every time the cricket team hits a 6, their associated football team also gets a goal, 6 points. And vice versa for the football teams.

The cricket teams could also help their associated football team by a cricket based form of shepherding, namely strategically placed cover drives into whichever tagger was scragging too closely.

This would make a day at the footy much more interesting, plus after years of using computers and multitasking, people find doing or watching only one thing boring. The natural end game of this is that in future, all sports will be run concurrently, ultimately leading to the Olympics only lasting 9.8 odd seconds as all medals are competed for during the 100m sprint.

Anyway, I have digressed. I see the 2011 season, icosikaihenagon based AFL 21/21 cricket hybrid looking something like this.

Opinions?

 

[Darkness Falls]

Opinions?

Footballers should also be allowed use of the Decision Review System to combat poor umpiring such as incorrect holding the ball. To maximise the appeal of this, we should give each team 21 chances, or 1 per player. It would also be effective to implement some rules of cricket in AFL. Eg. if a player kicks the ball out of the boundary on the full, the other team gets 6 points (and 4 if it bounces first). This should become a combined game known as AFC, Australian Football Cricket and will be a worldwide phenomenon played by every country in the world.

 

[The Passenger]

How about a fractal shaped boundary line, with an infinite length. Let's make those boundary umps earn their keep.

i agree.

i have a few prosposals.

now not all of those approriate, however 1) top line second from left, 2) second line very left, 3) third lind second from left, 4) third line very right, 5) fourth line very left and 6) fourth line second from right

all of those i believe we should do a cost benefit analysis of each of those six playing field shapes and what they offer for the future of the game.

 

[AsianWithAFro]

This is perhaps the weirdest thread to ever be posted on the board. Are you sure you weren't meant to post this in GD?

 

[sparklig]

wouldnt there be some terrible injuries with players & the occasional ump or streaker cutting or accidentally stabbing themselves on all those sharp edges

lawsuits galore im afraid

This was very funny

 

[TheSunGod]

Stop thinking about the exterior of the playing field and let's look at the interior of it, ladies and gentlemen I give you the solution

Nah don't like it - I can see Collingwood being given 22 games a year there to practice on...and their supporters 22 games a year to figure it out.

 

[Yianni]

Footballers should also be allowed use of the Decision Review System to combat poor umpiring such as incorrect holding the ball. To maximise the appeal of this, we should give each team 21 chances, or 1 per player. It would also be effective to implement some rules of cricket in AFL. Eg. if a player kicks the ball out of the boundary on the full, the other team gets 6 points (and 4 if it bounces first).

This should become a combined game known as AFC, Australian Football Cricket and will be a worldwide phenomenon played by every country in the world.

Finally, someone else with vision!

Yes, no doubt that Australian Football Cricket will be big, bit that's just the beginning.

Soon after, the AFC will merge with UFC (Ultimate Fighting Championship) to become UAFFC (Ultimate Australian Fighting Football Cricket) in which the AFC icosikaihenagon will be bounded within a UFC octagon and where allegience-free UFC fighters will be allowed to roam free within either the football or the cricket match using their freestyle fighting skills to help or hinder the teams or players of their choice.

This would bring a lot of disenfranchised supporters back as - in addition to the appeal of the polygonal field(s) - we would have successfully "brought back the biff" in a very real sense.

The 22nd "substitute" player would also be able to engage in violent conduct, however would be limited to the cricket field, as a sort of "12th man" fielding only role, farming up cricket balls and pelting them at any opposition players. Traditional playground brandy rules would apply.

I see it looking something like this.

Opinions?

 

[Yianni]

there are some threads that are so weird or bad that they become awesome

this aint one of them

I think you need to reconsider

 

[Glorious couch life]

Or possibly Ian Turpie. I've heard Turps currently hosts a successful trivia night every Wednesday at the Bat and Ball hotel in Surry Hills, Sydney, so he is apparently looking for something more substantial. Emdur currently has his hands full on the 'Sydney to Hobart.' If it would help Turps to come back, maybe John Deeks could be enticed to replace Craig Willis as the voice of the AFL.

You mean John Deeks and Craig Willis aren't the same person?

You're obviously as passionate about this as me. I take it Shane Savage is your favourite Hawk?

This is a vile departure, but imagine an interchange of Savage Lee Berry Dickinson (read slowly).

I think you'd need a shape with an exceptionally large amount of sides to make up for the disadvantage of that shape being less suited to the decimal system. If you go down that route and have, say 30 sides (a triacontagon)
, we are getting dangerously close, visually, to a circle, and we don't want that.

I agree wholeheartedly on this. There's no need to go overboard here. You can have too much of a good thing, and 30 sides is just comical. It is in fact the number of the circle, which as we all know is a visual expression of infinity.

Soccer uses a round (circular) ball, and their games seem to drag on ad infinitum. Coincidence? I think not. Do we really want our great game going down this path. The oval playing field is dangerously close as it is! Perhaps it's high time we introduce some straight lines into the design of the sherrin. This may help arrest decline of footy into a game played by hem-clutching lightweights. And Yianni's suggestion of throwing in some shaved-down punch-on merchants can't hurt either.

 

[Perry Pie]

Finally, someone else with vision!

Yes, no doubt that Australian Football Cricket will be big, bit that's just the beginning.

Soon after, the AFC will merge with UFC (Ultimate Fighting Championship) to become UAFFC (Ultimate Australian Fighting Football Cricket) in which the AFC icosikaihenagon will be bounded within a UFC octagon and where allegience-free UFC fighters will be allowed to roam free within either the football or the cricket match using their freestyle fighting skills to help or hinder the teams or players of their choice.

......

Opinions?

Ultimate Australian Fighting Football Cricket - Are you allowed to hit an oponent with a bat? I think its OK but not in the back or when going for a mark - I would not like to see marks getting harder than now.

Another alternative would be to merge with beach vollyball - the bikini thing would be great!
Ultimate Australian Beach Vollyball Fighting Football Cricket - improve on that!