Chris Bryan of Collingwood evades Bachar Houli of Essendon during the NAB Cup Match between the Collingwood Magpies and the Essendon Bombers at the Docklands Stadium. Slattery Images
The annual debate on the NAB Cup has surfaced again, but this time it was AFL footy operations manager Adrian Anderson who instigated the discussion by admitting the introduction of more clubs has threatened the competition’s future.
Gold Coast will officially join the AFL in 2011, while the Greater West Sydney club will be added the following year. Indeed, the additional clubs make the fixturing of the NAB Cup a logistical nightmare.
Plus, it is believed the AFL wants to increase the regular season to 24 rounds once they have 18 clubs, meaning the pre-season may need to be shortened.
And with the current sponsorship deal with NAB expiring after 2011, the future is hazy for the pre-season competition.
Anderson revealed, “We have got 17 teams (in 2011) so that provides an immediate challenge to the current structure of the NAB Cup.
“We have been talking to our clubs about what sort of preparation they require for the (home and away) season but the one thing that we are really keen to preserve is to take (pre-season) games to regional communities that usually don’t get the chance to see footy first hand.”
As Anderson’s comments suggest, one thing which is clear is that AFL clubs need pre-season matches to prepare for Round 1. You often hear athletes say nothing beats match-fitness and AFL players could ill-afford to go into Round 1 cold turkey.
And the pre-season gives clubs an opportunity to trial youth and experiment with tactics, while the AFL does their own experiments with trial rules.
So any calls for scrapping the pre-season competition altogether are off the mark.
Indeed, that idea has been suggested by many pundits who would like to see a longer and more evenly fixtured regular season with all sides playing each other twice, but that seems unlikely with 18 clubs and the AFL preferring twenty-odd money-making rounds of footy.
So it’s clear the pre-season must stay, but in what form?
In March earlier this year, the Herald Sun newspaper ran a poll on the NAB Cup which found that 75% of respondents said they didn’t care if their team won the pre-season competition or not.
Indeed, interest in the ‘old night premiership’ is limited with the pre-season rarely a good indicator for a club’s success for that year, although Geelong did do the double in 2009.
And some of the trial rules have confused people away from the NAB Cup, with the ‘supergoal’ going beyond a novelty.
So perhaps the AFL should rid us altogether of the NAB Cup and let clubs organize their own pre-season like they do in football (soccer)?
Realistically this would never work.
The best way for AFL clubs to get ready for the AFL season is to play AFL clubs, as the league is the unrivalled number one comp in the code with state clubs a fair step down in standard.
So letting the AFL organize pre-season schedules amongst the clubs is fair and ideal for all.
And by creating a pre-season where there’s a prize at the end of it all, the AFL has been able to generate some interest in clubs’ warm-up games, with decent TV numbers.
I dare say DreamTeam coaches love it too, as they shape up their teams prior to Round 1.
And after all, the Herald Sun’s poll showed one in four people where interested in their club’s performance in the NAB Cup which isn’t too bad for what effectively are practice games.
As well, NAB’s sponsorship of the night premiership is yet another brilliant money-maker for the
AFL, who may not be so lucky without a structured pre-season.
But structuring a pre-season competition which fits into the timeframe of the whole AFL season, whilst remaining somewhat relevant and interesting in the public’s mind, will be the tricky part in 2011 and 2012.
The sponsors and the public will want a tournament which has some relevance and delivers a winner, while clubs will want to play three of four pre-season matches and nobody will want to play less than other teams due to a bye.
Indeed, with 17 clubs in 2011 that will cause plenty of fixturing problems but with the even number of 18 in 2012, a suitable format should be found.
Perhaps we could see a miniature AFL season with all teams playing 2 or 3 matches, with the best four or two ranked sides qualifying for a semi-final or the simply a Grand Final.
Obviously, that’s a rough example, but the concept of a pre-season competition with a trophy at the end of it has a place in AFL footy and the NAB Cup (or whatever it’ll be named beyond 2011) should continue to exist despite its many knockers.
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