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It wasn’t surprising to hear the AFL announce the home-and-away-season will be moved a week earlier in 2014 with each team getting a second bye.
Given the players have been wanting a second bye for ages, such a decision seemed inevitable.
But there were other aspects to yesterday’s changes to the AFL’s season structure that were a tad less expected.
The NAB Cup has been shortened to two weeks. “Representative footy” is likely to fill the void.
This is also something players have wanted, although to say the move was unexpected is selling it well short.
Andrew Demetriou said as recently as April it wasn’t something he was keen on.
“Our game has great club-versus-club football,” he said. “That’s our strength. Sometimes it’s OK to acknowledge these are our strengths and these are our weaknesses.”
It’s a fine argument, but one few sports around the world subscribe to.
The only unfortunate bit is that it’s not clear what form of “representative footy” will get up.
The two options most talked about are State of Origin or the player-driven “All Star Game” idea.
There remains the possibility of a compromise solution along the lines of 2008’s Victoria against the Dream Team clash. However, if the AFL truly want the concept of rep footy to survive, that game gives out some strong lessons.
The crowd and TV ratings were solid, but if there was a way to measure passion it would reveal that the game not being “real Origin” hurt.
Who could blame the people of South and Western Australia for not feeling a connection with a thrown-together Dream Team, or even being turned off by another example of what they might term Victorian arrogance?
Victorians couldn’t even brag about their win to friends interstate because they hadn’t really beaten them, as such.
That 2008 example should serve as a vote against any form of merged team that doesn’t immediately incite passion into large amounts of people.
We just can’t have another Victoria versus the rest. It’s half-baked representative footy.
East versus West would be less than half.
The only way for rep footy to be brought back and for it to actually work is through State of Origin. And the only way for State of Origin to work is if the AFL go full tilt.
To that, the mechanism I introduced here on The Roar two years ago (which you can view in the image below) is the only way to go. I don’t say that to toot my own horn, it’s just that if we’ve only got one week of the calendar to work with there’s not much room for an alternative.
The idea is to have a system of promotion and relegation, with Victoria and Western Australia starting at the top and other states having the opportunity to work their way up to the top game and fight to be the champion state.
Some would disagree with rep footy returning to the fixture. My colleague Cam Rose has written a lengthy response to my views on the topic which I encourage you to read for a balanced view.
But with the AFL moving on the issue, the debate must now shift to how best to go about it.
The thought of a Western Australian team with the best talls in the land – a spine that would be chosen from Darren Glass, Luke McPharlin, Michael Johnson, Dean Cox, Nic Naitanui, Harry Taylor, Josh Kennedy and Buddy Franklin – going up against the midfield-heavy Vics should be enough to convince any fair-minded footy fan.
There’s simply no way that an All-Star or Dream Team arrangement can compare.
Bringing back Origin is the way to go.
