So much debate is happening right now, right across the AFL. Not content with sitting on the sidelines, The Roar’s AFL crew has banded together to bring you a few perspectives on issues in our native game.

Be like The Beatles

Jay Croucher: The persistent desire to tweak and improve something we love is as sympathetic and understandable as it is misguided.

But guys, it’s OK to let go.

Sometimes I too question the aesthetic appeal of all the congestion that dominates football today. But then, in times of trouble, Sam Mitchell, Luke Hodge and Shaun Burgoyne whisper words of wisdom to me, ‘let it be’.

When the best team in a sport is also the one that plays it in the most beautiful way, then there is no problem with the sport. The premier is the trendsetter, and the trends Hawthorn are setting are as follows: rapid ball movement, exquisite skill, purposeful hardness and unparalleled offensive efficiency. They’ve been a joy to watch for the past half-decade, and the 2015 incarnation might be the most thrilling yet.

Right now they’re a chase scene out of Max Max: Fury Road, an exhilarating, ordered chaos played at breakneck speed. They’re a testament to team, cohesion and selflessness. Like the dynasty that preceded them, they lost their best player and somehow got better.

There will always be bad games of football. Melbourne-Brisbane 60-36 is ugly, but that’s not a referendum on the state of the sport. Melbourne’s win over Geelong a month prior was one of the most exciting victories of the season. Don’t blame the dimensions of the ground or the rulebook for the occasional shocker – blame nature.

The Demons have been responsible for some of the best and worst AFL matches in recent memory. (Photo: Michael Willson/AFL Media)

Richmond’s 69-66 ‘basketball’ win over Adelaide in 2006 was labelled a disgrace at the time, an indictment on the game. But that same year would later produce one of the greatest grand finals of all time, a reinforcement of the greatness of our game.

There is generally a correlation between winning and beauty. All the great teams were a joy to watch in their own right. The only cause for concern are the outliers – teams that manipulated the rules to bring others down to their level.

This happened in the NHL with New Jersey’s neutral zone trap at the turn of the century, and in the NBA with the 1990s New York Knicks and their relentlessly physical defence that turned basketball games into street-fights. Those sports adjusted their rules to increase scoring. The AFL has no need to follow suit.

If Fremantle or Sydney were dominating the league by winning 70-44 every week, then we might have a problem. But as much as the old school likes to pontificate that defence wins premierships, offence and the ability to score freely will always be just as important.

The ladder lies right now, because the two best teams in the AFL at present are Hawthorn and West Coast, the two highest scoring teams in the league. The Hawks average 116 points a game and the upstart Eagles are right behind them at 107 per game.

Unsurprisingly, they’re also the two most watchable teams in the league right now. The success of Hawthorn and West Coast suggests that if you’re good enough, you can break through the congestion and still put up big scores. The problem with the aesthetic of the AFL isn’t in the game’s legislation – the teams just need to get better.

Minor changes can always be made. The sub-rule has been underwhelming, and the two-movement sling tackle should be outlawed. Buckland’s expansion of the goal-square idea is as sensible as it is practical.

These adjustments are slight though, and there’s no real justification for making wholesale on-field changes to a game that remains as compelling as ever. There’s no need to play God when the humans are doing just fine by themselves.

We’re screwed

Didn't see 40 hangers. Worst full forward shootout ever. Can't even sit in the Waverley car park for hours after a game. Get in the bin AFL.

— Scott (@Scottlb_) July 25, 2015

Not so fast

Cam Rose: The first thing that needs to be acknowledged before any sea change is made in rules or restrictions is that no-one will likely have any earthly idea what the outcome will be.

While examining why something might be a good idea, we must strenuously probe as to why it might be a bad one. Look not just at the outcomes we hope to achieve, but try to figure out the unforeseen.

David King has been public in wanting the last touch over the boundary lines between the 50m arcs to be penalised. It has generated support from commenters on The Roar too.

In theory, it sounds great. Surely this will promote teams to avoid the boundary and play the corridor? It sounds simple enough.

Looking at the flipside, I would actually expect this to encourage teams to play the boundary. How could it not? Think about it.

A player has the ball in his defensive fifty, and needs a get-out kick. Isn’t his best option going to be a player leading boundary side down the line, because he will actually get two chances at his team keeping the ball? Either his teammate marks it, or the opposition will spoil the ball over the line. Both result in his team keeping the ball.

Even kicking long to a pack situation near the boundary line can only benefit the team with the ball. Their players are free to go fly for the mark, while their opponent’s main source of defence, the spoil, is made redundant.

Coaches always play the percentages, and the percentages in these cases favour attacking via the boundary.

Coaches also hate being scored against. Another popular opinion is that reducing interchange numbers will increase fatigue and cause tired players to play more positionally, easing congestion and spreading numbers across the field.

For Ross Lyon it’s always been about structure and defence first and foremost. (Photo: Will Russell/AFL Media)

The more likely outcome is that coaches will instruct tired players to flood back and shore up their defence, particularly later in quarters.

Coaches also love control. It’s why the numbers around stoppages often consist of most players on the ground. This control comes from the percentages.

They believe that four players will beat three. Five players will beat four. Six will beat five, etc, etc. It’s always about having more numbers around the ball.

As supporters, we implore this of our team around the ground – how often do we notice that the winning team has more players around the ball in general play? Coaches can control this at stoppages.

Reducing the interchange cap, even drastically, won’t change this. Coaches will continue to coach to put more numbers where they can control it. Reducing the cap alone could well create more congestion.

Let’s hear a lot of ideas. Big ones. Small ones. Major. Minor. Drastic.

But we can’t afford to just take them as read, whether that be from coaches, ex-players, or high profile commentators. Just because they think something is going to happen, doesn’t mean it does.

The man knows his stuff

AFL footy boss Mark Evans addressed the Commission for 20 min today .. On agenda, interchange, sling tackles and congestion

— Mark Stevens (@Stevo7AFL) July 28, 2015

More dollars and sense

Ryan Buckland: Now I’m not saying there’s a problem with the AFL.

Sure, you could make the goal square bigger. You could completely blow up the fixturing system. If you wanted to shake things, there’s some reform available to player movement rules. Hell, you could buy a suburban Melbourne oval and turn it into a boutique stadium.

Nothing to see here folks. Just a crazy economist, not content with the world as it stands.

For what its worth, I think the new Prime Minister is doing a bang up job. But his constituents, and the press gallery, disagree.

Everyone’s got a view. Here’s mine.

The finances and administration of our game are still in need of a bit of a tune up.

Think about it. If the top level of our game has emerged as a game of chess from its bomb-it-down-the-line checkers roots, surely the best way forward is to give all clubs the capacity to become as innovative as the best teams in the game.

According to reports, most clubs have the financial capacity to pay at or near the full salary cap in 2015, which is an excellent development. That some clubs were struggling to pull enough pennies together to pay the league minimum should have never happened.

But the gulf in financial might remains that – a gulf.

Last footy year, Hawthorn as a business entity bought in $67.7 million in operating revenue. St Kilda raised less than half of this: $30.2 million. Collingwood pulled in close to $80 million. That includes distributions from the AFL, and its net of equalisation.

There are a lot of fixed costs in football, leaving the smaller revenue clubs with less cash to spend on what we in the business world would call the ‘nice to haves’. Things like research and development, innovation, data analysis, new marketing, player development, facilities.

Hovercrafts, too, I guess.

In a sports league, you’re judged on cold hard wins and losses. When you can’t use your financial might to buy more of the best players, it makes sense to invest in these new areas. That’s the death spiral that was on the verge of gripping the league, prompting the development of an equalisation policy.

While it’s too early to get a full handle on the impact, the AFL’s equalisation measures look more wet lettuce leaf than Praetorian guard of the game’s future.

There’s always a bright-side when you’re at the helm of the league’s richest club. (Photo: Michael Willson/AFL Media)

Indeed, the advent of the league’s salary cap banking mechanism might see the AFL’s 400-pound gorilla, the Magpies, lob the most lucrative offer for the game’s best free agent.

Teams without financial muscle must be content to follow the off field leader.

Indeed, it is quite remarkable that the minnowish Western Bulldogs have rebounded as fast as they have. It is in spite of, rather than because of, the dollars and cents. In saying that, the performance of the Doggies’ directors in the face of an unprecedented exodus of on and off field leadership suggests money isn’t everything, and people matter.

Equalisation is not a problem that can be considered solved. The league’s new broadcast agreement must be accompanied by a more comprehensive plan to give those at a financial disadvantage a chance to innovate. Let the clubs keep what they earn off their own bat. But be more dis-equal when distributing money from the central pot.

It’s a simple matter of dollars and sense.

We need ideas, except yours

More scoring, less throw-ins, @David_King_34 wants revolutionary change MORE: http://t.co/eoFhveQ3Kn pic.twitter.com/t3VCugypy7

— SuperFooty (AFL) (@superfooty) July 16, 2015

.@superfooty @David_King_34 what about this? http://t.co/mKNbyLMJJ5 pic.twitter.com/bu04RBpAE1

— Ryan Buckland (@RyanBuckland7) July 16, 2015

@RyanBuckland7 @superfooty nah. I think you knew that though.

— David King (@davidking34) July 16, 2015

The biggest change isn’t the game at all

Sarah Olle: It’s all well and good arguing for rule changes to improve the look of the game.

But if we want to revolutionise the football landscape, changes need to be made in the football hierarchy.

We need greater diversity and broader representation at all levels in football, but none more so than at the top of the tree.

While the AFL has taken steps to increase female representation on boards and within the umpiring department, the game must continue to evolve and move past what many perceive to be tokenistic appointments.

As Peta Searle has shown at St Kilda, Peggy O’Neal has shown at Richmond, and Chelsea Roffey, Rose O’Dea and Katrina Pressley have shown in the umpiring department, women in AFL are no longer just tokens.

In fact, women made up almost one-fifth of AFL participants in Australia last year, prompting AFL CEO Gillon McLachlan to announce that a national female competition was inevitable.

The AFL’s foresight to increase female representation has been one of its major recent achievements.

As for representation among Indigenous Australians? It’s almost non-existent.

In what may prove to be the greatest oversight of the year, Michael Long was overlooked for a position on the AFL Commission in March. Hawthorn champion Chris Langford was instead reinstated for another year, only months after announcing he would step down.

And so, when the AFL Commission meet this week and in the coming weeks and months to discuss the state of the game, there will be no one of Indigenous heritage to impart their views on where the game can be improved.

One issue that most certainly will be tabled is the continued booing of Adam Goodes and the rise of a very ugly racist undertone at Swans matches.

Long would have been the most articulate voice on that panel regarding Indigenous culture.

But the AFL chose to appoint a cookie-cutter mould to the position, and so we have a panel of predominantly white, middle-aged men to work out how to tackle the racist underbelly creeping back into the psyche of AFL fans.

The eight Commissioners – six are men, two are women – are all prolific in their fields and have been appointed as a result.

They will have no problem, at an intellectual level, discussing Goodes, Lewis Jetta and the jeers from hostile crowds.

But their experience of being white in Australia is immediately at odds with someone who is from a minority group, particularly someone who has Indigenous heritage.

When 71 Indigenous Australians are on AFL lists – that’s roughly 10 per cent of the competition – it seems absurd that the AFL overlooked Long.

And not because the AFL needs an Indigenous man to make decisions for Indigenous AFL players, but because greater diversity breeds greater decision-making.

Imagine the wisdom Long could have brought to the AFL Commission this week. Not because he is black, but because he has experienced racism as a footballer. And he has a shared experience with 10 per cent of AFL players that no other Commissioner has through his Indigenous heritage – something that should be seen as a bonus, not a lynchpin.

The greatest game changer? Not changes to the game at all.