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One of the first questions incoming AFL CEO Gillon McLachlan was asked in his official press conference last week was what he thought of the current state of the game.
His answer was, that among other things, he would suggest to coaches that they encourage their players to play a more ‘entertaining’ brand of football.
This was an incredible statement for McLachlan to make. The game’s governing body has always indirectly influenced the style of the game, most recently through introducing the substitute rule to try and slow down play and prevent the development of rolling mauls.
However, for a chief executive to so publicly declare this type of direct intervention in the way the game is played is an unusual and worrying sign.
Balancing the desire of clubs, coaches and players with the wishes of the game’s governing body has always been a difficult process. When the substitute rule was proposed, clubs were largely against it, given the fact that it would put more pressure on players to be able to run out games.
A big concern was that if a player went down injured early in a game, that team would be forced to use its substitute before strategically desirable, thereby robbing itself of a rotation. However, since its introduction, coaches, players and fans have largely accepted the rule.
The AFL is always concerned with making the game as appealing to its fans as possible, a trend that has only increased with its expansion into the traditional rugby heartlands of Gold Coast and western Sydney.
The desire to make the game more entertaining, and thus attract more fans, has always been an important factor for the AFL.
However, in this case, one has to question the usefulness of McLachlan’s edict. For one, we must ask ourselves whether fans care more about entertaining football than winning games. Of course, fans like it when teams play free flowing, fast paced footy. But they also like it when their team wins.
Tell Sydney fans in 2005 that their team should sacrifice its premiership in order to play more attacking football. Tell Fremantle and St Kilda fans that playing a defensively minded game doesn’t lead to grand finals.
I would wager that fans of these three teams would much rather see their team achieve ultimate success, no matter how this is achieved, than see a more entertaining game at the cost of success.
Indeed, when current CEO Andrew Demetriou told then-Sydney coach Paul Roos in 2005 that it would be desirable if the Swans played a more attacking style of football, Roos was less than committal.
Ironically, when Sydney won the premiership in 2005 with their ‘unappealing’ game style, Demetriou was silent on the issue of exciting football. St Kilda coach Alan Richardson echoed Roos’ views as early as two weeks ago when he stated that he didn’t care about the style of game his team played, as long as it led to success.
This seems to show the AFL’s desire to directly intervene in the style of the game. This would be detrimental to the game’s development, and would result in a very homogenous way of thinking about the game, one based solely on raising revenue at the expense of the very foundation of the game: ultimate success.
Of course the AFL needs to monitor the development of the game and the way it is being played. But this should be done indirectly rather than directly. That is, the AFL should provide rules and regulations that govern the game, but leave it up to clubs and players as to how they choose to interpret these rules for their game style.
For the good of the game, the AFL should let the game, and its style, evolve holistically and in due course.
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