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You can’t turn on a TV, open an internet browser or even cross the street at the moment without being confronted by talk of what’s wrong with AFL football and what needs to change.
I’m generally in the ‘leave the game alone’ camp, but there have been so many changes in the last decade and if we’ve learnt anything, it’s that almost none of these changes have had the desired impact. Often, it seems to be the opposite.
There has also been talk about making the game shorter in order to have greater appeal to the T20 generation. The other main topic is the ugliness of a majority of games.
Here are some tweaks I’d like to see, none of which are radical, but all of which would improve the game as a spectacle and/or allow less time for congestion to build around the ball.
Umpires bouncing the ball
Arguably the stupidest facet of the game is umpires bouncing the ball in the centre square instead of throwing it up.
If we were designing the game from scratch, we’d be looking for the simplest way to restart the game at the start of every quarter and after each goal. I’ll give you the tip, it wouldn’t be trying to bounce an oval ball straight up in the air.
Basketball is played with a round ball, and even they have the sense to throw it straight up. Throwing it up would provide a fairer contest for the ruckmen, and we’d save time not having to farcically wait for a recalled bounce.
No third man up in the ruck
The third man up in the ruck has become an obsession for some clubs this season, for reasons passing beyond comprehension. It needs to be disallowed via a rule change.
Why do we want players like Dyson Heppell, Nat Fyfe, Callan Ward, Ollie Wines, Luke Parker, Marcus Bontempelli and Patrick Dangerfield jumping up at ruck contests trying to win hit outs rather than being there to do what they do best – win the contested ball at ground level.
Also, we want to protect the sanctity of ruckmen, and ensure there is a place in our game for all body types. Let’s let the big men go at each other unencumbered.
It looks ugly and ridiculous, adding nothing to the game and in fact only detracting from it.
Video goal review
Another time waster. Let’s not chase perfection. How many times do we have to go through it, only to go with the umpire’s original decision. Get rid of it.
Marks and free kicks
We often see a player mark the ball in a pack situation while simultaneously a teammate of his is owed a free kick for an infringement. The free kick always seems to take precedence in this situation, but we need to make the change so the reverse applies – the mark should effectively be the umpire paying advantage.
Another tweak would be to make marks and free kicks the same in terms of advantage. Currently, advantage can be paid for a free kick, but not for a mark.
There’s no reason this needs to be so. Advantage should be opened up for both.
Both of these changes would cut down on wasted time and ease congestion – every week we see countless instances of the umpire having to call the ball back, which allows more time for flooding, defensive set-ups and filling the space up ahead with extra numbers.