Absurdity on the AFLW ladder

The congestion in the women’s game is awful because the women can’t kick as far. There is little danger of a goal being kicked until gets the within 30-35 meters of goal. However, The amount of space inside a 35m arc is about the half the space inside a 50m arc. With 16 players it is too easy clog the space inside 35m. It might ease congestion if they reduced the number of players to something like 12 per side.

Umpiring across the board in both the afl and the aflw is abysmal ! Now i harp on about how bad the women's fundamental skills set are but it pales in comparison to the umpires absolute lack of knowledge/applications of the basic rules of the game ! Watched the roos/saints game before the lions/suns game on sunday and just like the mens game was left gobsmacked with some of the rulings . Saw what was ,imo ,an absolute corcker of a tackle by a Norths' player who has hit the Saints player in the mid riff and fully put her on her back and halfway through this most awesome tackle the Saints player has tried to handball the footy only to drop it cold. Whistle blows and ump has pinged the North woman for holding! Seriously holding ! Its like that pesky little rule of incorrect disposal didnt exist or more likely didn't know it existed given how many times players just dropped the ball at any sign of contact. The pack goes up and the ball goes through the hands of the 2 players competing for the mark , clearly touched and lands in the lap of a player who stayed down and she was awarded the mark! The umpiring leaves alot to be desired to say the least and im gonna stop now before i go into a full on rant! Its way to early in the season......ef#%$&%$@ umpires!!!!

Would it be too rude to play them all tonight? Vic's quarantine record is ordinary and is a fair chance of being extended. Gladys will of course wait until it's appears here in NSW before she shuts the border too late again. She's all about freedom.

Thom – show me the figures that demonstrate I am wrong? Have the last 2 offseasons resulted in a net increase in Qld players of 40? (essentially doubling) (Hint only 2 Qld players were taken in this years national draft) You keep playing the man but the facts remain unchallenged.

Its only 5 days Pope, they will likely reschedule.

So what's the story with the Vic lockdown? Are the Melb games off? Can they escape to friendlier climes?

Unless two whole drafts have changed the data you are correct. Nonsense.

Last paragraph is absolutely spot on

Keep playing the man rather than the point, it just shows me to be correct. As for my player figures this is from 2019; https://public.flourish.studio/visualisation/827203/ Unless the net movement over the past 2 drafts has resulted in a doubling of Queensland and NSW representation my facts are correct.

My figures aren't wrong. 2019 there were as below. https://public.flourish.studio/visualisation/827203/ You will see there were just 41 players from Qld and about 120 from SA & WA - unless there has been a net doubling of QLD players in the system over the last 2 drafts my figures are correct. As for my sample size how would you like me to make it bigger than every game these latest expansion teams have played? It is funny how you claim I am wrong but simply attack the man rather than argue the point, probably because the facts are damning. AFLW fanboys like you can never hear any negative comments about the game, everything has to be fantastic, you can't even allow people to hold the opinion that AFLW is a worthwhile exercise that they fully support while recognising the reality of serious teething problems around the standard of the game due.

Congestion in the AFL is awful. Seeing all the players in one half is just depressing. It's no wonder the commentators almost explode when they break free. Back to the women, I can't see 2 more players and 20 min quarters + time on doing any harm.

You are operating on such a small sample size it is ridiculous. And your made up stats are wrong. Queensland produced double the number of players in the AFL draft than the quotient of players in the AFL per Queensland club. It is Victoria that is now producing fewer players than the number of players required per club. Your logic is skew whiff and dated AF.

3 of the 4 expansion sides have kicked 10 goals from 24 quarters combined but sure the talent pool is huge. The Eagles have 1 win from 8 games but it’s just a rough start, nothing to do with a lack of talent, the Tigers are yet to win a game but it isn’t a lack of talent in the pool just poor recruiting, the Suns have two wins from 8 games and currently have a percentage of 30, but it can’t be because of a lack of talent because they are from Queensland, while the cats also have just 2 wins from 8 and just 3 goals this year but they are chock full of talent. And FWIW if you applied your player representation to teams in the state logic to the AFL the Suns and Giants would relocate to Adelaide and Perth.

Oh yes, I have been harping on about the non paying of frees in the mens league too for some time. Applying rules that we have is the most obvious first step to ease congestion. The consequences of not paying frees is just that much worse in lower levels. Not only do we have more congestion than we should, the players are not as skilled (or powerful) at making a good play in that situation.

It happens in the men’s game too, they simply have longer kicks and more training to work themselves into scoring situations. 16 players doesn’t really help in those situations either, even if it does prevent congestion. The VFL will this year have a 3-12-3 at stoppages, which is being trialled for the AFL. Having 6 players in each 50 means less congestion and should have been brought in to the AFLW this season instead of the “lasso” rule.

Yeah, the interpretation leaves much to be desired in all forms of the game, but especially in AFLW. In round 1 when the Demons were continually encroaching the protected zone around the mark I was doubting myself that maybe the rule had been taken out of women’s footy, then 3 50m penalties resulting in goals killed the Suns. Per Bec Goddard, they were deserved and the losers paid the price, but it wasn’t consistent at all, which is the frustrating thing. AFLW needs a different set of rules. Nothing drastic and, as you say, just a finer adjudication which allows better footy when the rules are consistently applied.

Be that as it may, delaying expansion would have only disadvantaged teams like the Suns and Saints even further. In the AFLW, there are more players from Queensland than there are list spots for two Queensland teams. Claiming that there isn't enough talent for the rate of expansion when the competition quality far exceeds all preceding years is spurious at best. I think the West Coast franchise has had a rough start, but the club is too big to fail in the long run, while Richmond's team is probably the only one that really bears out your argument only not for the reasons you put forward (they just bought stars and forgot to nurture a strong VFLW side, plus the club has de-funded them).

1 franchise sure but how is the second franchise going? Every fact points to there not being enough talent in the pool to support the rate of expansion that has been conducted.

This is probably the worst take you’ve taken on AFLW out some pretty poor takes. With Queensland providing 20% of the players, it stands to season that they deserved a franchise.

Slick passages of play in tight situations, under pressure are becoming more common, which is a great sign. I agree though that they often play on into trouble when there is no need. They also instructed to go up the ground to the action where the ball is bottled up like the men, so they are also ailed by finally breaking clear around the wing or centre but facing 80-90 metres to the goal with no friendlies in front of them. So, inevitably a promising attack peters out around the 50m line.