Two-time premiership star Tom Lynch has welcomed the return of the AFL grand final parade in a new “hybrid” model as the season decider moves back to Melbourne for the first time in three years.
A “re-imagined” route will take players on a boat parade down the Yarra River and through Birrarung Marr on the back of utes on the morning of grand final eve.
It will finish in Yarra Park at a “festival of football”, with three AFLW matches to be played at nearby Punt Road Oval and Olympic Park on the public holiday.
A fourth AFLW match will be played at Ikon Park that night.
It is only the fifth time the parade route has been changed since it was first staged in 1977.
The grand final parade was scrapped for the COVID-affected 2020 and 2021 seasons, when the season deciders were held in Brisbane and Perth respectively.
Richmond gun Lynch, who featured in the most recent grand final parade before the Tigers smashed GWS at the MCG in 2019, gave the event his tick of approval.
But the sixth-placed Tigers will have to engineer something special to get there this year, having to navigate three straight knockout finals if they are to reach the decider.
The first hurdle is an elimination final against Brisbane at the Gabba on Thursday night.
“I don’t care where we’re going, as long as we’re on it,” Lynch told reporters on Saturday.
“I’ve been involved with it once and it is amazing to connect with fans.
“I’m sure at the forefront of (the AFL’s) mind is getting fans back and into the CBD, so I’m sure it will be a great show.”
AFL commercial boss Kylie Rogers welcomed the grand final’s return to Melbourne and declared the new parade route an “improved family friendly layout”.
“As we have all bounced back from two really challenging years, footy has helped bring the heartbeat of the city back,” Rogers said.
“Grand final week in September will bring together all things great about our game and the city of Melbourne.”
Angela
Roar Rookie
When last I looked AFL meant Australian Football League, a national game. I realise it’s going to take generations for the ‘heartland’ states to come to terms with this concept however much they’d like to hug VFL to their collective chests and keep it theirs forever. Australian Football was codified in colonial times in Melbourne almost half a century before federation, it is not “native” to Sydney. Irrelevant, many New South Wales ‘natives’ and Queensland ‘natives’ watch and participate in Australian football. Being constantly viewed as ‘outsiders’ by the so-called heartland states – particularly Victoria – is guaranteed to cause the friction evident on this site.
RT
Roar Rookie
It's nice this article is about Richmond.
fabian gulino
Roar Rookie
The parade should remain the same.A parade in boats in the water bloody BORING. Enjoy the reply.
Homer Nixon
Guest
In 5 years time... We'll go the family lands of Tom Wills near Canberra and begin - with appropriate indigenous blessings from both the elders of the land in Canberra and those in which the MCG is built on - will commence an annual "premiership cup relay" where the cup is run around the villages, towns and cities of this great country. It will be run up Mt Kosciuszko, taken into the Great Barrier Bleach Reef, run around Uluru... It will have a lap of honour at the Adelaide Oval, Optus Stadium, the Gabba, the SCG, Manuka, York Park... It will do laps around the great ovals of the past: the Whitten Oval, Football Oval, the ruins of Subiaco, Princes Park, the mighty Jiangwan stadium in Shanghai... It will be run past schools, hospitals, taken up the tallest towers, down the deepest mines... Until on that last day of September the relay will be timed perfectly so that the cup is run into the stadium at full time where the "final cup bearer" will have the honour of handing the cup to the victorious captain! Just. You. Watch.
Al
Guest
Australian Football was codified in colonial times in Melbourne almost half a century before federation, it is not "native" to Sydney. Also being am "Aussie of many generations" is irrelevant, migrants and first generation Australians also watch and participate in the sport in the heartland states.
George Apps
Roar Rookie
Don't you know that the AFL likes to change everything all the time - sometimes I think just for the sake of something different.
George Apps
Roar Rookie
Wash your mouth out with soap! Are you so juvenile with an attention span of a gnat that a weeks wait for footy is unbearable? Think of the players whose bodies are aching after a long season wanting be fully fit for the finals so that we can see them at their best. Nobody is forcing anything down your throat. (or maybe someone is)
fabian gulino
Roar Rookie
What about a parade over the west gate bridge? What is wrong with the AFL keeps on changing even the parade.What a joke they are.
Angela
Roar Rookie
I'm an Aussie of many generations, AFL is my 'native' game.
Reg Grundy
Guest
Its the Yarra not the Swan or Brisbane Rivers! P*ssweak World by AFL! Get rid of the stupid bye and stop forcing AFLW down our throats with a footy festival.
Doc Disnick
Roar Guru
She gets the best of both worlds.
Al
Guest
Yet you bandwagon the Melbourne game over your own native game.
Naughty's Headband
Roar Rookie
Lame.
Doc Disnick
Roar Guru
Was this Eddie's idea by any chance?
mrl
Roar Rookie
It’s going to look like that ridiculous moment at Melbourne Commonwealth games when the AFL players in their singlets walked with the flame…with most of the Commonwealth completely confused.
Angela
Roar Rookie
Call that a river...? :silly:
Chanon
Roar Rookie
Supporters will fall in the river seems ridiculous :laughing:
Gyfox
Roar Rookie
Should never have had the holiday. Much better when parade was in Collins St on a working day & city stopped for it.
PeteB
Roar Rookie
Happy April Fools Day :laughing: Oh hang on :shocked: