Even gimmick games need meaning and a team to support.
For a club competition like we had this year, at least you were following your club. But who’s going to care whether Team Blue beats Team Green?

Unfortunately neither Newcastle nor Wollongong have oval grounds with sufficient capacity or facilities. Newcastle No 1 Sports Ground would barely hold 5,000; and I doubt you’d get more than 2,000 into North Dalton Oval. Neither have corporate facilities or spectator seating that would be acceptable at AFL level.

I couldn’t see Canberra having its own team for a very long time. The corporate backing isn’t there; and the facilities at Manuka are poor and the ground’s capacity is only around 14,000.
But it’s a useful secondary market for the Giants. It’s worth $1m per season plus 4,000 members to them. The current deal with Canberra expires at the end of the 2021 season, but all stakeholders are keen to renew it well before then.

Enjoyable article Matt. Should get plenty of thoughts and comments going.
The bucket list – the things you need to experience at least once before you die.

I’ve been to most of the big sporting events in Australia and visited most of the major grounds. The new stadium in Perth is one that I’m keen to get over to the Wild West and check out at some stage. Won’t be in 2019 unless the Giants play a final there – our only game there during the regular season is round 2, and I’ve entered RunWest the next day and couldn’t do that on the back of a flight on the Red Eye!
I’ve been to footy at the Adelaide Oval before, but not a Showdown. I’ve been to Origin before but not in Perth (obviously, no-one has yet). I’ve been to AFL & NRL Grand Finals, and international cricket at several Australian grounds – and may possibly add a Manuka Test to that list before this summer is out.
But there’s some overseas items on my bucket list. An Ashes Test at Lords is definately on mine as well. I’d love to get to Wimbledon. Wouldn’t mind a visit to Anfield either – I’ve seen Liverpool play, I crossed that one off my bucket list in Brisbane 3 years ago; but to see an EPL game live would be an experience.

The Roar is dedicated to many sports. This article was on the AFL tab; but all sports get a run here.

The logical extension to that is that during trade period, players would be trades for points rather than picks.
That would certainly create a fairer system for free agency compensation, which would be a sliding scale of points depending on the new contract.

24,342. A palindrome, and better than expected.
But what a dire performance by the Aussies.

Sydney & the Giants don’t alternate being at home in round 1.
Or the last round, and that will be interesting. The GIANTS have always travelled interstate in the last round. Not such a factor with the pre-finals bye; but will 2019 be the year they finally get a home game in the last round?

Come back Smith, Warner and Bancroft. All is forgiven.

Can I suggest one slight amendment.
“But many Swans fans won’t want this trade, as the cost of Moore will obstruct a pay rise for the beloved Aliir Aliir, who’s out of contract.”

Aliir Aliir is contracted to 2021.

One minor correction.
“Every first and second-tier grand final has been played during the day in the history of the AFL, including the AFL, AFLW, VFL, VFLW, WAFL, SANFL, NEAFL, TSL et cetera.”
The 2017 NEAFL Grand Final was a night game. It was played at the SCG after the Swans v Essendon Elimination Final. It went back to being a stand-alone daytime game this year.

I doubt it will change under the current TV rights contract; but I fully expect the price to pay to get the contract closer to $3b for the next round of TV rights is a twilight Grand Final.
As a Saturday afternoon game, the AFL Grand Final is often out-rated by the NRL’s Sunday night Grand Final. To justify getting double the TV revenue, that can’t continue; and so the AFL will inevitably move to a higher-rating timeslot.
And it wouldn’t worry me if the Grand Final became a twilight game. Times change, traditions change. The world moves on.

I have actually tasted the forbidden fruit of switching teams. In my case, living in the western suburbs of Sydney, I switched to GWS when they started. For the Giants to work, start-up supporters were essential, and due to the tyranny of distance I rarely saw my former club anyway. And being a part of something from day one and playing a role in growing the game up here was too attractive to pass up.

There will always be winners and losers. That’s sport. To stop following a team, there would normally be more to it than just losing games.
Maybe the club’s done the wrong thing by you (eg stuffing up your membership) or you’ve fallen out with fellow supporters or something the club is doing you disagree with. For whatever reason, you no longer have the passion. You’re unhappy, you don’t want to be there, and you sense your unhappiness is making others unhappy.
Footy is a multi-billion commercial industry. You have just as much commercial right to change your footy team as your brand of breakfast cereal. If you would enjoy following a new team more than your current team, you have every right to make the switch. But if you close the door on your current team, it is closed forever. It will never be the same again if you go back.

They haven’t shortened it, they just haven’t lengthened it; even though there’s two new teams, and another four coming in 2020.
Disappointing. The AFLW competition has had some success in its short history, which led to the expansion in teams. But the AFL administration in recent times appear to have lost confidence in it.

2018 was always going to be a write-off. The situation was not of their making, but the Commonwealth Games and not having a home game until the season was half over meant they were always going to be up against it.
One thing they’ve got right is to get out of China. Being on the Gold Coast and re-connecting with the local community is far more important for their future than being Port’s patsy in China.

A thought that’s entered my mind – the bye week before the AFL Finals should be designated as Community Football Weekend.
With no AFL games, all state, local and country leagues should have their Grand Finals – and with no clash with the AFL, local footy gets the spotlight and is showcased with its biggest day.
Fox Footy could show games such as the VFL, SANFL, NEAFL etc Grand Finals.

I’m not sure this concept has legs. Maybe it does, maybe it’s just another of my silly ideas.

No problems with a Thursday night last year for Adelaide v GWS, or the year before for West Coast v Bulldogs. But as soon as they put a Thursday night final in Melbourne, the waaaa-mbulance is overbooked.

I’ve read a lot of comments on social media, and have come to the conclusion that the reasons for this are:
* Richmond and Hawthorn supporters believe the world should revolve around them.
* Bulldogs fans in 2016 travelled to Perth and GWS last year to Adelaide on a Thursday night, but it’s unreasonable to expect the away Hawthorn fans to go all the way to their home ground on a weeknight.
* 7:20pm on a Thursday night doesn’t give enough time to get there after work, so 5:20pm in Perth would be better.
* Children in states outside Victoria do not attend school on Fridays.
* Victorian children and workers need more sleep than those in other states.
* Notwithstanding that 6-day breaks for finals are problematic, a Sunday game should have been scheduled instead; but not involving Richmond or Hawthorn. Maybe some tinkering with the Gregorian Calendar could fix that.
* It’s hard to get home from the MCG after a game, because unlike in Adelaide and Perth there is traffic and less frequent night trains in Melbourne.

Looks impressive. Like all site changes, will take a bit of getting used to; but we’ll get there.

Thanks for the effort you put in.

A bit of luck for my Giants to get the Swans. It’s amazing that there’s only ever been one all-SA final, never been an all-WA final, but this will be the second Giants v Swans final in 3 seasons.
Thankful for the week off. The Giants need every day they can get to regroup. No wind in their sails today.

With an early start and a late Easter next year, it may be possible to get a game at Spotless before the Royal Easter Show. If that happens, it would likely be against a low-drawing opponent so they can have the lower bowl of seating already taken out.

Wouldn’t it be great if people weren’t judged by the colour of their skin or what name they give their god; but were instead judged by their character.
Maybe it will happen one day.

I’ve been thinking about this and come up with an idea of how it could work.
Playing a 9-round season, so everyone plays each other once.
Start a week earlier, on the weekend of January 25-28. The Australian Open final is on the Sunday but there’s a public holiday Monday we can take advantage of.
Channel 7 is showing cricket on the main channel, and the Big Bash goes well into February; but 7Mate & Fox Footy will be happy for some live content.
The last round of the home & away season would be the weekend of March 22-24.
The semi finals would be on the weekend of March 29-31. Under my model, the men’s AFL season would start with the traditional Richmond v Carlton game on the Thursday night.
But the first AFLW semi final could be played at 6.30pm on the Friday night. Play the AFL game at Adelaide Oval on the Friday night- 7.50pm their time is 8.20pm our time so it fits.
Then play the second AFLW semi-final at 12 noon on the Saturday, and it will be all over before the 1.45pm game.
Could be problematic if Freo qualify for a home semi – we’d just have to play it later against AFL games.
Then on Friday 5 April, no AFL games are scheduled. This becomes a stand-alone slot for the AFLW Grand Final. AFL round 2 would be played on Saturday & Sunday 6-7 April.
With one in-season bye, same as now, the final round would be the weekend 30 August to 1 September.
A week off for the finals on 6-8 September, which becomes Community Football Weekend when state, metro & country leagues have their Grand Finals.
The first round of finals would start on Thursday 12 September and go through to the Grand Final on Saturday 5 October.

When we go to 14 teams in 2020 and 13 rounds, there will be overlap between the AFLW & AFL seasons. That’s unavoidable. Because of the heat I doubt AFLW can start earlier, and even if you could push the AFL season back another week or 2 to reduce the overlap, you couldn’t push it back 4 weeks.

If you want to lift the standard and professionalism of womens footy, to lift the profile and entice players – you need to give them is more games to play. Reducing the number of games each team plays makes no sense.
And for Gil to compare AFLW to the World Cup is a joke. The World Cup doesn’t send memos to change the rules and tactics mid-tournament, even if there’s a game where no goals are scored.

To us in the eastern states, any Test match in Perth is effectively already a day-night Test.

They can make the 8 but not the top 4. It would take a run through the finals like the Western Bulldogs a couple of years ago. Not impossible but unlikely.

The injury run is a concern and it’s something the club doesn’t manage well. When you have the worst injury run in the league seven years in a row, it can’t be luck; there’s something the Giants aren’t doing right.

It was easily the best crowd we’ve had this season; and certainly the noisiest!

Apparently they announced the crowd figure over the PA system, but I didn’t hear it – this will come as no surprise to anyone lol. Cracking atmosphere and a ripper of a game.
It’s always going to be a long-term project to build crowds and support. No-one disputes that. But all we as fans can do is do our best to make sure those who do come have a great time. Certainly achieved that on Saturday night.