Naming team line ups. Is it a joke??

[Coastal Boy]

I see the sydneyafl website is now naming teams with line ups. The telegraph does the same most weeks. It seems to me that teams are making a mockery of it by giving false line ups with rep players on the bench and on-ballers in the ruck etc etc. What's the point of providing this information at all when the concept is not embraced by clubs???? Incidently, how does the AFL police the naming of teams???

[Rafters]

Sure it may not be ideal but at least it provides a bit of publicity in the paper & may encourage someone to go out to a game. Coaches & pundits of the game would know that names are not going to be 100% accurate (especially with so many named on I/C) & I am sure that there is a level of tolerance accepted.

It would be great if a fixture list was in the AFL section of the Friday sports section - would take up the same amount of space as a snippet about Barry Hall's favourite meal & other useless AFL trivia.

[Jacks]

It is expected by the League that lineups are as close to accurate as possible with regards to the players that are listed but not neccessarily the positions in which they are listed. This is in line with what happens in most top level comps as well as the AFL.
At the beginning of the year clubs were told that there would be penalties for not naming accurate lists. These were to include monetary fines and the possible loss of competition points. I think there have been some warnings this year but no actual penalties as yet.
This year has seen the clubs provide the most accurate lists since the teams have been going into the papers and most weeks I would say that at least 90% of the players named actually play on the weekend. In the past it may have been closer to 60% with some clubs treating it as the above mentioned joke. Most around Sydney footy are smart enough to know which players are likely to play where for which clubs so naming players that are obviously not going to play achieves nothing and if we are serious about promoting the game we should take opportunities like this and not waste them, the Sydney papers are not required to print the teams.
Finally I would think that if it is good enough for AFL teams to provide accurate teams on a Thursday then it shouldn't be to hard for SydAFL clubs to do the same.