Wild Card Round For 2026 on

[lwjoyner]

Money hungry AFL. Waht makes its important other than that to add 2 extra teams to the finals.
Helps mediocrity, maybe they should be dropping it back to six or saying u need to win at least 15 or 16 games to make the finals.

Absolutyely ridiculous change

[BFG]

All about the money for AFL executives, It's in their KPIs.

Not good enough to make the top 8 after playing 23 rounds? Well have a go at this.

All it does is take away the bye for 7th and 8th meaning top 6 is now so important. If after the second last round you are in 7th or 8th and can't be displaced, would you rest a heap of key players for the last minor round, as teams were doing prior to 2016. You sure will so you get a better chance of advancing in the finals.

AFL HQ has been an idiot show for a long time now - and it's continuing!

[Nico]

What a ridiculous concept. Why not just make it a 18 team finals. This mob listen to SEN. Dumb stuff like this gets trotted out almost daily. Whately will be waxing lyrical about this tomorrow. So 8th is 3 games clear of 9th, have worked their guts out to make it, and along comes Joe who's had a poor season and flukes a win in the wild card round. They AFL must make these decisions over a barrel on a Friday night in the off season.

[KSAS]

Psul Roos was flabbergasted when the idea of the Wild Car. was raised during the season and laughed it off for the reasons mentioned above.. i imagine he'll be very scathing of the AFL.

If you take this year for example, GC would play off against us who finished with 3 wins and a 28% percentage the better.

The argument for the Wild Card round is to keep interest in the season longer for teams below 10th. It's basically sacrificing the integrity of the season for a contrived climax.

The closeness of the ladder varies each year for a variety of reasons. We had an exciting finish in 2024 when many teams were fighing for the last few spots at the end, compared to this year when ithe final 8 was settled with a few rounds to spare. This probably what had influenced the AFL's decision.

I predict within a few years this concept will be scrapped as the flaws become exposed with huge supporter backlash, who in the main were against the idea in the first place.

[imuninformedtwo]

It's such a knuckleheaded concept.

We didn't make the finals this year because we didn't deserve it. All this does is cruel the chances of the teams finishing 7th and 8th, as they'll be asked to go on a five-week run of finals intensity. Gold Coast deserved the right last year to go over to Freo and knock them off, rather than be stuck with a match against us, when they were so consistently and substantially better than us all year.

So the AFL gets more content and revenue, but it really reduces the competition to a six-team race.

[Thunder Shaker]

I am opposed to the idea because it rewards mediocrity. The AFL would be playing a 23-round season over 25 weeks just to decide which eight teams don't make the finals.

It's not as bad as the finals systems the VFL had in the early days, but it's getting there.

For a bad finals system, here's the one that applied in the 1900 season. Eight teams played 14 rounds to decide a minor premier. Then they divided the teams into "sections" where 1st, 3rd, 5th and 7th played three games each in one section and the other teams played in the other. The winners of the two sections (decided by a finals ladder) then played off. If the minor premier did not win that final (or didn't play in it) then they had a right of challenge to the winner of the final to another game to decide the premiership. There were other nuances that I haven't covered.

To see why that system was so bad, the results in 1900 were as follows. Fitzroy finished on top of the ladder two games clear of Geelong in second. They finished second in their section so didn't play the final, which was between Essendon (3rd) and Melbourne (6th). Melbourne won the final by 2 points, then defeated Fitzroy by 4 points in the Grand Final. This system was ditched the following year for the first of the Argus systems (which was used in various forms in most years until 1930).

I think the final 8 is fine as is. Why change something that works reasonably well?

If I was designing the AFL season, it would work like this. Each team plays each other team once over 18 or 20 weeks. No Opening Round. Split round 11 where every team gets a weekend off. Don't reward mediocrity, but have a final five or final six. Bye before Grand Final in which various suburban leagues play their Grand Finals, with highlights of the best suburban Grand Finals played on Saturday night on free to air TV. Night Grand Final on the last Saturday in September.

Final six: like final five but with two elimination finals and top 2 get a double chance, or like final eight without the first week of finals and no double chance for any team.

[BRS328]

I am opposed to the idea because it rewards mediocrity. The AFL would be playing a 23-round season over 25 weeks just to decide which eight teams don't make the finals.

It's not as bad as the finals systems the VFL had in the early days, but it's getting there.

For a bad finals system, here's the one that applied in the 1900 season. Eight teams played 14 rounds to decide a minor premier. Then they divided the teams into "sections" where 1st, 3rd, 5th and 7th played three games each in one section and the other teams played in the other. The winners of the two sections (decided by a finals ladder) then played off. If the minor premier did not win that final (or didn't play in it) then they had a right of challenge to the winner of the final to another game to decide the premiership. There were other nuances that I haven't covered.

To see why that system was so bad, the results in 1900 were as follows. Fitzroy finished on top of the ladder two games clear of Geelong in second. They finished second in their section so didn't play the final, which was between Essendon (3rd) and Melbourne (6th). Melbourne won the final by 2 points, then defeated Fitzroy by 4 points in the Grand Final. This system was ditched the following year for the first of the Argus systems (which was used in various forms in most years until 1930).

I think the final 8 is fine as is. Why change something that works reasonably well?

If I was designing the AFL season, it would work like this. Each team plays each other team once over 18 or 20 weeks. No Opening Round. Split round 11 where every team gets a weekend off. Don't reward mediocrity, but have a final five or final six. Bye before Grand Final in which various suburban leagues play their Grand Finals, with highlights of the best suburban Grand Finals played on Saturday night on free to air TV. Night Grand Final on the last Saturday in September.

Final six: like final five but with two elimination finals and top 2 get a double chance, or like final eight without the first week of finals and no double chance for any team.

Won’t happen because you’re shortening the season and revenue streams. Would players accept less money?. I think not.
There would be less money from television and media etc. Will not happen

[Thunder Shaker]

Won’t happen because you’re shortening the season and revenue streams. Would players accept less money?. I think not.
There would be less money from television and media etc. Will not happen

I ignored the AFL's insatiable desire for money in my post, and I forgot to state this.

However, my criticism of the final 10 stands. Mediocrity should not be rewarded with a finals berth even when justified as a mitigation of the unbalanced fixture.

Instead of a final 10 with 23 rounds or a 17-match season and fewer finals, a third possibility is possible. The replacement for the 1900 finals system retained the sectional rounds and incorporated them into the final ladder to give a 17-round season. A similar approach can be made to work with 18 teams to give a 22-round season.

It could work as follows. After each team has played 17 games, the teams are divided into three groups of six based on ladder position and a new fixture is devised for the remaining five rounds. The AFL already has a floating fixture for these rounds so an entirely new fixture is possible. The groups would be every third team starting from the top three, for example 1, 4, 7, 10, 13 and 16. The AFL could juggle these groups slightly as needed to accommodate derbies. If Adelaide was 7th and Port Adelaide was 11th, 10th and 11th could be swapped between their respective groups.

19 teams could be done, but not neatly because 19 is a prime number.

20 teams can produce a 23-round season with five groups of four, or a 24-round season with four groups of five. 20 teams opens up other possibilities:
* Two divisions of 10 with promotion and relegation. This does not work well with the draft so is not a realistic choice.
* Two conferences of 10, with five or so inter-conference matches either during the season (as a fixture) or at the end (as sectional rounds).

A conference system allows for interesting possibilities. The Victorian teams could be one conference and the rest of the teams could be the other. The AFL would need to ensure equity by paying clubs a stipend to cover airfares. The finals could be the top four in each, or something similar to the AFL's proposed final 10 where fourth and fifth in each conference play against teams in the other conference. Finals could be based on the final eight, with cross-conference finals in the second week when eight teams remain. This system would be fairer than the current unbalanced fixture, but has the deficit of being too similar to American systems and would not be liked by many for that reason.

Overall, I think some kind of sectional round would be the best approach, but that has its own issues with allocation of home games and fans not knowing until a week or two out if their teams have away games interstate. This can be mitigated by moving Gather Round to the first week of the sectional rounds.

[mcs]

Wildcard round is a stupid Amercanism. Adds nothing beyond making it all but impossible that a team from 7th or 8th will ever win the flag. Win 5 straight finals to win a flag - not likely. Especially when you'll have two contests against teams coming off a bye and fresh. And to be honest - who wants someone from 9th or 10th (Even with 19 or 20 teams) having a chance to win the flag. We didn't deserve to be anywhere near finals this year after the rubbish we served up, yet would have reached a wildcard game.

It works in some leagues but not the AFL for mine. But its extra $ and extra games, and that's the only @@@@ the head honchos at AFL care about.

[Thunder Shaker]

We didn't deserve to be anywhere near finals this year after the rubbish we served up, yet would have reached a wildcard game.

Round 11 (Melbourne) and round 12 (Adelaide) were rubbish games, but this "rubbish" happened when Sydney had important players out injured. Sydney was one of the form teams of the competition after round 12, winning 8 of 11 games. The losses were Bulldogs (9 points with more scoring shots), GWS (44 points) and Geelong (43 points). The wins included Brisbane at the Gabba and Fremantle, two teams that made the finals. Provided that Sydney defeated Gold Coast away (not a certainty), the Swans could have won as many as three games before losing a preliminary final. If finals were on the table, McDonald could have been available for selection.

The Bulldogs in ninth would not have been pushovers either. They would have played Hawthorn. The Dogs would likely have lost that (their recent form against Hawthorn is losses). Hawthorn made it to a preliminary final this year after becoming the first team to eliminate a minor premier in "straight sets" since 1983.

[mcs]

Round 11 (Melbourne) and round 12 (Adelaide) were rubbish games, but this "rubbish" happened when Sydney had important players out injured. Sydney was one of the form teams of the competition after round 12, winning 8 of 11 games. The losses were Bulldogs (9 points with more scoring shots), GWS (44 points) and Geelong (43 points). The wins included Brisbane at the Gabba and Fremantle, two teams that made the finals. Provided that Sydney defeated Gold Coast away (not a certainty), the Swans could have won as many as three games before losing a preliminary final. If finals were on the table, McDonald could have been available for selection.

The Bulldogs in ninth would not have been pushovers either. They would have played Hawthorn. The Dogs would likely have lost that (their recent form against Hawthorn is losses). Hawthorn made it to a preliminary final this year after becoming the first team to eliminate a minor premier in "straight sets" since 1983.

If is doing an awful lot of heavy lifting in there Thunder Shaker!

Our season was poor at best - it had good moments, but we weren't nearly good enough across the entirety of the season and didn't deserve to play finals football, no matter how good our second half of the season was. And yes injuries were a factor, but the cold hard statistical fact of the season was we only won one more game than we lost, and had a percentage below 100, at some 12 per cent below the worst top 8 team in Freo. Only 6 teams scored fewer points than we did, and we were ranked 11th defensively (on points conceded). None of that screams to me at all that we would of got anywhere near the back end of the finals had the wildcard existed.

[goswannies]

Rather than the wild card round, bring back the knock out night series for all teams that miss the finals like the original night series concept

[Thunder Shaker]

If is doing an awful lot of heavy lifting in there Thunder Shaker!

Only in the context of hypothetical "wildcard" finals.

Our season was poor at best - it had good moments, but we weren't nearly good enough across the entirety of the season and didn't deserve to play finals football, no matter how good our second half of the season was. And yes injuries were a factor, but the cold hard statistical fact of the season was we only won one more game than we lost, and had a percentage below 100, at some 12 per cent below the worst top 8 team in Freo. Only 6 teams scored fewer points than we did, and we were ranked 11th defensively (on points conceded). None of that screams to me at all that we would of got anywhere near the back end of the finals had the wildcard existed.

Making the finals with a percentage below 100 doesn't mean anything. It's been done many times by other clubs. North Melbourne's done it seven times, sometimes finishing as high as third with a percentage lower than 100 (1954 with 12 teams and a final four). North Melbourne's seasons with finals and a percentage below 100: 1954 (3/12), 1958 (4/12), 1985 (5/12), 1987 (4/14), 2002 (7/16), 2005 (5/16), 2008 (7/16).

Yes, it would happen a lot more with a final 10 (ninth and tenth), but making the finals higher than ninth with a percentage below 100 will still occur.

[mcs]

Only in the context of hypothetical "wildcard" finals.


Making the finals with a percentage below 100 doesn't mean anything. It's been done many times by other clubs. North Melbourne's done it seven times, sometimes finishing as high as third with a percentage lower than 100 (1954 with 12 teams and a final four). North Melbourne's seasons with finals and a percentage below 100: 1954 (3/12), 1958 (4/12), 1985 (5/12), 1987 (4/14), 2002 (7/16), 2005 (5/16), 2008 (7/16).

Yes, it would happen a lot more with a final 10 (ninth and tenth), but making the finals higher than ninth with a percentage below 100 will still occur.

Of course it will. My point being that a percentage under 100 usually is a sign of a mediocre season at best. Not always - but quite often. But its a bit harder to tell these days when there are generally a few 'bash em up' teams that throw percentages a bit out of loop - if you don't flog one of them during the season, it may not truly reflect the quality of the football being played.

Anyway, all nice theocraticals to keep us entertained over summer ha

[KSAS]

What makes this Wild Card round concept even worse in my book, is that the AFL has officially desigated it as a 5th week of the finals and not a knock out round to qualify for the top 8.

This is a top 10 finals system. Play 23 rounds to only eliminate 8 teams (less than 50%l). It diminishes the prestige of making the finals, where it was considered an elite achievement in doing so.

Another classic example of the AFL trying to fix a problem it had created in the first place when it introduced the pre finals bye.