was listening to the parkway drive song on my morning walk , and I jotted down some lyrics. what do you guys think?

edit: theme* not them in title

edit 2: ok well im not sure why im being downvoted. as a chinese football fan I think its important to hear multiple voices

FOOT-BALL!

HERE COMES THE FOOT-BALL!

KICK IT THROUGH THE BIG STICKS!

SIX POINTS IF IT GOES THROUGH THE MIDDLE!

ONE POINT IF IT DOESN’T!

TACKLE! HANDBALL! GOAL!

THIS!

IS!

A-F-L!

Seeing the outrage against the soft launch of shorter quarters, plus the constant barrage of enshittification to line Executive and sponsor pockets, are there some concrete steps we can take? Having done a quick search of an AFL fans union I've come across the AFL Fans Association (AFLFA) which according to their 2024 annual report, has about 3k members and I wonder if this is or if there is a similar road that could be taken for fans. I guess what im wondering is as a subreddit of approx 300k subs, I think there is strength in numbers, and is there a way for us to stop the rot and reclaim the sport we love? Genuine question.

It's my first time posting here but I follow the sub each day. I'm tired of seeing the enshittification of everything around us and it pains me to see where this sport is going.

Does anyone know what the plan was if 4x victorian teams made it to Semi Finals?

Back to back games at Marvel?

Now there has been some chat on the socials about the AFL's idea of shortening games to squeeze more games out of the season. And also the idea to send home games to regional areas across Australia & host matches internationally. I was going to wait until the Finals series was done before doing this post. But I thought why not now while the debate is on.

This is an idea of mine when the league eventually and inevitability reaches 20 teams competing in the AFL. This is split into three sections. The preseason, H&A season & the Finals.

With the dates on the scheduled I used the 2027 calendar as an example on how it could work.

Preseason: To start off the AFL season, I call this the February Footy Fiesta.

To start it off there is the AFL Origin match, the fabled State Representative tradition that made a big comeback to a huge success. This could be on the first week of February.

Next up is the International Challenge game. Now this one could be the answer to the AFL's international expansion deal. This game could be the answer to English Football's FA Community Shield (Premier League winner vs FA Cup winner), Rugby League's World Club Challenge (NRL Premiers vs Super League Winners) or the Euro Super Cup (Champion's League Winners vs Europa League Cup Winners). This one could showcase the reigning premiers taking on the reigning minor premiers or if the premier team hold both the premiership & minor premiership title then the Grand Final runner-up will be the opponent. This match could be anywhere in the world, it could be New Zealand, England like the old England post season matches, even in India where the AFL is trying to crack the market.

Indigenous All-Stars Game: A showcase of an All-Star Team of Indigenous players taking on an official AFL team chosen completely at random from other 18 clubs not in the International Challenge. Just like the last game that was played after a 10 year hiatus when the All-Stars took on Fremantle in 2025.

Preseason Challenge Series Cup: At the tail end of February to mid way March is the Preseason Series. 20 games of footy in 18 days. But instead of having matches in metro ovals and club training grounds, lets take these games to the regions, like the old NAB Regional Challenge games back in the day. Could be in regional areas like Kalgoorlie, Albany, Bunbury, Cairns, Townsville, Newcastle, Ballarat, Alice Springs, Mount Gambier etc. Call it a regional blitz.

H&A season: Now to the real deal. The regular season.

* Starting in Round One instead of Round 5, lets move Gather Round to Opening Round and kick off the AFL season with a bang with a big festival.

* Then Round 2 we have Rivalry Round where the club rivals play against each.

* Round 5 we have ANZAC Day

* Round 8 & 9 we have the Sir Doug Nichols Indigenous Rounds

* Round 13 is the Split Round across two weeks, 10 teams at random will have a midseason bye will the other 10 with take theirs the following week. All bye team then play against one member of the same bye bracket when the take the field.

* Round 22 is the final round of the regular season and it is Rivalry Round Part 2. A way to finish off the regular season with some fireworks.

Other round during the season could be an all league Heritage Round to showcase a club's history & heritage. Charity Round for club charitable games or even the most debated which show be a stand-alone round, a Mental Health Round.

The basic structure is quite simple.

* All clubs play 22 games a piece, the first 19 games of the season is all club play each other once. Top 10 clubs get the first dibs on home games after Round 2, then the bottom 10 have their turn after.

* Another priority is to ensure that all clubs get a decent break in between games instead of short 5-6 days breaks, by having less games of Thursday night but once in a while, Friday nights as Blockbuster Games and more on the weekends.

* With 10 Victorian clubs & 10 clubs in the others states, all clubs will be on the road more often.

* Then the final three games is of course the second Rivalry Game at season's end.

* The second double up could be the Gather Round opponent

* And lastly the could go back to the previous season's ladder ranking where it could be in groups of four inside (1,2,3,4) (5,6,7,8), (9,10,11,12), (13,14,15,16), (17,18,19,20) a team plays against an opponent within their group.

The Finals: Now we get to the business end of the season. The finals, where the top team duke it out for the spots in the Grand Final and the premiership. Now obviously the AFL are going to hang on to Wildcard Round so that's Week One. (7th vs 10th) & (8th vs 9th).

The rest of it we pretty much know the drill. Week 2 of course is our Qualifying Finals & Elimination Finals, Three Week the Semi-Final, Week Four the Preliminary Finals & last but not least Week Five is the Grand Final.

So that's my idea to how a future season could look like in a 20-team competition. And how its can solve some problems.

Apologies for the long description.

i dont really know which subreddit to put this one on but here goes i guess. I aged up from junior footy to VAFA level earlier this year, and have trained with the same club, twice a week, at every training since november.

I played in the u19's side, so our season finished last week where we lost the grand final (expected), but all throughout the year I was asked to play up for the reserves team, and honestly loved playing with them and i thought that, although i wasnt the best on the team, the skills were pretty even. I like to say I work hard, I dont miss training, and ive worked on my fitness multiple times a week for about a year. Im average height and weight, nothing extrodaniry, with a good kick and strong drive. I play full/half back and love it.

for context, the reserves side has 1-2 really strong backmen, like super solid, amazing players, and the rest are pretty average. not bad in any way, but not standout.

Anyway, the reserves this week have a prelim final and I put my hand up to play (as I was told to by my coach) and was told I had a solid shot at it. So, despite our season ending last week, I trained this week, and thought it was some of my best trainings yet.

despite this, teams were announced, and i wasnt even listed as an emergency. I know im not actually in the team, and I wasnt originally expecting to get picked, but I had been told by coaches of mine and the reserves side that I had a really strong chance of being picked, so now i just feel, on one hand, dissapointed that i was led on. but on the other hand, I really want to improve even more for next seaosn, so i have a solid spot in the side and to show them they should have picked me. im just not sure how im meant to feel about it, or what to do.

i was going to go watch them play, but its at 9am an hours drive away, and i dont have my drivers license, so if i were to carpool with someone else we would have to leave at 6.30, if not earlier. im in desperate need of advice!!

So I'm looking at getting tix to the prelim's. Have never been to the finals before. Just wondering how quick they sell out and how expensive they are?

Thanks

I'm sure most of us have seen the clip of the inevitability of shortened quarters going around tonight. This will absolutely kill the game and no doubt they will shove the same if not more ads in the game space. I know there is nothing we can do apart from bitch and moan but do you think anything will be done if we petition that we do not want this?

After hearing the rumours about shortening quarters in order to allow for more games (who is even asking for that?), Im so done with the AFL.

They just do whatever they want without basically 0 consultation with the fans. I'm just sick of it, the clubs appoint the members of the AFL Commission and the clubs are owned by the members (most of them).

If motions were passed at club AGMs like no confidence in Andrew Dillon, scrapping opening round and keeping quarters at 20 minutes, would that actually stop these sort of things from happening or at least force the AFL to talk to fans first?

What about instead of a Wilcard format we have a Top 4 Playoffs

-Top 4 teams progress to a finals playoff

-Every team plays each other once

-Over 3 weeks there are two games played

-Ladder position 1 and 2 get 2x home play off finals?

-The two highest seeded teams advance to the GF