Angst over the state of AFL football was a big social media theme last Thursday night.
I really enjoyed the start of last Thursday night’s Hawthorn-Sydney clash at the MCG. It was open football and the goals flowed, 11 of them in the first 23 minutes, but the skills were high and I thought there was enough of the contested tough stuff to suffice.
Turns out I was wrong, apparently. Worse, it was my fault, too, because as a “Boomer” (actually I’m on the cusp of Gen X, but who’s quibbling?) this was all because me and my generational like in the football media had grumbled too long and loud about the “state of the game”, hence the latest slew of rule changes.
Tweet after tweet from mostly younger footy fans bemoaned the game having turned into uncontested basketball, swifter ball movement thanks to some rule changes supposedly making defence impossible, and a season of tedious blowouts seemingly inevitable.
Wow, talk about a bunch of Chicken Littles! And talk about going early with the hysteria! As it transpired, the “basketball” didn’t even last past quarter time at the MCG. The subsequent three quarters produced a collective 16 goals and a tense and tight tussle ensued, Hawthorn only sure of victory with a couple of minutes left.
And if you want deeper statistical proof of what was being roundly derided as bruise-free basketball between the Hawks and Swans actually proving anything but, consider the following numbers, courtesy of Champion Data.
Across the four quarters, 39.6 per cent of possessions were won from a contest – the second-highest percentage in any game so far this season. There were 128 tackles applied, the third-most in a game this season. And there were 56 forward half intercepts – the third-most in any game this season.
Action from last Thursday night’s Hawthorn-Sydney clash at the MCG.
The other major cause of hand-wringing angst when it’s come to the rule changes, despite just 21 of 207 home and away games having now been played, has been the potential for more lopsided blowouts. Maybe that will prove the case, too, though I don’t think that’s a given. But there’s little evidence to suggest it to date.
In fact, at this same stage last year (with two fewer games thanks to two being postponed), we’d had seven games decided by 50 points or more, the same amount as 2026 thus far. And we’ve also already this season seen no fewer than nine games determined by 14 points or less.
It actually feels a bit like Groundhog Day at the moment to this admittedly crusty old observer.
Every year the season starts like a whirlwind, with seemingly profound changes, freer-scoring more open football, and we see a catalogue of “hot takes” from the usual suspects proclaiming a “revolution” of some form or another.
And then fatigue, fouler weather and familiarity with opposition kicks in, and there’s a correction back to something like the status quo.
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This year, yes, the various rule tweaks, particularly the “last touch” rule eliminating boundary throw-ins between the arcs, appear to have quickened things up, but I’m not sure the ramifications are or will prove as dramatic as some insist. Ditto the ruck rules.
We know the changes like the 6-6-6 and “stand” rules have been more about freedom of ball movement and fewer stoppages as much as scoring, and to that end I’ve been a fan of more end-to-end football. But really, the overall impact in the context of a two-hour game has been pretty minimal.
If there had really been a major impact, surely average scores per team wouldn’t have hovered at either 83 or 84 points, as they have now for the past four completed seasons.
But look, if there does prove to be a more dramatic spike in flowing, attacking and, yes, higher-scoring football, I’m here for it. Contested footy is great, tackles, smothers, close-in work is terrific, but if push comes to shove, it’s the raw skill of kicks, marks, handballs, and tremendous athleticism I want to see most.
And I strongly suspect (as we saw in the Hawks v Swans game) that what we’re most likely to see now is simply more contrast in patches of football even in the midst of the same games, bursts of high-powered, high-scoring play then counteracted with defensive strategy. Surely that sort of variety is a good thing?
I’m of the age now where I’m the subject of a lot of those famous “old man yells at cloud” memes on social media when I have an (admittedly frequent) grumble about stuff. The irony in this case, though, is that it’s the mainly the “younger men” in the footy world doing the shouting!
Football fans of my vintage might have a preference for a more open, free-scoring style of game with which we grew up, but anyone assuming that inevitably also meant a non-physical game lacking toughness (as basketball used in a football analogy always implies) is way off the mark.
I’d actually suggest they need to watch a game like the famous 1989 grand final between Hawthorn and Geelong as an educational tool, the definitive proof that Australian football can be open, skilful, high-scoring and still tough as nails in the contest and in defence when it needs to be.
And nearly 40 years on, it still can be. Our game doesn’t have to be one thing or the other. Indeed, I’d counter that Simpsons meme with grandpa yelling at clouds with one of my own which people might recognise, the little girl from the taco ad who says, simply, “Why not both?”
This article first appeared at ESPN.
