One-Eyed Richmond Forum
Football => Richmond Rant => Topic started by: one-eyed on April 08, 2020, 07:01:24 PM
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Will you see the 2020 premiers (be it us or an opposition club) as having won a genuine premiership or will they always have an asterix next to their name?
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AFL: This could be a very special and noteworthy premiership win given the amount of logistical obstacles in the way and the amount of adaptability teams will have to display to get there.
Rohan Connolly: Rules on the run, altering the playing conditions of matches midway through a competition in any sport, doesn't do a lot for integrity.... I can't be the only one who is really struggling to embrace the possibility of a Grand Final played in December. To be blunt, it seems ridiculous. Not to mention potentially compromising the quality of next season as well. If there's an arbitrary line of a tolerable amount of change to the normal season format, that, in my view, certainly crosses it. And I'm having more than a few misgivings about most of the other compromises being mooted, or already in effect.
My Footyology podcast co-host Mark Fine is as fanatical and devoted a fan of the Saints as I have met. This week, he volunteered he'd much rather St Kilda didn't salute in 2020, such is the level of scepticism he already has about plans to play out the rest of the season.
It's the football public which will decide whether the 2020 premier is worthy, or will forever carry an enormous asterisk beside its name like some sort of scarlet letter.
Connolly's full article: https://www.espn.com.au/afl/story/_/id/29008967/when-premiership-not-really-premiership
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Enormous asterix, still like to see some footy though but once again I doubt it!
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They should cancel the season.
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If us or West Coast win it then no
If anyone else wins it - especially GWS or Collingwood - then yes there has to be an asterisk
You know it makes sense
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If us or West Coast win it then no
If anyone else wins it - especially GWS or Collingwood - then yes there has to be an asterisk
You know it makes sense
:clapping
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If us or West Coast win it then no
If anyone else wins it - especially GWS or Collingwood - then yes there has to be an asterisk
You know it makes sense
For the others no premiership awarded. If Hawthorn win then take two of their others away.
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They should cancel the season.
Think that will be the result.
Couldn't find another thread so will post my reasoning here.
This will go on for a long time. The government has said their Jobkeeper is in for 6 months and that's their minimum. So a shut down of business for that long.
Their modelling obviously shows that's what will be needed.
If you look at the two curves idea the short sharp one is about three times shorter than the flat one that we're trying to achieve.
Italy started about March 1 and probably just reached it's peak with a slightly longer tail to come.
You can probably presume about 3 months in total.
If we then assume 3 times that makes it at least 6 months and more likely to be 9 months at least.
Our outbreak started at the end of January and adding 9 months takes us to October.
If we can't play until October, due to government restrictions around business and isolation, starting the season then is pointless.
I think we'll just cancel the season and roll over into a full 2021 season.
Now the 2021 season.
There will be no draft in 2020 (no junior footy either) and the draft age will be raised to 19 as will the TAC. Not a bad thing IMO and long overdue.
Lists will be limited to 36/38 and I don't know how they will lower contracts like Dusty's but they must do it, with the AFL controlling many list decisions
There will be severe restrictions on off-season spending and this is why clubs that can afford it want to avoid the hand of the AFL on their choices.
Independent clubs (Richmond, West Coast, Collingwood, Hawthorn, Bulldogs, Adelaide) will be able to structure their lists and staff as they see fit, the others won't.
Using Richmond as an example (which won't hopefully happen), the AFL may well decide that the list cuts will come from the out-of-contract players.
We have 44 including rookies so eight must go.
Out of contract are 12 and 3 rookies. The club could be forced to choose between a Caddy and an RCD.
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Duff and Quarters: The 2020 AFL season will have an asterisk, so would you still want your team to win?
The West Australian
Thursday, 30 April 2020 4:39PM
The 2020 AFL season has been irreversibly altered due to the coronavirus so would you still care if your team didn’t claim the premiership?
Speaking on The Duff and Quarters podcast, The West Australian’s chief footy writer Mark Duffield and The Sunday Times sports editor Glen Quarterman debate whether or not this season has become meaningless.
“I don’t want this to be Fremantle’s first premiership this year.” longtime Dockers fan Duffield argued.
“If let’s say, we get a hub in WA here, and let’s say Fremantle and West Coast stay at home for the entire remaining 16 weeks of the home and away season.
“Then there’ll be all this catcalling about you only won it because you had all these home games.
“Let’s not kid ourselves, (the 2020 season) doesn’t just have an asterisk around it, this has a whole circle of asterisks around it.”
Quartermain believes footy teams would still cherish a tainted title.
“It will still mean something to a club because a premiership is a premiership.
“It’s highly unlikely we’ll get crowds this year, can you imagine grand final day your standing on the dais with the cup and there’s no one in the terraces?”
One thing the pair can agree on is that the 2020 season needs to occur in some form for the long-term security of the AFL.
“The overriding fact, we gotta get that season under way.” Quartermain said.
Revenue lost from door sales and broadcast rights would be so great that AFL clubs and the league itself would be under significant financial risk.
https://thewest.com.au/sport/the-game-afl-podcast/duff-and-quarters-the-2020-afl-season-will-have-an-asterisk-so-would-you-still-want-your-team-to-win-ng-b881532494z
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The asterisk, and why it shouldn’t ruin Richmond’s run at history
May 1, 2020
Max Laughton
FOX SPORTS
And in sports, nothing suggests something is wrong more than the simple asterisk.
While in Australia, fans are more familiar with the * mark next to a not-out cricketer, across the global landscape, the asterisk suggests a lack of purity. That someone, or some team, did something... but they didn’t really.
Once the 2020 AFL season was shortened, some critics suggested its premier wouldn’t be a true premier; that by virtue of the year being different, it wasn’t the same as all others.
“I’ve heard the asterisk label bandied around and it is a different season, a different time, but we’ll be happy to have an asterisk next to our name,” Collingwood coach Nathan Buckley said in early April.
But what exactly does the asterisk mean in sport? Should it really apply to this AFL season? And if it does, what does that mean for Richmond - a club striving for a historic feat of greatness?
EXPLAINING THE ASTERISK
Asterisks have been used since the Middle Ages, in an attempt by the author to connect one passage of text to a footnote, or separate comment.
In sport, the mark is most commonly associated with baseball.
Back in 1961, the New York Yankees’ Roger Maris broke the single-season home run record, smashing 61 dingers to surpass the legendary Babe Ruth (60).
However Maris did so in the first season of 162 games - eight more than Ruth’s 154-game season. And so the commissioner of baseball, Ford stuff, called on the keepers of the sport’s record books to put a “distinctive mark” next to Maris’ record, to refer to the fact his friend Ruth still held the 154-game record.
A New York sports writer, idiot Young, took this to mean Maris’ record held an asterisk, which it has been associated with ever since.
Then in the late 1990s, when baseball went through an offensive explosion - partially spurred on by the use of steroids - the asterisk returned. Maris’ record was smashed by Mark McGwire, then Barry Bonds, both of whom had grown grotesquely swollen in recent years.
Most famously though was when Bonds broke Hank Aaron’s career home run record of 755. The ball for his 756th home run is now in the Baseball Hall of Fame - with an asterisk on it.
No-one is suggesting anyone would be cheating by winning this year’s AFL premiership; instead that because of the sheer number of differences between this season - whenever it is played - and previous ones, it deserves some marker signifying that.
SO HOW WOULD THIS APPLY TO RICHMOND?
While every team would be desperate to win the 2020 flag, you could argue the Tigers would be most negatively impacted by an asterisk being placed on it.
After all, Damien Hardwick’s sign is trying to enter rare air, as one of the few teams in VFL/AFL history to win three premierships in four years.
It has only happened eight times - ten, if you count a pair of overlaps which we’ll explain in a second - and we’d argue to win three in four is the mark of a dynasty.
One flag is hard enough to win, and three in three years is incredible, but adding a fourth year onto that shows a certain amount of impressive longevity.
Just look at the teams the Tigers are trying to join as some of the greatest in league history.
THREE FLAGS IN FOUR YEARS (or better)
Carlton - 1906, 07, 08 [Threepeat]
Collingwood - 1927, 28, 29, 30 [Fourpeat]
Melbourne - 1939, 40, 41 [Threepeat]
Melbourne - 1955, 56, 57 (OR 57, 59, 60) [Threepeat OR Three in Four]
Carlton - 1979, 81, 82 [Three in Four]
Hawthorn - 1986, 88, 89 (OR 88, 89, 91) [Three in Four, twice]
Brisbane Lions - 2001, 02, 03 [Threepeat]
Hawthorn - 2013, 14, 15 [Threepeat]
These are inarguably some of footy’s greatest ever teams - the ‘Machine’ Magpies, the early aughts Lions, the modern-day Hawks.
Richmond is the betting favourite to win the 2020 premiership, and would join these teams if it did so. That is why this year is so important to them.
BUT DOES THIS YEAR REALLY DESERVE AN ASTERISK?
An AFL flag has never before had an asterisk placed on it - despite some years with massive difficulties and changes, compared to others.
The only thing we can really compare this coronavirus-forced hiatus to is the two World Wars, which each had different impacts on the relevant VFL seasons.
Early in World War I, the VFL voted as to whether it would play the 1915 season, passing 13-4. The season began the day before the Gallipoli landing.
The season most different to all others was 1916. From nine teams, the VFL was reduced to just four - Carlton, Collingwood, Fitzroy and Richmond. They all made the finals, and so after winning just two games all year, Fitzroy had a chance at the flag... and won it.
Teams gradually rejoined over the ensuing three seasons, with Melbourne the last to return in 1919.
During World War II, no Brownlows were given out, and Geelong was forced out of the competition through 1942 and 1943 because its fans couldn’t attend games in Melbourne (there were restrictions on rail and road travel).
There were also slight changes in some future seasons. In 1952 for example, there was one extra round - this was used for a ‘National Day’, in which all six VFL games were played outside of Melbourne.
The number of rounds was also constantly shifting, moving between 18, 20, 19, 18, 22, 24, 22 and 24 and finally falling on the current number of 23.
WITH ALL OF THAT, DOES 2020 REALLY DESERVE AN ASTERISK?
So, just how different will footy be this year?
We’ll have fewer rounds, shorter games and potentially more interchanges than in recent seasons. The games are also likely to be compacted closer together.
But is that much worse than 1916, when the wooden spooner won the flag, and there were fewer than half as many teams as the year before?
Not once have we seen Fitzroy’s premiership from that year declared invalid, or even really tainted. South Melbourne won just three flags before moving to Sydney, and one of those was in 1918, a WWI-impacted season. That one still counts.
There is one constant through VFL and AFL history: change.
We’d have to agree with Collingwood president Eddie McGuire’s view on this.
“If you want to put asterisks up, I’d start with salary cap years,” he said on Triple M last month.
“Then I’d move through, what do you do, the war years?
“Do you put the years, Darc, where we didn’t have a grand final, which was the Bombers’ first win in the original season, where whoever finished on top got the premiership?
“I mean I think once you set the terms of what the season is, that’s the season and away you go.
“Every year we’ve ever played we’ve had a compromised draw since we went away from 22 games and 12 teams… if the AFL gets a season away this year, that’s the season.
“Whoever holds up the cup gets the cup, they’re the premier of that competition.”
Let’s all agree: if the Tigers win the 2020 flag, they join the dynasty club. If GWS, Fremantle or Gold Coast wins its first flag, it’ll never be proclaimed invalid.
(Well, actually, if the Suns win it, we’ll be questioning reality a tiny bit.)
https://www.stuff-on-2020-premiership-is-richmond-a-dynasty-afl-dynasties-asterisk-in-sports-best-afl-teams-ever/news-story/4895e56abd2173ae847460da1b8eefd9
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If there ever was a premiership that needed an asterix it was Essendon 1924. They won it only on % despite us beating them in the finals and ending up on the same number of round robin finals wins as them. We are still the only club to have won the last game in September yet weren't given the flag.
Up until the late 60s there were only 18 rounds in a season. 1916 only had 12 rounds. So 17 rounds this year playing each other once is still a valid comp. Of course, that's if we win it again ;D.
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The 2020 premiership will be one of the greatest flag wins: Hardwick
Sam McClure
The Age
18 May 2020
Reigning premiership coach Damien Hardwick has laid down the challenge to his players and the rest of the competition, declaring the 2020 premiership will be one of the greatest ever achievements seen in the game.
Players returned to clubs across the country on Monday, with groups of eight allowed to train under strict protocols handed down by the AFL.
Many clubs have voiced concerns about training loads and the greater risk of injury as the league moves closer to a June 11 restart, likely to be kicked off by the Tigers playing old rivals Collingwood behind closed doors at the MCG.
But the Richmond coach has brushed off any concerns and has told his players that this is a unique chance to create history.
"For us it's an opportunity," Hardwick told reporters on Monday.
"I know a lot of people have jumped up in arms a little bit in regards to an unfair playing field and it's going to be a little bit different, but this will be one of the greatest premierships ever won in AFL.
"The circumstances we are in presents an enormous opportunity for our footy club and our players are very much looking forward to it.
"We're very well placed. We do a lot of work not just in our physical preparation but our mental preparation as well, so we're very confident the way we will prepare will lead us into a very good round two and onwards result."
Superstars Dustin Martin and Trent Cotchin were among the first group to train on Monday morning at Punt Road.
Hardwick said the club doctors and high performance bosses were keeping a close eye on players' groins and calves in particular, as players undertake more dynamic training now that they are able to train in more than just pairs.
And although some clubs have opted to separate their backs, fowards and mids to mitigate the risk of losing an entire line if one player tests positive to COVID-19, the Tigers have sought to keep things as normal as possible.
"No, we've just backed in our system. At the end of the day, we just worry about what we can control, our backs are all together, our mids are all together," Hardwick said.
"The connection of how we play is vitally important, so for us it was more about, 'let's get the connection of our team up and going straight away'.
"We've got great faith in our players in regards to hygiene and washing of hands, social distancing. We've been very well educated from our strength and conditioning and our medical staff so we're very confident they'll be OK.
"Our biggest, number-one priority is getting our side playing together as quickly as we can in this three-week period."
Premiership defender Bachar Houli is the only Tiger with an injury concern as they head back to training.
Houli missed the round one win over Carlton with a calf strain, but Hardwick is confident it won't be a long-term injury.
https://www.theage.com.au/sport/afl/the-2020-premiership-will-be-one-of-the-greatest-stuff-20200518-p54ty6.html
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Tigers primed for 2020 AFL flag challenge
Anna Harrington
18 May 2020
Richmond coach Damien Hardwick believes the Tigers are in a good position to capitalise on the difficulties of the 2020 season and push for their third AFL premiership in four years.
This year's season is like no other - reduced to 17 games plus finals, likely all without crowds - but Hardwick said those conditions presented an "opportunity" for his side, who could become the first Tigers outfit to go back-to-back since 1974.
"I know a lot of people have probably jumped up in arms a little bit with regard to 'it's going to be an unfair playing field and it's going to be a little bit different' but this will be one of the greatest premierships ever won in AFL," Hardwick said.
"The circumstances we're in presents an enormous opportunity for the club and our players are very much looking forward to it - as are our coaching staff and our fans."
On Monday all AFL players were permitted to train at their clubs in groups of eight before of a return to full training on May 25.
Hardwick said the Tigers had put a lot of work into mentally preparing their players for the season restart, as well as their physical conditioning.
Rather than the difficult circumstances bringing Richmond back to the pack, Hardwick was confident the Tigers' well-established playing style and stable squad put them at an advantage.
"We've embedded a game plan that we've been very fortunate to have had three seasons of playing - it will always evolve but our playing list is relatively stable as well," he said.
"We've brought in some young talent but predominantly, the 18 to 22 players that are going to form the basis of our side are on the track and training together right now, so I think it will hold us in good stead.
"There's going to be some challenges, there's no doubt about that... But we're very confident that we'll be able to put on a good product come round two and the season thereafter."
https://www.maitlandmercury.com.au/story/6760397/tigers-primed-for-2020-afl-flag-challenge/
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AFL should NOT hand out a premiership cup in 2020: Cometti
By SEN
18 May 2020
Legendary footy commentator Dennis Cometti doesn’t believe the AFL should hand out a premiership or a Brownlow Medal in 2020.
Cometti believes the imbalance of the fixture and the issues COVID-19 has caused should see the 2020 season simply be “exhibition” matches.
“I can understand all that’s going on here, but I don’t think there should be a premiership or a Brownlow Medal,” he told Mix 94.5 radio in Perth.
“I just feel strongly about that because this is a standalone world event, this isn’t over.
“So playing says more about Australia’s spirit than it does a cup or a medal. I think they should just drop the idea of it being a competition because it is so lop-sided, so strange and who knows what they’re doing in two weeks time.
“I don’t think you can have a real serious competition based on what is pretty flimsy ground.
“Exhibition games would sort of be the way I would describe them.
“The best players are playing, but at the same time, these players are going to be finding these surrounds and everything they’re doing out of character so it’s going to be a tough time for them.
“Everyone thinks of them of being an elite group because of what they’ve done so far and that is break what most people are doing, so I don’t think they’d be much on the football ball, if you like, they wouldn’t be thinking about football and I don’t think they’d be approaching it the same way.
“As a football man I just think this would be a very awkward situation to be in, particularly if you’re playing golf with someone you’re playing against next weekend.”
https://www.sen.com.au/news/2020/05/18/afl-should-not-hand-out-a-premiership-cup-in-2020-cometti/
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What a twit.
2020 will still be a deserving brownlow and premier.
If they all play each other once for at least 100 minutes it's all fair.
All teams and players have the same rules anyway.
Preseason stuffed up, no magoos, players out of condition, less rounds to run them into form etc. Lots of new tactics and restrictions, personnel cuts. Whoever wins 2020 deserves it. Very tough year. Need to adapt.
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If they keep mucking around with the rules and treating this season as a way if experimenting with everything, then it will carry an asterisk
in my book. They've already shortened the quarters. No more stupid changes just because we can.
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'This will be one of the greatest premierships ever won in AFL': But will it?
Rohan Connolly
The Age
21 May 2020
Step by tiny step, an AFL season aborted after just one round inches back towards a resumption.
We have an official date for a restart, June 11.
To that end, news stories about this or that injured player's chances of proving their fitness for round two have emerged.
Senior coaches are resuming their weekly media conferences.
All of which is making the beast which is the AFL industry these days just a little easier to feed than has been the case for the past couple of months.
In fact, one of those coach's news conferences on Monday produced an eminently quotable line.
But it wasn't the first time it had been uttered during the last eight matchless weeks.
And it's doubtful it will be the last, either.
Reigning premiership coach, Richmond's Damien Hardwick, asked about the challenges this unique season will present, had little hesitation in answering: "This will be one of the greatest premierships ever won in AFL."
That is already becoming a bit of a refrain. The cynic in me wonders whether clubs have been encouraged to get that message out there, not only to players they're trying to motivate as they pick up the tools again, but indeed to an entire AFL supporter base which, like all of us, has been pondering just how seriously we can take this season.
It's certainly a big call. Is it true?
Well, without dismissing whatever sort of season we end up with as a waste of time or even worthy of an asterisk, I'm not sure the hyperbole stacks up.
Implicit in that claim is that not all premierships are equal. And that on its own I can understand.
There are seasons when the heavyweight teams of the recent past may be in decline, other clubs succumb to a plague of injuries, the twists and turns of fate play a bigger role, and a flag may be "pinched".
There are others when great teams are at their very best, the depth at the top of the ladder is plentiful, and when winning a premiership may mean overcoming not just one but several highly credentialled opponents when the stakes are highest.
Hardwick refers more to the logistical and structural hurdles which will have to be overcome this year than the quality of the competition as such.
But you'd be donning the rose-coloured glasses to think the first factor isn't going to impinge significantly on the second in 2020.
There are degrees of disadvantage, of course, inherent in the AFL structure even in normal seasons, largely to do with the travel factor in such a large country and home ground and home state games.
But they have increased significantly with the demand that the two teams from both South Australia and Western Australia will have to be at least initially housed on the Gold Coast, playing games ordinarily scheduled at home far away.
Then there's the temporary elimination of second tier competitions for players not picked in the senior 22.
That impacts on all clubs, but surely harder on those with less experienced lists, not just robbing youngsters of serious competitive hit-outs and slowing down their development, but also working against senior players returning from injury.
Already, it's looking like this will be a particularly bad year for a club to have a poor run in the medical room.
It's not a good year to be a team based outside Victoria.
And it's not a good year to have a major influx of talent still becoming familiar with each other (eg. St Kilda) or to be attempting to overhaul a game plan (eg. Essendon or Fremantle).
So there are at least 10 clubs arguably starting from further behind scratch than usual even before adding those for whom injuries become a significant concern.
Call me simplistic, but doesn't that actually decrease the factor of difficulty for the favourites rather than make it harder?
And even if the logistics remain complex, unfamiliar and changeable, aren't they the same issues with which every club will be dealing?
If everyone is struggling similarly, the bar will be set significantly lower compared to other years in more normal circumstances. And someone still has to win.
Indeed, in 2020, it could well be the least-compromised rather than the best of the best as such.
None of which is to argue, by the way, that the 2020 flag should be disregarded.
I'm feeling a lot more comfortable about its status now we can be reasonably confident the schedule will look at least reasonably similar to normal, and that we'll have a premier decided at least by the end of October rather than the unthinkable late December timeframe which initially seemed a distinct possibility.
Perhaps there are plenty of footy fans out there for whom there will seem barely a difference.
And perhaps there are plenty, also, who might be more sceptical than me, or given the events of recent times, finding it hard to muster much enthusiasm for a mere game.
The AFL has to be prepared for that possibility and for the smaller TV audiences that implies, in the same way it is bracing itself for life as a smaller, leaner and less ambitious outfit even when the health concerns are over and we're left with longer-lasting economic problems.
In this climate, you have to make do with what you've got.
And if there really is a contrivance to the "one of the greatest premierships" line, it's hyperbole we can probably do without.
https://www.canberratimes.com.au/story/6763477/this-will-be-one-of-the-greatest-premierships-ever-won-in-afl-really/
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As AFL great Wayne Carey put it, “If you win (the premiership) this year, there might be an asterisk saying this is the best premiership ever.”
This will be a challenging season for all clubs, coaches and players. In fact, it will be one of the most challenging seasons in the game’s history, which might, in fact, make an asterisk next to the season worthwhile, but certainly not because it’s inferior.
https://www.theage.com.au/sport/afl/in-the-afl-s-history-this-season-is-still-far-from-the-weirdest-yet-20200520-p54usa.html
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While Mick Molloy’s dream of every club playing the entire season at Punt Road Oval won’t come to life, he won’t slap an asterisk on the 2020 premiership.
Unless his beloved Tigers fail to get up for a third flag in four years.
“I think it is (legitimate). But then again, our window’s open at Richmond,” he said.
“It’ll be legitimate till Richmond can’t win it. Then it’ll be a farce.”
https://7news.com.au/sport/afl/mick-molloys-theory-on-the-legitimacy-of-the-2020-afl-premiership-c-1068267
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With no crowds and few goals, what is the point?
Greg Baum
The Age
11 July 2020
At least three accomplished former players I know wonder why the AFL is persevering at all with season 2020.
...
So when wondering about whether it is worth it to ad lib our way through this syncopated season, the cliche of the age rings true: it is what it is. My confidantes who scratch their head about the whole project have a valid point of view, but they had good careers and are living rewarding other lives and so can take or leave.
For the rest of us, given a choice between this footy and no footy, we’ll take this footy every time.
Read the full article here: https://www.smh.com.au/sport/afl/with-no-crowds-and-few-goals-what-is-the-point-20200710-p55axf.html
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Forget the asterisk - this AFL flag will have an exclamation mark
Rohan Connolly
ESPN
21 October 2020
For what seemed an eternity as the logistics of this most unusual AFL season were thrashed out, we were asking whether the eventual premier would forever carry an asterisk beside its name.
And yet, come late Saturday night, whether it's Richmond or Geelong, it's far more likely to be an exclamation mark.
Is that hyperbole? I don't think so. It's also one of the few occasions in my professional career I've been delighted to be able to say I was wrong.
I was certainly one of the sceptics early on. Too many compromises to competition integrity with a shortened schedule, shortened games, a compacted fixture and surrendering of home grounds, I felt. Not to mention the aesthetics of, as was being seriously discussed, a Grand Final in December.
With the accompanying background noise about the extent of the financial calamity were we not to have a season at all, it all seemed a bit unseemly, and the quick grabs from coaches about "greatest premierships" given the logistical difficulties a little too manufactured.
I'm certainly not prepared to declare Saturday's flag winner anything like 'greatest'. But I suspect strongly we're going to hear a steady trickle of post-season stories about the difficulties 'clubs in hubs' endured which give us all a better idea of the extent of obstacles either the Tigers or Cats had to climb on their way to the flag.
Not the likes of incidents involving Richmond pair Sydney Stack and Callum Coleman-Jones or Sydney's Elijah Taylor. But the toll on mental health to which Collingwood coach Nathan Buckley alluded recently, or North Melbourne coach Rhyce Shaw's current struggles.
Hub life, for Richmond and Geelong, has now extended to well over 100 days, three times the initial estimates of just over 30 with which they thought they'd be dealing with.
Football clubs and players particularly, crave routine. And never have the routines of professional sportspeople been thrown out the window in such dramatic fashion as 2020.
That the two grand finalists have been able to perform to any sort of level at all, let alone in recent weeks recover from potentially morale-sapping first-up finals defeats to scramble back on to the Grand Final stage, is remarkable enough even before they win or lose in this last concerted effort.
There's also a compelling argument that the way events have unfolded in season 2020 have given the determining of the premiership team even greater legitimacy in terms of competition integrity.
Those who (and with some justification) bemoan the loaded AFL fixture in which teams normally play 12 opponents once and just five twice can have far fewer grumbles this year with every side playing every other just the once pre-finals.
The Tigers will be looking to win a third premiership in four years. Ryan Pierse/Getty Images
And so, by virtue of the two teams playing off, has the home and away factor been largely removed as a potential 'leg-up'.
I wouldn't have had any quibbles at all with the rights of either Port Adelaide or Brisbane to be competing for a premiership on Saturday. But had either won their preliminary finals, we would surely already this week have heard much debate about that advantage, given the Grand Final would have been the Lions' 12th game out of 20 played on their home deck, while Port Adelaide also got to play just on half their games at home.
Richmond and Geelong's success this season would have been even more satisfying for both clubs given they are the two Victorian clubs subjected most to bleating about their normal home ground advantage.
Since their re-emergence as a heavyweight in Round 6 of 2007, Geelong have won a staggering 92 of 103 (or just on 90 percent) of games played at Kardinia Park, an edge which popular argument has gone has inflated their ladder finish and thus explained its finals disappointments.
The Tigers clearly love the MCG. Since their amazing resurgence in 2017, they've won 42 and drawn another of 49 games there (or 86 percent) including, obviously, two Grand Finals against non-Victorian teams.
Well, they don't get to play off for a premiership on it this year. And have graced their favourite ground just four times all season, for only two victories, too.
Collectively, the Tigers and Cats have played just seven times in 40 games at home in 2020. A win on Saturday would be a good antidote to popular wisdom as well as adding another trophy to the cabinet.
Which is another reason there's a genuine buzz around this contest. Take this season as just another chapter in a modern-day premiership novel, and this is a clash of true heavyweights on the scale of Ali vs. Frazier.
Even if they lose on Saturday, Richmond remains clearly the best team of the past four seasons. A third flag in four seasons will give them officially the mantle of owning (behind hat-trick winners Brisbane and Hawthorn) the third-most successful era football has seen since the Hawks between 1988-91.
Geelong, meanwhile, in terms of total games won, is the standout team not only of the 21st century, but the entire AFL era.
The Cats have missed finals just once in the past 14 seasons, won three flags, played in four Grand Finals and 10 preliminary finals. It's been a phenomenal run. stuff it with a fourth premiership, and only Hawthorn, with five, will stand above Geelong (and West Coast) in the most obvious measure of AFL-era greatness
You don't get better bonafides than those the Tigers and Cats will take on to the Gabba on Saturday evening. And you won't find two grand finalists who have negotiated not only as many, but as unexpected hurdles to get there.
Only a few short months later, any talk of asterisks beside the 2020 premiership team's name seems ridiculous as well as insulting. And whoever prevails, far from an afterthought, will be a team likely in years to come to be hailed louder than most of its predecessors.
https://www.espn.com.au/afl/story/_/id/30152242/afl-2020-grand-final-rohan-connolly-greatest-richmond-geelong
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Will the 2020 premiership have an asterix?
Not now :snidegrin.