AFL sets club membership recordThe Age
August 23, 2013 The AFL's off-field dramas haven't stopped the competition's 18 clubs cumulatively attracting more members this season than ever before.
The AFL on Thursday announced a record club membership tally of 756,717, a 6.94 per cent increase on last year.
Eleven clubs broke their own membership records, including Collingwood, whose 78,427 members are more than any club has had before.
Hawthorn (63,353) and
Richmond (60,321) also topped the 60,000 mark.
The AFL's two newest clubs, Greater Western Sydney (12,681) and Gold Coast (12,502), have tallies that are clearly the competition's lowest, although both increased on last season. Battlers Melbourne (33,177) and St Kilda (32,707) were the only two clubs to have membership decreases.
The AFL also announced on Thursday it would trial the Vision-Stacking System, which it had tested earlier this year, to assist with scoring decisions in 12 matches across the final two rounds.
The system enables a decision to be reviewed across multiple camera angles on one screen in real time. It was tested earlier this year at the MCG, and would now be tested live, according to football operations manager Mark Evans.
''We are assessing the system … to see if it provides benefits in improved accuracy and/or reduced time taken on decisions,'' he said.
http://www.smh.com.au/afl/afl-news/afl-sets-club-membership-record-20130822-2seke.html
