Laws of the Game committee proposals

[one-eyed]

Laws of the Game committee proposals

AFL general manager football operations Adrian Anderson today said he had written to all 17 AFL clubs, seeking their feedback on the key Laws of the Game topics that are up for discussion for the 2011 Toyota AFL Premiership Season.

Mr Anderson said that after consulting with clubs and key stakeholders throughout the season, the laws committee had put forward seven proposals for feedback from the football community. Following this final round of consultation, a final set of proposals would then be considered by the AFL executive and Commission later this year.

View the full Laws of the Game proposals document by clicking (PDF document will open in a new window)
http://afl.com.au/portals/0/afl_docs/laws_050810_v3.pdf

The proposals for feedback are:

1. Restricting interchange by one of the following methods:
(a) Three interchange players and one substitute player
(b) Two interchange players and two substitute players
(c) Cap of 80 interchanges per match (including changes at breaks)

2. Length of game: adjust the timing of quarters to keep the average length between 29-30 minutes

3. Advantage rule: player not umpire decides if there is an advantage (as per 2010 NAB Cup trial)

4. Boundary umpires pay free kicks for holding and high contact at stoppages (as per 2010 NAB Cup trial)

5. Free kick against player who drags ball under opponent (as per 2010 NAB Cup trial)

6. Rough conduct (shepherd): make consistent with head down over the ball rule so that a player who shepherds is guilty of a reportable offence if he makes forceful contact to the head or neck, unless the contact was caused by circumstances outside the control of the shepherding player

7. Scoring system: If a ball hits the posts inside the goal-scoring area and goes through, it remains a goal. If a ball hits the posts inside the point-scoring area and goes through, it remains a point

Mr Anderson said the AFL was also seeking the public's feedback on these topics, and supporters can respond via afl.com.au.

Full article at:
http://www.afl.com.au/news/newsarticle/tabid/208/newsid/100109/default.aspx

[Ramps]

1a for me

[wayne]

1a for me

Same for me.

Also, rule 5, umpires are having a tough time with the regulation holding the ball rule, why make it harder for them?

[one-eyed]

Here's the survey webpage to give your opinion

http://www.afl.com.au/aflrulesyoursay/tabid/16504/default.aspx

[mightytiges]

Here's a original idea - how about we leave the rules of the game alone for once and let the game evolve naturally as it should .

1. Restricting interchange by one of the following methods:
(a) Three interchange players and one substitute player
(b) Two interchange players and two substitute players
(c) Cap of 80 interchanges per match (including changes at breaks)

This only makes any sense if one side cops an injury early on in the game and they can't rotate the bench as much compared to their opponents. So if there has to be a change then 1a makes some sense. The 3 interchanges players are rotated tactically while the interchange is the spare. It still doesn't solve the rare times when a side is unlucky and is left with 2, 1 or no-one on the bench. Injuries are just part of the game and it's just bad luck. Sometime you gain from it and sometimes you are disadvantaged. Swings and roundabouts. Altering the interchange won't solve every situation and coaches will find new ways to abuse and take advantage of whatever system is in place.

2. Length of game: adjust the timing of quarters to keep the average length between 29-30 minutes

Pass. Sheesh I remember some quarters in the "old" days going for 35 mins plus.

3. Advantage rule: player not umpire decides if there is an advantage (as per 2010 NAB Cup trial)

Pass. It's the umpire's job to officiate the game.

4. Boundary umpires pay free kicks for holding and high contact at stoppages (as per 2010 NAB Cup trial)

Not the worse idea but why limit it to just certain frees. Either leaves things as they are or turn them into field umps positioned on the other side of a stoppage. The problem with that though is the talent pool for AFL standard umps is very thin as it is.
 

5. Free kick against player who drags ball under opponent (as per 2010 NAB Cup trial)

The umps are having enough trouble as it is to get the existing interpretations right let alone adding more interpretations.

6. Rough conduct (shepherd): make consistent with head down over the ball rule so that a player who shepherds is guilty of a reportable offence if he makes forceful contact to the head or neck, unless the contact was caused by circumstances outside the control of the shepherding player

I'm guessing this is a reaction to the Josh Kennedy shepherd on Colin Sylvia in the preseason which broke Sylvia's jaw. Doesn't a rule for illegal high contact already exist and the MRP is meant to be there to judge whether the illegal shepherd is worthy of a report?

7. Scoring system: If a ball hits the posts inside the goal-scoring area and goes through, it remains a goal. If a ball hits the posts inside the point-scoring area and goes through, it remains a point

The most stupid suggestion of the lot by daylight. Let's just change a fundamental aspect of the game because there are 3 mistakes a year out of the 5000 or so goals kicked. Furthermore this will just replace one uncertainty with a new one. So typical of the AFL's rule changes over the past 5 years under dopey Anderson. Tries to solve one problem that he only sees as a major issue by creating new problems which in turn he needs to create new rules for to "fix". Hey Anderson what happens when the ball hits the post and rolls along the goal-line and the goal ump calls it play on when the ball was actually over the line or the goal ump calls a goal when the ball was still partly inside the line and in play. Imagine the uproar. Yep AA let's change the game fundamentally and create new uncertainties and difficulties for the goal umps  .

Adrian Anderson is complete and utter moron. He goes on SEN just now that he wants to keep the game as the best spectacle it is but by changing the rules every 5 minutes he mustn't think it is  ???. Sack the little twirp please!  

[WilliamPowell]

One minute they want to keep the game flowing and not slow it down

Now they want to slow it down

PASS ON ALL

Leave it bloody well alone for gawd's sake 

Adrian Anderson is complete and utter moron. He goes on SEN just now that he wants to keep the game as the best spectacle it is but by changing the rules every 5 minutes he mustn't think it is  ???. Sack the little twirp please! 

Post of the decade 

[Rodgerramjet]

Great decision by the AFL to cap the interchange to 80 should have been done 2 years ago when it first started to be abused. If I had my way i'd make it 60 or less, there is no way in hell that a side needs that many interchanges a match its crap.

[mightytiges]

One minute they want to keep the game flowing and not slow it down

Now they want to slow it down

PASS ON ALL

Leave it bloody well alone for gawd's sake 

 

Adrian Anderson just makes it up as he goes along 

[wayne]

The most stupid suggestion of the lot by daylight. Let's just change a fundamental aspect of the game because there are 3 mistakes a year out of the 5000 or so goals kicked.

What about the history of the game?

Do we go back in time and watch every shot at goal Ablett, Lockett or Dunstall ever had and give them goals for posters they may have kicked, or do we have an asterisk next to future champion goalkickers' names saying that although they have beaten Lockett's record, we counted posters in their overall tally??  ???

[one-eyed]

KB defended the new proposed laws yesterday ....

Bartlett said on his SEN radio program this morning that his committee try to be "one step in front" … of trends in football "so serious things (injuries) don't happen to players."

He says if fans are so happy with football the way it is, they have rule changes over the past five years to thank.

Bartlett compared his committee's work to changes in road laws aimed to avoid accidents.

Bartlett used his program this morning to canvas feedback on the rule changes, apparently one of the methods he uses to determine which aspects of the game are tampered with.

"All these areas that are being looked at have been talking points on this program for starters."

http://www.theage.com.au/afl/afl-news/bartlett-defends-rule-change-proposals-20100812-120b1.html

[Tigermonk]

Leave the game as it is in fact of the removed some of the stupid rules the umpires would have more brains & make less mistakes

get rid of Anderson & Demetriou & put someone who likes football & not money in charge
And as much as l respect KB l think he needs to retire & travel the world 

[one-eyed]

Hard to see the "goal off the post" one getting up when Demetriou said today even he is against such a change.

[RollsRoyce]

I think the theory with capping the number of interchanges is to stop this mega-flooding, lockdown tyle of game that has become so prevalent.
If the players don't have the amount of rest necessary to do the kind of up and down gut-running this style entails,theoretically the game will open up. Not surprisingly the loudest voice of dissent to this proposed change is Mick Malthouse,currently the worst exponent of this horrid, ugly, stifling style of congested rubbish.
If the theory works, then I'm all for it as a means to returning to an open, man-on-man, high scoring free flowing game. But I'm not convinced that an interchange cap in itself is enough.
Leigh Matthews posited a radical solution in The Age yesterday that I think has a lot of merit, whereby a rule keeping 8 players per team at one end of the ground at ALL times could be introduced. I love the idea. I know a lot of you will jump up and down on this and say "leave the game alone". But you'd be the same ones complaining that you hate all the backwards, sideways keepings-off junk we currently have to endure.
The point is, the game wont fix itself, or evolve past this sorry state as many say, as long as tossers like Malthouse, Paul Roos, and Ross Lyon continue to shamelessly "uglify" the game in their pursuit of a flag.
Hell, even Dean Bailey was copying Mick's trick's last week. Does anyone remember how long the ball was locked up in our forward line going nowhere because he had the full-team "press" on? Something HAS to be done to stop this CRAP!   

[Penelope]

If they really wanted to open the game up they'd just get rid of the wings.

[mightytiges]

If the rules had been left alone over the past 5 years (excluding the ruck rule to prevent PCL injuries) and just allowed the game to evolve naturally the AFL wouldn't need to bring in more rule changes to fix the problems the initial rule changes caused. Let's see the AFL and in particular Anderson are complaining about the speed of the game now yet they were the ones who changed the kick-in rule and brought in rules to reduce stoppages to speed the game up. Go Figure! They are making it up as they go along  .

Also remember it was only 4 years ago that non-Vic teams dominated the top 8 and there was supposedly a crisis in Vic football. Guess what no one touched anything and now Vic clubs dominate the top 8. Dopey Anderson needs to realise the game has evolved fine without his compulsive needs to intervene to "save it" and "fix it"  .

If they really wanted to open the game up they'd just get rid of the wings.

Spot on. That's the simplest solution - reducing the numbers on the field so there's more gaps in zones/floods and what's more it doesn't require a massive change to the rules. You should apply for AFL CEO al  .