Fixture AFLW Gather Round (??)

[Teen Wolf]

A subject already raised in the 2024 fixture thread, but likely in need of its own space eventually, if not already. ICYMI...

AFL and AFLW Collective Bargaining Agreement 2023–2027:

Schedule 5B – AFLW Player and List Management

1. AFLW Season Structure​

1.3 2025, 2026 and 2027 AFLW Seasons​

(a) ... the 2025, 2026 and 2027 AFLW Seasons will consist of a minimum of twelve (12) AFLW Premiership Season Matches for each AFLW Team and a four (4) week AFLW Finals Series.​

12 May 2024, News Corp:

The AFL and NT Government have begun talks of hosting an AFLW Gather Round in Darwin in future years...

The Sunday Territorian understands both stakeholders are in the early stages of planning a potential Gather Round for Darwin to host across four grounds.

TIO Stadium would be the main stadium used with options to play games at Cazalys Arena in Palmerston and potentially even the smaller boutique Gardens Oval situated just outside the CBD. TIO Stadium Oval 2 would also be considered as an option.

17 July 2024, News Corp:

A far North Queensland city has made a bold bid to the AFL to host the inaugural AFLW Gather Round.

Cairns Council and AFL Cairns have launched the ambitious bid after landing the Hawthorn AFLW side on a three-year deal in June and now wants to continue to expand the game in the region.

The round could see four games played at Cazalys Stadium, two games in Port Douglas and one game each at suburban grounds. Cazalys Stadium has hosted an AFL game between 2011-2022, except in 2019. The region hosted its first AFLW game in 2023.

In summary:
The AFL have to add at least one more round next year, and they're looking for a council/government to pay for it.

If they can strike a really good deal, perhaps it'll even fund a 13th round which would make it worthwhile imo (as everybody would then get 6 home, 6 away, and 1 GR game).

Both Darwin and Cairns proposals sound dreadful (particularly for the players), let's be honest, but I wouldn't object to either without being privy to the commercial terms of such an arrangement.

 

[Teen Wolf]

Marvel Stadium would be the best option if there's not going to be a 13th round, since it'd be the only way to retain something vaguely resembling 6 home and 6 away games per team (by making each GR game a Melbourne team vs Geelong/non-Vic team).

Plus you don't actually need multiple grounds for AFLW Gather Round, as the matches are Rugby League length. The fixture could simply be something like:

Fri 6.05pm: Rich v Syd
Fri 8.20pm: Coll v Adel
Sat 12.35pm: Melb v GC
Sat 2.50pm: Carl v Frem
Sat 5.05pm: WB v WCE
Sat 7.20pm: StK v Geel
Sun 12.05pm: Haw v GWS
Sun 2.20pm: NM v BL
Sun 4.35pm: Ess v PA

We all know the other benefits of having a whole round of women's footy at a proper stadium, so I won't get into that. And anyway, the AFL would actually go for this if the Vic govt wanted it badly enough (which I'd say is a 0.1% possibility).

 

[Teen Wolf]

Arguably Sydney "deserves" to host it, and the AFL would love the promotion (I guess there's also a 0.1% chance that the final decision won't be entirely dictated by money).

It would be ok in Adelaide too but my initial thought about that is... if Mr Malinauskas cared about AFLW, he would've found a way to add it to the contracts signed ~15 months ago.

Darwin, Cairns, Canberra, Regional Vic etc: don't seem like good options to me, assuming they all involve 2nd/3rd/4th grounds with substandard facilities.

I didn't add Perth to the poll because of timezones, even though it could be said the AFL should be doing more to help inject life into WA women's footy and this would be a good start.

SE Qld and Tasmania: Maybe it could be done across Brisbane/Gold Coast or Hobart/Launceston, but that'd require more dealings with either of those state's governments, and Andrew Dillon would rather stick pins in his eyes I'm sure.

 

[Teen Wolf]

I put North Sydney Oval and Henson Park as the option for Sydney in the poll, but it might be better to just use one to start with (hard to know if two venues isn't going to cannibalise each other).

That one venue would have to be NSO, since it has proper lights and also a 2nd oval within ~100 metres, on which players can warm up and therefore minimise time between matches.

From the perspective of maximising attendance: The best fixture for a Sydney AFLW Gather Round is probably to put the Swans on Friday night, and the Giants on Sunday. Then put the 6 biggest Vic clubs on Saturday, and also promote both NSW clubs (men's and women's teams) will be there signing autographs and running clinics etc.

Here's what my team have come up with: