AFLW Round 2 - 2024 AFLW season

[Teen Wolf]

Friday, 6 September

W. Bulldogs (18th) v Port Adelaide (12th)
4.30pm AEST, Melbourne Cricket Ground
7mate - SA


Saturday, 7 September

Melbourne (8th) v Brisbane (14th)
11.05am AEST, Casey Fields
7mate - QLD

West Coast (9th) v Essendon (16th)
1.05pm AEST, Mineral Resources Park
7mate - WA

Collingwood (13th) v Hawthorn (4th)
1.05pm AEST, Victoria Park


Sunday, 8 September

Richmond (10th) v GWS Giants (1st)
1.05pm AEST, Swinburne Centre
Seven - VIC; 7mate - NSW

Gold Coast (17th) v Carlton (15th)
1.05pm AEST, Great Barrier Reef Arena
7mate - QLD

St Kilda (2nd) v Sydney (6th)
3.04pm AEST, RSEA Park
7mate - NSW

North Melb. (5th) v Geelong (11th)
3.05pm AEST, Arden Street Oval
Seven - VIC

Fremantle (3rd) v Adelaide (7th)
5.05pm AEST, Fremantle Oval
7mate - SA, WA

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The Western Bulldogs are set to make their long-awaited return to the MCG...



...oops, silly me, that's a Melbourne footballer! Hang on, here's a Bulldog at the MCG:



But in all sincerity, whenever AFLW makes a rare appearance at this famous coliseum, I like to think of how many players will be getting the chance to compete on the hallowed turf for the first time.

In terms of current Dogs, I think just 3 have played there before: Ellie Blackburn (2013, 2015 and 2016 exhibition for Melbourne), Deanna Berry (2016 U18 for Vic Metro) and Ellie Gavalas (2022 S7 AFLW for North Melbourne).

With regards to the present Port list: Angela Foley (2016 exhibition for Melbourne), Jasmin Stewart (2016 U18 for WA) and Indy Tahau (2022 S6 AFLW for Brisbane) have played there before. Tahau is inactive though, and Stewart was only named an emergency last week.

---

Meanwhile I'm hearing from special sauces that the Saints-Swans affair on Sunday will start a minute early, thereby designating the Roos-Cats game as the indisputable 500th AFLW Match.

Whether that is true or just completely made up, the Arden Street fixture will in fact be the women's "SuperClash" for the Royal Children's Hospital, so all the more reason to get behind it.

 

[CURVE]

There are almost 20 players on the injury list, most listed as being out for the season with an ACL injury. That's seems to be an incredibly high number for this time of the season.

Injury List - September 3

 

[cmndstab]

There are almost 20 players on the injury list, most listed as being out for the season with an ACL injury. That's seems to be an incredibly high number for this time of the season.

Injury List - September 3

I may be misunderstanding something, but I count 84 players on the injury list, of which only 19 are ACLs.

 

[CURVE]

I may be misunderstanding something, but I count 84 players on the injury list, of which only 19 are ACLs.

19 is almost 20. At least that is what I was taught at school.

I think I may have missed a comma after season.

 

[cmndstab]

I may be misunderstanding something, but I count 84 players on the injury list, of which only 19 are ACLs.

Aha, I see how I was meant to parse your post now. Yes, 19 ACLs seems pretty hefty, although it might not be helped by many players having played a full season of state-based footy prior to this one starting.

By comparison, the injury list for round 3 in the AFL had only a single ACL injury.

https://www.afl.com.au/news/1094910/medical-room-the-full-afl-injury-list-r3

 

[Teen Wolf]

Teen Wolf's Exper-Tips
PA by 50
BL by 3
WCE by 12
Coll/Haw by 3 (depends on Davey's availability)
Rich by 12
GC by 3
StK by 24
NM by 12
Adel by 24

When ya think about it, I'm kinda tipping the Bulldogs to improve on last week's performance. Hard to do worse, though if they actually lose by "just" 50 per my tip, there will be no comfort derived from starting the season with two thrashings at the hands of 2023's 15th and 16th placers. The size of the MCG may or may not play a part--obviously its width is foreign to most AFLW grounds, but Alberton Oval is 10 metres longer.

My pre-season projections had Brisbane winning last week and losing this week, on the assumption they might have grown out of their play-much-better-as-underdogs tag. Comments by the coach before R1, and performance by the team during it, suggests this might not be the case. So I'll back them to narrowly avoid an 0-2 start by winning at a venue with a formidable reputation for away teams.

One of West Coast's two wins last year came against Essendon at Windy Hill. This time around they meet in WA, the Eagles are full of confidence, and the Bombers have some major injury concerns (not just the lack of key forwards in Toogood and Scott, but Amber Clarke also played a blinder when the two teams last met at Lathlain, while the loss of Brooke Brown also hinders the fast rebounding game which handed WC a heavy defeat).

Suns-Blues is a nightmare match to tip, keeping in mind Carlton knocked them off in R1 last year at home. Both teams poor last week, so I'll just stick with Gold Coast up in Mackay.

Saints were very good last week, and I didn't think the Swans were particularly impressive as a team but it could possibly be put down to just not playing the NSO dimensions well.

North Melbourne should get the job done with reasonable conviction against a Scheer-less Geelong at Arden Street, but it's still a very important game as they come up against Melbourne at Casey Fields next week, while the Cats are staring down the barrel of 0-2.

As for Fremantle, I've decided to tip their games based on whether the opposition has a good match-up for Aine Tighe. Would've held up if I abided by that philosophy in R1.

This was much more than I intended to write, but there are a lot of captivating contests this week, including the two matches I haven't really talked about, but I just don't have a strong feeling about what will happen in the Coll-Haw and Rich-GWS games.

 

[cmndstab]

As for Fremantle, I've decided to tip their games based on whether the opposition has a good match-up for Aine Tighe. Would've held up if I abided by that philosophy in R1.

Who are you imagining will take Tighe? I'm guessing Prowse, but I guess Biddell or Allan are options as well.

 

[mookieb]

Aha, I see how I was meant to parse your post now. Yes, 19 ACLs seems pretty hefty, although it might not be helped by many players having played a full season of state-based footy prior to this one starting.

By comparison, the injury list for round 3 in the AFL had only a single ACL injury.

https://www.afl.com.au/news/1094910/medical-room-the-full-afl-injury-list-r3

ACL injuries are the elephant in the room that no-one wants to talk about. Obviously women are more susceptible to doing ACL's and I fear that if AFLW had a full 24 game season at 20 minute quarters they would end up with 50 people with ACL's on the injury list.

Not sure if this would be somewhat rectified by a more professional training system in place now or if they can implement exercises to help in this regard though.

 

[Mitchell Madness]

ACL injuries are the elephant in the room that no-one wants to talk about. Obviously women are more susceptible to doing ACL's and I fear that if AFLW had a full 24 game season at 20 minute quarters they would end up with 50 people with ACL's on the injury list.

Not sure if this would be somewhat rectified by a more professional training system in place now or if they can implement exercises to help in this regard though.

Women are more prone to bow-legs. This puts extra pressure on the knees.
Part is genetic, the other is childhood.
We will see a change in 20-30 years as girls continue to be encouraged to play sports etc as children.

 

[Saints2001]

Tayla Harris ruled out for the whole season - hope she gets the treatment she needs now...

 

[jatz14]

ACL injuries are the elephant in the room that no-one wants to talk about. Obviously women are more susceptible to doing ACL's and I fear that if AFLW had a full 24 game season at 20 minute quarters they would end up with 50 people with ACL's on the injury list.

Not sure if this would be somewhat rectified by a more professional training system in place now or if they can implement exercises to help in this regard though.

AFLW looks bad in comparison to other sports, but that's mainly due to the number of players on the ground, and in a squad, and in the comp.

All of which are much bigger numbers than other sports.

Based on a per player basis, the AFLW is actually comparable sports like netball, basketball, soccer.

So, more players, more teams, bigger squads = big raw numbers of ACLs. But the chance of individual players doing ACLs isn't actually elevated.

Also, because the season is short, lots of those players listed out didn't do them in the AFLW, or this year.

On SM-A346E using BigFooty.com mobile app

 

[mookieb]

AFLW looks bad in comparison to other sports, but that's mainly due to the number of players on the ground, and in a squad, and in the comp.

All of which are much bigger numbers than other sports.

Based on a per player basis, the AFLW is actually comparable sports like netball, basketball, soccer.

So, more players, more teams, bigger squads = big raw numbers of ACLs. But the chance of individual players doing ACLs isn't actually elevated.

Also, because the season is short, lots of those players listed out didn't do them in the AFLW, or this year.

On SM-A346E using BigFooty.com mobile app

I wouldn't have any idea of other sports but to me the amount of ACL's is huge and there is certainly a massive difference between the AFL and AFLW.

 

[Teen Wolf]

An established fact acknowledged by the AFL's own annual AFLW injury report, and widely reported on by the media, since the competition's inception. Yep, such an elephant in the room.

 

[mookieb]

An established fact acknowledged by the AFL's own annual AFLW injury report, and widely reported on by the media, since the competition's inception. Yep, such an elephant in the room.

Well I would expect an AFLW injury report to include details on injuries...

A quick google check of AFLW ACL did bring a few articles from ESPN and ABC in 2023 and a couple of articles from 2022.

In all the games I haven't heard commentators mention it apart from discussing the tragedy for the individual player. To me women being 6 times more likely to do a knee than men would be a discussion topic but the AFLW tend to shy away from anything negative.

Has the AFLW website done any articles on the number of ACL injuries?

 

[petits]

In all the games I haven't heard commentators mention it apart from discussing the tragedy for the individual player. To me women being 6 times more likely to do a knee than men would be a discussion topic but the AFLW tend to shy away from anything negative.

Has the AFLW website done any articles on the number of ACL injuries?

Mostly the annual injury reports, but they usually lead with the ACL news, eg https://www.afl.com.au/aflw/news/99...ort-acls-at-all-time-low-concussions-increase

Devoting commentary time to it would be like pausing on commentating a men's match to discuss TBI and risks of brain problems in the future - it's an important topic, but not during gameplay.

Women are more prone to bow-legs. This puts extra pressure on the knees.
Part is genetic, the other is childhood.
We will see a change in 20-30 years as girls continue to be encouraged to play sports etc as children.

Do you have a source for that? I understood that there was an element relating to the pelvis width, but not bow-leggedness in the sense of the medical deformity.

 

[Teen Wolf]

"A quick Google search disproves my sweeping statement about how ACLs are a clandestine issue," says AFLW media watchdog.

 

[mookieb]

"A quick Google search disproves my sweeping statement about how ACLs are a clandestine issue," says AFLW media watchdog.

Feel free to show me if there are numerous articles on the subject.

The AFLW website provides articles on absolutely everything AFLW related. How many articles have they done?

 

[Teen Wolf]

Posted an hour ago on the AFL/W websites:

The incidence of ACL injuries occurring in matches has continued to decrease with 2.51 ACL injuries per 1000 player hours in the 2023 season.

The overall ACL incidence rate including training injuries hasn't risen over the last four seasons despite the increase in average number of games per club increasing from 6.6. to 11 in 2023. ACL injuries continue to be a leading cause of missed matches resulting in 5.44 missed AFLW matches per club during the 2023 AFLW season.

Omg why is the ACL crisis being covered up!!!

 

[Aristarchus]

I wouldn't have any idea of other sports but to me the amount of ACL's is huge and there is certainly a massive difference between the AFL and AFLW.

Fta.

And no kidding, I don't think you have any idea on anything except concern trolling across multiple threads trying to derail them. Maybe if you were genuine and were willing to listen or read you'd know already what TW easily pointed out, but that's not really the your purpose is it?

 

[Vacuous Space]

Out of those 19 listed ACL injuries, 9 of them are holdovers from last season. Five more of them happened to players playing in other competitions during the AFLW off-season. Out of the ones that happened since AFLW training resumed, as best as I can tell, two happened at training, three happened in the practice games. It's not like all these injuries happened in one round of footy.

Spoiler: ACL dates

Jade Pregelj (Brisbane) - Sept 2023
Kalinda Howarth (Collingwood) - Sept 2023
Ange Stannett (Freo) - May 2024
Alana Gee (Gold Coast) Sept 2024
Daisy Walker (GWS) - July 2024
Jacinta Hose (Melbourne) - 2023
Aimee Mackin (Melbourne) - May 2024
Georgie Jacques (Port Adelaide) - 2023
Indy Tahau (Port Adelaide) - Sept 2024
Lauren Young (Port Adelaide) - April 2024
Shelby Knoll (Richmond) - December 2023
Montana McKinnon (Richmond) - August 2024
Steph Chiocci (St Kilda) - October 2023
Annabel Johnson (West Coast) - August 2024
Kayley Kavanagh (West Coast) - April 2024
Courtney Rowley (West Coast) - November 2023
Elle Bennetts (Western Bulldogs) - September 2023
Keely Coyne (Western Bulldogs) - October 2023
Mua Laloifi (Western Bulldogs) - August 2024

 

[mookieb]

Fta.

And no kidding, I don't think you have any idea on anything except concern trolling across multiple threads trying to derail them. Maybe if you were genuine and were willing to listen or read you'd know already what TW easily pointed out, but that's not really the your purpose is it?

Instead of being fragile you could provide references to the AFLW site where they discuss AFLW ACL injuries. I'm always happy to be proven wrong.

It is a round 2 discussion topic though so I'll pivot.

Port by 25 (marked down for weather and MCG)
Ess by 6
StK by 10
Hawks by 10
Melb by 4
NM by 20
GC by 8 (GC marked up a bit for weather)
Rich by 22
Ade by 6

 

[Mitchell Madness]

Mostly the annual injury reports, but they usually lead with the ACL news, eg https://www.afl.com.au/aflw/news/99...ort-acls-at-all-time-low-concussions-increase

Devoting commentary time to it would be like pausing on commentating a men's match to discuss TBI and risks of brain problems in the future - it's an important topic, but not during gameplay.


Do you have a source for that? I understood that there was an element relating to the pelvis width, but not bow-leggedness in the sense of the medical deformity.

There is a bit of pseudo-science to it as correlation does not equal causation, and it isn't like they can make someone bow-legged to test the theory.

Plenty of information (from both reliable and unreliable sources) with a quick google search

 

[Aristarchus]

There is a bit of pseudo-science to it as correlation does not equal causation, and it isn't like they can make someone bow-legged to test the theory.

Plenty of information (from both reliable and unreliable sources) with a quick google search

There's no quick fix or answer. It'll come down to multiple factors and unfortunately the research across multiple sports has lagged for decades as has all research involving women and sports science. Its even hard to do on grand scales now because of the variance in professionalism even in the same leagues (soccer is a good example). Actually where the AFL/AFLPA getting organised could be world leaders given there should be a relative baseline to professionalism and training standards across the AFLW.

But anyone saying the issue is being ignored is living under a rock and has spent 0 effort or time in women's sport spaces.

 

[mookieb]

There's no quick fix or answer. It'll come down to multiple factors and unfortunately the research across multiple sports has lagged for decades as has all research involving women and sports science. Its even hard to do on grand scales now because of the variance in professionalism even in the same leagues (soccer is a good example). Actually where the AFL/AFLPA getting organised could be world leaders given there should be a relative baseline to professionalism and training standards across the AFLW.

But anyone saying the issue is being ignored is living under a rock and has spent 0 effort or time in women's sport spaces.

On the odd chance you're referring to my post I stated that I consider the number of ACL's to be a concern and that it is an issue that isn't discussed by the AFLW. Never said it's being ignored. Might be high priority but if it is it isn't discussed with people following the sport.

 

[Teen Wolf]

When are the "play it on smaller grounds" truthers going to acknowledge the biggest collision injuries last weekend once again took place on below-average sized playing dimensions?

Or are torn ACLs the only kind of injury worthy of discussion (noting there were none during R1)?