Opinion Which club currently has the biggest home ground advantage in the AFL?

[GC2015]

2024 home game W/L records at main ground/s

• Sydney: 9-2 @ SCG (81.8%)
• Gold Coast: 7-2 @ Carrara (77.7%)
• GWS: 6-2 @ Showgrounds (75%)
• Port Adelaide 9-3 @ AO (75%)
• Fremantle: 7.5-3.5 @ Optus (68.1%)
• Collingwood: 6-3 @ MCG (66.6%)
• Geelong: 6-3 @ Kardinia Park (66.6%)
• Brisbane: 7-4 @ Gabba (63.6%)
• Carlton: 6-4 @ Marvel/MCG (60%)
• Melbourne: 6-4 @ MCG (60%)
• St Kilda: 6-4 @ Marvel (60%)
• Essendon: 6.5-4.5 (59%)
• Hawthorn: 3-3 @ MCG (50%)
• Adelaide: 5.5-6.5 @ AO (45.8%)
• Bulldogs: 4-5 @ Marvel (44.4%)
• West Coast: 4-7 @ Optus (36.3%)
• North Melbourne: 2-5 @ Marvel (28.5%)
• Richmond: 1-10 @ MCG (9.1%)

There's more to it than just the W-L record (like travel, crowds etc), but the numbers above should give people a good idea of what's going on. So, which club currently has the biggest home ground advantage in the AFL and why?

 

[craffles]

Geelong, Gold Coast, Brisbane, Sydney and GWS as no one else plays home games there and they do regularly.

End thread.

 

[Strapping Young Lad]

Hawthorn: 3-3 @ MCG (50%)

Now do Launceston.

 

[randyzany]

Geelong, Gold Coast, Brisbane, Sydney and GWS as no one else plays home games there and they do regularly.

End thread.

Mmmm.... I'll put Sydney, Giants, (although Giants foolishly schedule one of their home games in Canberra) Brisbane, Gold Coast, (Suns may also schedule one of their home games somewhere else, can't be bothered looking into it) West Coast, Fremantle, Adelaide, Port as clear cut equal first as they play 10 home games against teams that rarely play in their respective home grounds.

Sometimes years between matches, and have to contend with the impact of plane travel such as hopping on a plane for 2 to 4 hours (not to mention driving to the airport and driving from the airport to the hotel) at least a day before the game and booking alternative accommodation that disturbs the usual pattern of visiting teams

Geelong on the other hand have had just 9 games at Kardinia Park (and there might have been a few seasons where Geelong just had 8 or just 7 games at KP if I recall correctly) for decades as they have been strong armed by the AFL to play 2 of their home games at the 'G.

For Geelong's genuine 9 home games most of the away visiting teams that come to KP are just an hour drive down the road. Players playing for Melbourne based teams (some could even be living in or near Geelong) don't have to fly out a day before and arrange hotel accommodation to sleep in a foreign environment before the game. It is hardly some huge cumbersome task that involves the aforementioned inconvenient impact of teams flying to a different city.

And in regards to Geelong's 2 MCG 'home games', it is almost always against one the so-called Big 4 clubs that have larger supporter bases (and usually playing well enough to be in the Top 8 or thereabouts) that can drown out Geelong supporters, who have to travel to watch their own team play in a home game.

So, Geelong's home 'advantage' is relatively negligible compared to the advantage that interstate sides get playing against teams that have to travel by plane to Brisbane, Gold Coast, Sydney, Adelaide and Perth.

Geelong's home advantage for mine is generally overrated because of the club's success due to being well managed, as it's not even close to the much bigger advantage that interstate sides get from their home games.

Granted Geelong do get to play a few more MCG matches in a year in comparison to interstate clubs but that's a whole different topic altogether.

 

[Pistol Night]

GC in Darwin

 

[L_W_P]

Geelong, and it's not even close IMO.

They get all the schedule benefits of being a VIC team, only leaving the state 4-5 times a season, while also having a unique home ground.

If we are focusing on just home games then maybe there's another conversation but, with the scheduling of their away games, the Cats advantage at home is amplified exponentially more than anyone else.

 

[terrybull]

I voted Brisbane because of opposition players brains becoming numb of constantly hearing Country Roads and Sweet Caroline…

 

[Timothy Luncheon]

Geelong, and it's not even close IMO.

They get all the schedule benefits of being a VIC team, only leaving the state 4-5 times a season, while also having a unique home ground.

If we are focusing on just home games then maybe there's another conversation but, with the scheduling of their away games, the Cats advantage at home is amplified exponentially more than anyone else.

Correct. Cats fans won't accept that though. If they got home games in finals then they'd have the clearest advantage in both the H&A season and the finals

 

[PhatBoy]

Geelong, and it's not even close IMO.

They get all the schedule benefits of being a VIC team, only leaving the state 4-5 times a season, while also having a unique home ground.

If we are focusing on just home games then maybe there's another conversation but, with the scheduling of their away games, the Cats advantage at home is amplified exponentially more than anyone else.

We played 7 home and away games interstate this season, 6 the year before.

 

[PhatBoy]

Correct. Cats fans won't accept that though. If they got home games in finals then they'd have the clearest advantage in both the H&A season and the finals

Tell you what. When the tigers host us at Kardinia park, we will call it square.

 

[JasRulz63]

Sometimes years between matches, and have to contend with the impact of plane travel such as hopping on a plane for 2 to 4 hours (not to mention driving to the airport and driving from the airport to the hotel) at least a day before the game and booking alternative accommodation that disturbs the usual pattern of visiting teams

For Geelong's genuine 9 home games most of the away visiting teams that come to KP are just an hour drive down the road. Players playing for Melbourne based teams (some could even be living in or near Geelong) don't have to fly out a day before and arrange hotel accommodation to sleep in a foreign environment before the game. It is hardly some huge cumbersome task that involves the aforementioned inconvenient impact of teams flying to a different city.

The benefit of home ground advantage sounds heavily outweighed by the non Victorian clubs having to travel every second week based on what you're saying.

Geelong, and it's not even close IMO.

They get all the schedule benefits of being a VIC team, only leaving the state 4-5 times a season, while also having a unique home ground.

If we are focusing on just home games then maybe there's another conversation but, with the scheduling of their away games, the Cats advantage at home is amplified exponentially more than anyone else.

I think this is where I land. If you're talking purely home games, the non Victorian sides probably have a bigger advantage, but taking into account the whole fixture, Geelong have the most advantageous H&A fixture IMO given non Victorian clubs have to travel essentially every second week.

 

[voorhees]

Geelong, and it's not even close IMO.

They get all the schedule benefits of being a VIC team, only leaving the state 4-5 times a season, while also having a unique home ground.

If we are focusing on just home games then maybe there's another conversation but, with the scheduling of their away games, the Cats advantage at home is amplified exponentially more than anyone else.

winner...
the unfair advantage continues year after year

 

[PhatBoy]

winner...
the unfair advantage continues year after year

Oh my, it’s just such a struggle for the poor MCG teams isn’t it. How DO they cope with the world against them, their 14 or so games at their home ground each year, their long, long road trips occasionally down the tramway to Docklands where their supporters must rug up like Robert Scott and Captain Oates and brave the conditions, and their supporters leave home and tell their loved ones ‘I’m going out for a walk, I may be some time’ and no one really knows if they will ever make it back, and they have to leave notes at incremental points along the way to tell people of their remarkable journey to and from the venue.

It’s a hard life.

 

[Jimmy Yamazaki]

MCG tenants have won 9 flags out of 17 since 2008, it would be 10 if it wasn't for Covid in 2021, yet people still have you believe it's a "neutral/fair" venue that gives no advantages lol.

 

[randyzany]

The benefit of home ground advantage sounds heavily outweighed by the non Victorian clubs having to travel every second week based on what you're saying.



I think this is where I land. If you're talking purely home games, the non Victorian sides probably have a bigger advantage, but taking into account the whole fixture, Geelong have the most advantageous H&A fixture IMO given non Victorian clubs have to travel essentially every second week.

It was intended more as a facetious mocking of Melbourne clubs that insist in comparing traveling to play in Geelong to flying to another city; it's a ridiculous notion to even think the 'disadvantage' is in the same ball park. Just more bitching and whingeing to dismiss Geelong's ability to consistently play in finals in the past couple of decades.

These clubs used to have basically the same 'advantage' when they had their own boutique stadiums (Glenferrie Oval, Victoria Park, Punt Road Oval, Princes Park, Whitten Oval, Moorabbin Oval, Windy Hill, Arden Street Oval, etc..) but relinquished it without a fight by bending over to the AFL's stadium rationing plan in the late 90s.

Interstate sides travel 11 times whilst Geelong sometime travels up to 7 times in a season, 4 games it's not that of a huge discrepancy between Geelong and interstate clubs to be honest.

In any case the main disadvantage is not actually the disruption to the usual routine by having to travel first class by plane and staying at luxury hotels to another city in Australia.

The biggest disadvantage lies in playing in an unfamiliar stadium by virtue of playing there only once every 2 to 3 years and the dealing with a one-eyed partisan crowd (95% feral home fans) that highly influence the multi coloured maggots into favouring the home team in the majority of contentious decisions.

Because half the clubs are in Melbourne, interstate clubs do eventually become more familiar and therefore get used to playing at Docklands and the MCG, more so than the other way around.

I'd rather Geelong be an interstate club and get to play 11 genuine home games and the opportunity to play several times in Melbourne in the same 2 grounds, Docklands and the MCG.

Interstate sides don't know how good they have it; whingeing fans of these clubs are a just of bunch of ingrates that will never be satisfied until Collingwood, Carlton, Essendon and Richmond are the only clubs based in Melbourne.

That's not just gonna happen any time soon. The AFL needs the other smaller Melbourne clubs to justify the asking price for the TV rights; more airtime content for Rupert and Channel 7 to fill their premium prime time commercial slots.

 

[Dirty Bird]

Geelong. with Brisbane/Sydney also being quite good.

However, I feel having specific setups with secondary grounds can also give a large advantage.

So I think Hawthorn and Western Bulldogs have a good HGA too.

North Melbourne, Gold Coast and GWS have good setups however, their regular HGA is negligible, so not in the same breath as above.

 

[Sttew]

Geelong, and it's not even close IMO.

If we are focusing on just home games then maybe there's another conversation but, with the scheduling of their away games, the Cats advantage at home is amplified exponentially more than anyone else.

WOW!! What is the scheduling of away games issue? FYI in 2025 Cats get 6 interstate games and Saints get 5.

 

[Papa G]

When the game is structured to advantage an over represented region in a state sanctioned corrupt league minor things like home ground advantage mean little.

 

[L_W_P]

WOW!! What is the scheduling of away games issue? FYI in 2025 Cats get 6 interstate games and Saints get 5.

No issue.

The 'quirk' in the fixture is that Geelong generally play their away games in Vic at the MCG. In 2025 you play Marvel teams in Essendon & Carlton there, as the away team.

With non Vic teams screaming for MCG games year on year, those little things add up.

I'm not sure why Cats fans get so defensive about it.

I wish the Saints had a setup as good as Geelong's.

Being able to own your own home ground, while operating in a state where the rest of the teams have to share stadiums, is a massive advantage.

Embrace it.