Adelaide Crows could head into AFLW’s round one with only 24 fit players as list management comes under spotlight across the league
As Adelaide prepares to mount its AFLW premiership defence, injuries have cut the number of players available for selection to just 24. It’s reignited debate across the league about list management.
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The AFLW’s reigning premiers Adelaide are likely to enter their round one clash against Brisbane on Saturday with only 24 of their 30 players available for selection.
While this opens the door for debuts from the club’s eight new players, it raises the question as to whether the AFL should change its list management rules.
The current rule is that when the number of available players drops below 23, clubs can then elevate a ‘train-on’ to a ‘top-up’ player.
The Crows’ best defensive player from last season, Deni Varnhagen, has been ruled out of round one with knee cartilage damage, alongside Chelsea Randall (torn ACL) and Ruth Wallace (personal reasons).
Randall and Wallace will not play any football in 2020, but Varnhagen could return by round three.
Return dates are also pending for the trio rehabbing torn ACLs: co-captain Erin Phillips, forward Chloe Scheer and ruck Rhiannon Metcalfe.
All three are strong possibilities to return at some stage this season and no-one has, as yet, entirely discounted a round one comeback for any of them.
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The Crows are not the only AFLW club affected by list management issues: Melbourne will start the 2020 season with 26 players, after two torn ACL in pre-season (Katherine Smith and Shae Sloane), cartilage damage to Lauren Pearce’s knee and Bianca Jakobsson withdrawing due to work commitments.
Asked whether it’s time for the AFL to change the list management rule, Crows coach Matthew Clarke didn’t mince his words.
“My honest answer is yes, but that’s not a decision for me,” he said.
Clarke said his view was that train-on players should be given the chance to play as top-ups if listed players were unavailable in the long-term.
“I guess the counterargument is something around competitive balance, but once a player is on the long-term injury list they’re not available for you,” he said.
“So, the players who would then come onto any team’s list would originally have been outside what was perceived to be the best 30 players, so I’m not sure that the competitive balance is that greatly disturbed.
“But the rules are the rules and it’s okay because they are the same for everybody, so we’ll
just play within them.”
The AFL’s head of women’s football, Nicole Livingstone, addressed the issue during the week, saying that the AFL was in discussion with clubs regarding list management.
“There’s been a lot of discussions about list size in terms of the activation … once it reaches 23, being able to top players up,” she told womens.afl.
“We continue to speak to the clubs, and we’ve said to them that if they feel they have any exceptional circumstances to be able to elevate train-ons to top-ups, then they can come to us.”
The Crows’ injuries mean there will almost certainly be debutants on Saturday, with players including former GWS midfielder Courtney Gum and 2019’s SANFLW best and fairest Najwa Allen likely to debut in the tricolours.
Adelaide will announce its squad on Thursday.
* Round one: Brisbane v Adelaide, Saturday, February 8, Hickey Park, 4.40pm