AFLW’s brave move to a conference system highlights the challenges elite women’s football faces as each AFL club buys into the new league

Season Three for the AFLW reaffirms there is no stopping the growth of elite women’s football - and leaves in question just where the AFLW will ultimately fit on the Australian football calendar.

Expansion to 10 teams - while being hemmed into a nine-week season - did present the AFLW with a logistic challenge on its fixture. The new conference format is under fire today, but further emphasises the task of ultimately having an 18 or 20-team AFLW work in the Australian football calendar. Picture: Ian Currie

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Currently the four best-performed teams in the AFLW are the new girls from North Melbourne, Fremantle, Melbourne and inaugural (2017) premiers Adelaide.

These four teams also are in the same division of the two-conference national women’s football league.

In fact, after three rounds of the seven-game qualifying rounds, all five teams in Conference A have better records than the five sides in Conference B.

And the critics are eager to take issue with the new look to the three-year-old AFLW and the league’s full-time boss Nicole Livingstone.

Expansion to 10 teams - while being hemmed into a nine-week season - did present the AFLW with a logistic challenge on its fixture. The new conference format is under fire today, but further emphasises the task of ultimately having an 18 or 20-team AFLW work in the Australian football calendar. Picture: Darrian Traynor (Getty Images)

The conference system was supposed to ease the AFLW’s growing pains. There are two new teams this season (the Kangaroos and Geelong), but just a small nine-week window for the AFLW games - seven qualifying matches, two preliminary finals and a grand final.

Livingstone could have endorsed a championship system, such as the English Premier League from soccer. The 10 teams would have played each other once across the nine weeks to crown the top team with no finals.

AFL Head of Women's Football Nicole Livingstone. Picture: AAP Image/Daniel Pockett

This ran the risk of the season ending early. And what is Australian football without a grand final?

Livingstone could have stuck with the same “league” format of the first two seasons. But 10 teams across seven weekends would have meant each team would have bypassed two of its league rivals in the home-and-away series.

The conference system - one used by the VFL in its early years - seemed the best compromise.

The challenge with conferences is making each division equal.

Livingstone and her staff used the 2018 AFLW ladder to split the competition. In Conference A are the Western Bulldogs (No.1 in 2018), Melbourne (3), Adelaide (5) and Fremantle (7) plus the new Kangaroos.

In Conference B are Brisbane (No. 2 in 2017 and 2018), GWS (4), Collingwood (6) and Carlton (8) plus the expansion team Geelong.

Adelaide Crows players celebrate their Round 3 victory against Geelong at Norwood Oval on Sunday. Picture: AFL Media

Conference A appears stronger than B, leaving the critics - if not some of the competitors - concerned with how the preliminary finals could become lopsided and lead to blow-out results. Still, the grand final should be a super play-off between the best two teams in Conference A.

Lopsided conferences always were a risk for Livingstone.

But there is a bigger picture. The AFL is to keep expanding. All 18 AFL clubs realise the importance of having a senior women’s team, including Port Adelaide that is expecting to enter the AFLW in 2021.

How does an 18-team AFLW - or 20-club league if the NT and Tasmania push for entry - fit on the Australian football calendar?

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