Rucci's Rip: Adelaide's push into SANFL a giggle more than anything else

MICHELANGELO Rucci tussled with you, the readers, today on the SANFL reserves debate. Take a look at the questions he answered here now!

ADV Rucci ME

PORT Adelaide's plan for AFL reserves in the SANFL is dead in the water.

By contrast, the Crows' model is on life support ... and the shock is how a well-prepared club such as Adelaide has sold itself so short in this debate.

So far, the Power's plan - taking over the Magpies in the SANFL league competition and developing "top-up'' players by keeping the Magpies' seconds, under-age teams and recruiting zones under the guise of being a "community club'' - has been torn to shreds.

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In essence, the Port model goes too far at a time when the Power needs grow to its national ambitions rather than lose focus on its suburban roots.

It goes way too far in the eyes of the SA Football Commission and the SANFL league directors who must endorse any change to the state league.

By contrast, the Adelaide model does not go far enough. It does not even come close to a genuine alternative.

The public scrutiny of the Crows plan also has not been full and searching, particularly of the finer detail.

Adelaide wants the following:

ALL excess Crows to form the Adelaide team in the SANFL league series.

IT would BE the SANFL's 10th team.

And that's it. No more. Not even a genuine sideshow.

The concept of naming the team "Ravens'' to protect the Crows image across SANFL supporter bases is more a giggle than a point of debate.

Pushed to show a strong commitment to the SANFL - amid concerns Adelaide could run to a national reserves series or the VFL in three years - the Crows have agreed to stay in the state league for at least 15 years.

This coincides with the terms of the buy-back of the Adelaide licence from the SANFL.

But there needs to be more.

Adelaide says it will claim "top-up'' players from the SANFL clubs.

Excess players in suburbia will get six-week contracts to be Crows "guest'' players in the SANFL or work to a roster from SANFL reserves teams.

How Adelaide coach Brenton Sanderson thinks this can work is beyond any basic debate.

Does he really want a new crew of drop-ins to work at West Lakes, learning all the Crows' secrets and then speaking freely of them once their six-week deals are up?

Sanderson may as well pull done the fences at West Lakes.

Closed training sessions would become a mockery as the Adelaide playbook moves from 44 contracted players at West Lakes to an extra 32 "blow-ins'' who can hardly be kept silent by confidentiality agreements.

Port Adelaide chief executive Keith Thomas makes a strong point on the danger of having no internal system supplying top-up players to the Crows and Power reserves in the SANFL.

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"It's round 18, 2014 and Port Adelaide are playing Norwood at The Parade for a spot in the SANFL finals,'' says Thomas.

"Port Adelaide has 14 AFL listed players available, so it requires seven additional players who have been rostered on from the bottom of the South Adelaide reserves list.

"Would you expect them to go to war for Port Adelaide?''

Definitely not. And immediately the Power reserves are compromised, along with the SANFL.

The answer?

Adelaide and Port must each have an under-18 academy team.

The advantages - from top-up players to AFL draft screening - are too significant to ignore.

It is surprising the Crows have not seen this already.

The question remains as from where these juniors are recruited if the Crows do not have an established zone on the SANFL map?

That challenge is for the SA Football Commission and its tormented boundaries committee.

The spin-off is a further commitment from the Crows to SANFL grasssroots.

There are still many big questions - such as finances and integrity - to be resolved in the AFL-SANFL reserves debate.

But the search for a structure that serves the SANFL, the Crows and the Power under the commission's demand for equality is very clear now: The two AFL clubs must have an under-18 academy team and recruiting zone attached to their SANFL units.

RIP IT UP

FIVE thoughts as the move to Adelaide Oval gets closer - and the vote for AFL-based reserves teams in the SANFL gets even closer.

1. ONE CLUB, ONE JUMPER

EVENTUALLY the penny will drop with the masses that - just as Port chief executive Keith Thomas declared on Radio FiveAA recently - having Power reserves players wear the Magpie jumper in the SANFL is "tokenism" no matter how the deal for B teams in the state league shakes down. There is a far better way to respect the Magpies' traditional black-and-white jumper. It should be honoured by Port Adelaide in AFL Showdowns on the new national stage at Adelaide Oval where the prison bars were made famous. And everywhere else - AFL and SANFL - it should be the Power jumper with theme "One Club, One Jumper".

2. ENEMY WITHIN

WHEN the New York Yankees left the House Babe Built for their stadium in 2009, the construction workers created a stir by setting a Boston Red Sox jersey in the concrete of the Yankee rooms. How would the Crows deal if this was repeated at the new Adelaide Oval with a Power jumper? Crows chief operating officer Nigel Smart is curious as to which Power jumper would have been used? Word is the one Scott Cummings wore in Showdown I as it did very well in deflecting a jack hammer.

3. WHOSE CALL?

IF - or is that when - the Crows and Power get reserves teams, who would be captain? And would it be a title condemning the player to little AFL action?

4. TIMING ISSUE

AS The Advertiser reported in May, the AFL's promise to not only launch the premiership season with a dinner in Adelaide but also to open the season with a Friday night Showdown at the new Adelaide Oval is being tested to the limit. The AFL is under increasing pressure from the northern club to match the NRL's start dates in early March. But the builders are not due out of the Oval until Monday, March 24. The earliest date for the Oval's AFL opening would be Friday, March 28 when the premiership season may be in its third week.
And the AFL is still waiting to learn how access to the Gabba, SCG and MCG will be delayed in March 2015 by cricket's hold on these grounds for the World Cup.
 
5. MONEY TALKS

THAT pressure to match the NRL in the northern states has the AFL spending big money to get onto the MCG earlier - $44 million. This is the cheque the AFL has written to the Victorian Cricket Association to fund the redevelopment of St Kilda's Junction Oval. Cricket has first rights on the MCG from October 1 to March 31 until 2019. But $44m will buy the AFL earlier access to the MCG and puts the now traditional Carlton-Richmond opener in the frame for a Thursday, March 20 date next season - eight days before the Crows and Power can play on Adelaide Oval next year. Cricket controls the new Adelaide Oval from October 8 to March 14 ... and the AFL is holding a $5m cheque for the new Oval. Will that money go to Glenelg Oval to make it easier to move the Redbacks if the AFL season needs to start before March 14 in Adelaide?

RIPPER OF THE WEEK

"I just hate players who pay holding-the-ball rather than protect the player first in for the ball."

LAWS of the Game committee member LEIGH MATTHEWS highlighting again the intent of the rule makers and the actions of the umpires are not aligned.