Mark Robinson: The AFL needs to find its rhythm in craziness of 2024 season

The AFL has tried a lot of different things lately, but have they worked? Mark Robinson asks legends of the past five decades what they think of the modern game and schedule.

Footy is helter skelter on the field and, in 2024, it appears the AFL wants the same off it.

Rounds long ago were usurped by weeks and the weeks have been engulfed by days and nights of footy, which is packaged and ribboned into a schedule which this season is unprecedented for its fervour.

The first fortnight, which included “Opening Round” in the northern states and Round 1, was played over two weekends and incorporated 13 games.

It meant that at one time, teams such as Collingwood, Richmond, Carlton and Sydney had played two games before teams like Essendon, Geelong and North Melbourne had played a single game.

The craziness continued when Carlton and the Brisbane Lions had a bye in Round 2 and then in Round 3, which was Easter, Gold Coast and the GWS Giants had a bye.

The Easter extravaganza had eight games from Thursday to Monday and – three days after those games were completed – the next extravaganza arrived, Round 4 which is Gather Round.

From the start of Easter until the end of Gather Round, there will be 17 games in 11 days.

At the time of writing, one team had played five games, four teams had played four games and 13 teams had played three games. After Friday night’s double-header, it will have been 32 games played in 29 days. It’s an NBA schedule for the AFL.

And for the first time, the question could be asked: Has footy ever been so out of whack?

Indeed, has there been too much footy?

Tom Hawkins gets chaired off after game 350 on Easter Monday. Picture: Quinn Rooney/Getty Images

I can imagine the answers to that last question. Do you have a rock for a brain? There’s no such world where there’s too much football.

It’s why people buy 75-inch TVs. And subscribe to Kayo. They get wall-to-wall footy. If they miss a game, they can record it. And watch it on Tuesday.

Like society’s fast-food mentality, the AFL competition is a fast-paced product. On weekends, one game ends and another starts with little time to breathe in between.

It’ why Easter Monday’s game between Hawthorn and Geelong was so enjoyable. The single game allowed Tom Hawkins to be celebrated – both before and after the game.

There was time to breathe and bask and not have Sarah Jones winding up the coverage and crossing to Marvel Stadium for the second of the double-header.

There was a welcomed pause.

Not for too long, mind you. The next round arrived two days later.

Footy hasn’t found its rhythm.

The AFL thunderously trumpeted “Opening Round’’ as a success in New South Wales and Queensland, but what it did over the subsequent weeks was create a puzzle of the AFL ladder.

Footy folk are simple. They barrack, attend and watch their team on TV. And what they like on Monday mornings is to peruse the ladder. Where their team sits against every other team.

What they get is a concoction of numbers and some confusion. Like, “we’ve lost three games, and Melbourne has played five games, and Adelaide has lost four games, but we are still below Adelaide”.

To some, they need a professor of mathematics to make sense of it all.

Gather Round kicked off in Adelaide on Thursday night. Picture: Phil Hillyard

The AFL’s want for world domination is relentless. It’s why suggestions this week that Brisbane was considering a media boycott was outlandish commentary. As if the AFL would allow that. Rather, it wants footy in every home, on every TV and radio station and in every newspaper around the country, including Brisbane’s Courier Mail.

The bombardment of games and the saturating coverage of them keeps feeding the beast.

Unquestionably, the AFL wants footy to dominate the headlines. Not the drugs issue, or racism, or concussion. It’s games and more games. It’s bets and more bets. It’s conversation and debate. Altogether, the sport spins faster than it has ever done before. It’s a whirlwind.

Non-footy people must be so curious as to why the sport ravages so much of society.

We are at Gather Round. It is the shiny new toy. With every team in attendance, Adelaide is the mecca for four days. The people there say it’s footy on steroids – and on wine and cheese. On every measure, it’s a monumental success.

Some people want even more themed rounds. In fact, others want the season to start in February. The AFL would love to push it into October. Expansion is never-ending. Tassie is coming and soon enough there will be a 20th team. It means more games, more byes, and more saturation.

Soon, though, this season will settle into its predictable rhythm.

And it needs to. It needs to take a breath.

If anything, it needs the ladder to return to normality.

Originally published as Mark Robinson: The AFL needs to find its rhythm in craziness of 2024 season