More drama and division, but the AFL has never been better
While there are clear divides between interstate teams and the foundation clubs, the AFL’s on-field product has never been stronger.
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Australian Rules football has undergone the biggest revolution in the sport’s history over the past few decades.
Since its inaugural season in 1897, the competition originally known as the Victorian Football League (VFL) enjoyed 85 years of overall stability and growth.
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Powerhouse foundation clubs Essendon, Carlton and Collingwood regularly competed for premierships, while the likes of Footscray, St Kilda, Fitzroy and South Melbourne often battled for support and success.
The landscape began to change when debt-riddled South Melbourne relocated to Sydney in 1982 in a move that kickstarted the shift to a national competition.
Fast forward 40 years or so and the league is now unrecognisable from those VFL days, with Western Australia, South Australia, Queensland and NSW all boasting two clubs in an 18-team competition.
There are fractures and divisions, with expansion leading to deep resentments over perceived allowances for the interstate clubs and favouritism towards the establishment.
The league also battles a lopsided draw. While non-Victorian teams face regular travel, some Melbourne teams barely left home in 2024. Seventeen of Collingwood’s 23 matches this year were in Melbourne.
Yet despite all the issues presented by skewed draft advantages, vastly differing travel requirements and a diluted talent pool due to expansion, the product itself has never been better.
Some might snigger at that last statement, particularly after a 2024 season when umpiring, score reviews and the Match Review Panel were firmly in the spotlight.
Yet it only takes a quick look at the athletes that play the sport these days to appreciate how far footy has come.
Aussie Rules footballers are among the fittest in professional sport worldwide.
They spend weeks running and building up their fitness base in pre-season before they even touch a Sherrin.
When they do pick up the footy, the precision kicking and chains of handballs that allow teams to motor down the ground are indicative of the highest skill level the game has ever seen.
Nick Daicos is a case in point. The son of Collingwood legend Peter and brother of Josh, Nick has demonstrated extraordinary skill since bursting onto the scene in round 1, 2022 as a teenager.
He helped the Pies win the flag last season and this year may claim the first of what many expect to be multiple Brownlow medals.
Yet as powerful and skilful as Daicos is at just 22 years of age, he is not alone in possessing these incredible traits.
Isaac Heeney turned his back on rugby league to become one of the most impactful players in the game. Marcus Bontempelli, Patrick Cripps and Chad Warner also hold that ability to single-handedly turn a match with their strength, skill and poise.
Errol Gulden may just be the pick of that bunch when it comes to kicking skills and it’s no surprise every one of those names above earned All Australian status in 2024.
It’s also only a matter of time before West Coast phenom Harley Reid joins that list.
The competition also might be the most even in its history. We have just come off one of the most unpredictable home and away seasons ever, when 14 teams were still in with a shot of the top eight over the closing two rounds.
Ninth-placed Collingwood finished with 12 wins, nine defeats and two draws. Those 52 competition points would have made the finals in eight of the last 10 seasons, excluding the Covid shortened 2020 campaign.
Fremantle and Essendon, who ended up 10th and 11th on the ladder, both had a 50% winning record or better.
GWS finished a lofty fourth on the ladder and Gold Coast had a club-record 11 wins, showing the days of the most recent expansion sides being easy beats are long gone.
Bombers fans might look back with misty eyes to the time they regularly banked September wins and the traditional clubs may well yearn for the days when the Swans were still a basket case, rather than an established giant that makes the finals just about every year.
But all things considered, the sport has never been better.
Originally published as More drama and division, but the AFL has never been better
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