Gippsland: 70 clubs in Gippsland found to have player points errors
Gippsland clubs have been hit with “please explains” for wrong player points allocations, and fines could be on their way.
Victoria
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Gippsland’s 70-plus senior football teams are responding to “please explains” for miscalculating player points applications this year.
An initial breach by Warragul Industrials for two players with incorrect allocations discovered last month, leading to a $3500 fine, has become more widespread with clubs in seven leagues having at least one player wrongly assessed.
AFL Victoria’s John O’Donohue said fault existed at club, league and regional levels, but “after four or five years, clubs become complacent” and strongly denied the switch to the PlayHQ administration system was to blame.
Boisdale-Briagolong president Ryan Evans said the absence of a system to confirm whether allocations were right was a major factor.
The issue is confined to Gippsland and no premiership-winning club was above the points cap.
“There is no breach of the caps being alleged here. It’s just wrong allocations,” O’Donohue said.
“There are failings at the club for misinterpreting the categories, there is fault at the league level for not overseeing and there is probably fault at the regional level for not overseeing it all.”
Evans said it was more a “system issue” after his club had three players with incorrect allocations.
“Not every club in the land is trying to rort the system,” he said.
“There are a whole heap of things that have happened this year that could have exacerbated the problem.
“The move to PlayHQ, you weren’t able to get access to players’ data until late in the year and no checking place.
“There was no system in place to get something confirmed.”
AFL Victoria didn’t have a full-time regional manager in place until August.
But O’Donohue rejected suggestions the system failed.
“There are some clubs pedalling that line, but it’s not a factor,” he said.
“Gippsland’s processes haven’t been best practice, but we’ve got confidence going into 2023 that the issues will be fixed.
“The system wasn’t set up to penalise clubs, it was to put a system in place to control spending, equalisation and whatever else.
“My biggest fear was it would open Pandora’s box across the state, but that’s not the case.
“It just failed in Gippsland.”
The player points system in which every player is rated on their playing history was introduced in 2016 to help equalise competitions.
Players recruited from the AFL and rival clubs carry the highest point allocations with “homegrown” players having the lowest.
Originally published as Gippsland: 70 clubs in Gippsland found to have player points errors
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