Hawthorn’s trial of starting positions a big reason for AFL’s eagerness to make rule changes

FORGET Alastair Clarkson’s coffee meetings with Gillon McLachlan. JON RALPH writes the AFL was sold on introducing starting positions in one fleeting moment last month.

Hawks coach Alastair Clarkson with star Luke Breust. Pic: Getty Images

ALL of Alastair Clarkson’s coffee dates with Gill McLachlan did nothing to fix footy compared to a single watershed moment last month.

For years Clarkson has been urging the AFL to help bring positional play back and ensure the code is played by all shapes and sizes.

Yet all that lobbying paled into comparison with the AFL’s 20-minute trial of starting points last month.

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Or more to the point, what happened when his team reverted to its normal match simulation for 15 minutes after that 20-minute trial.

In the Etihad Stadium trial on June 9 with three pairs of players inside 50 at stoppages the Sherrin zinged around the field.

AFL chiefs like what they’ve seen from rule trials. Pic: Getty Images

Players like Isaac Smith had room to run and bounce and show their magnificent eye-popping skills.

Jaeger O’Meara commented that he could break from a stoppage without fear of players crash-tackling him from behind at any moment.

Football looked like the game we once loved again.

Then trial over, the Hawks reverted to normal service for 15 minutes to prepare for their next AFL match.

It was as if the game had swallowed a cup of concrete — a formerly free-flowing game was clogged with constipation.

Players surged to the contest again in numbers, the forwards again began to shuttle-run up and back, the beauty was lost in a click of the fingers.

Make no mistake, starting points are coming next year, and no one should fear them.

As AFL footy boss Steve Hocking said as he continues to condition the market for their introduction, we have them already.

It’s just that right now the starting points — drilled by down-the-ground footage — involve 30 players around a stoppage.

Hocking uses terms like introducing “volatile space” back into the game, space either side of a stoppage for players to use to exhibit their incredible skills.

In those trials, “the use of players with high skill execution has been exceptional,” he said.

Hawk Jaeger O'Meara had space when he took part in the trial. Pic: Getty Images

“The kickers can just carve up the game.”

Hugh McCluggage dominated in the Brisbane trial, Hawthorn’s Smith was basking with room to gobble up space at Etihad.

Don’t fall into the trap of thinking a handful of recent free-flowing games will have Hocking and his game analysis committee backing off.

It has only “reinforced” — his word — his determination to make more games that kind of up-and-back, free-flowing attraction.

He says Collingwood, Melbourne and North Melbourne now hold their forwards deep and thinks the urgency for finals-sealing wins has seen teams want to score more.

The flow-on effect of those high-scoring games has also been lower free kick tallies (31 for North Melbourne-Essendon, 29 for North Melbourne-Sydney) and kicking efficiency off the charts.

A fourth St Kilda rules trial will come in the next fortnight, with a full-length state league game being organised as well.

The sample size isn’t ideal — ideally the AFL would trial a combination of restricted interchange, starting points and other alterations for a full JLT competition.

But Hocking is a man in a hurry — and why not given falling ratings and a growing discontent with a game that its best is unrivalled.

The North Melbourne game saw 31 goals, stunning one-on-one match-ups, four players kick four or more goals.

That is the football the AFL wants to see, not dreary Port Adelaide-Fremantle three-goal first halves.

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