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Thread: AFL changes academy rules and shafts Giants and Swans

  1. #13
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    I'm quite prepared for the furore IF Nick Blakey nominates the Swans rather than Norf.

    I know Fitzmuppet has left the Commission but wouldn't surprise me to see the VFL do some last minute tinkering IF it appears that Nick Blakey will be putting us first on his ballot paper.

  2. #14
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    Quote Originally Posted by 707 View Post
    I'm quite prepared for the furore IF Nick Blakey nominates the Swans rather than Norf.

    I know Fitzmuppet has left the Commission but wouldn't surprise me to see the VFL do some last minute tinkering IF it appears that Nick Blakey will be putting us first on his ballot paper.
    If Blakey wants to join the Swans (and he may well prefer to play at a club where his father isn't a coach), there's nought the AFL can do. Even if he weren't in the academy, he's under no obligation to agree to join North (or Brisbane - don't forget he's eligible for both clubs under the FS rules).

    Furthermore, my understanding is that players in the final year of an academy programme can't refuse to join the parent club if nominated. The idea is that they had the choice whether or not to sign up for the academy programme. You don't get to choose who your father played for.

    If he wants to join North or the Lions, he can pull out of the academy programme, or the Swans may show flexibility out of respect for John. But the AFL can have no say in the matter. Not that it will stop the whinging from over the border...

  3. #15
    Go Swannies! Site Admin Meg's Avatar
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    But if North draft Blakey as F/S they would do so under easier draft rules compared with those the Swans would be under drafting him as an academy talent (my earlier complaint).

    (This is hypothetical as it would only be an issue if either/both clubs finished in top four/eight and if North had more than one F/S or the Swans had more than one academy prospect. The North position in particular is unlikely. But it does illustrate the point.)

  4. #16
    Travelling Swannie!! mcs's Avatar
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    Quote Originally Posted by liz View Post
    I doubt it will be 10 years (2018 is my guess, unless FS politics derails his availability) but I agree that the club getting Heeney and Mills in successive years is far from the current "normal". For the Swans, at least. The Giants' zone has proved to be so rich that they have picked up a stream of under-20 draft picks in the last couple of seasons, and the pipeline doesn't look to be slowing down. Even the removal of part of the zone won't entirely stem the flow.

    I am passionately supportive of the NSW and Queensland academies and what they are trying to achieve. And there does need to be some incentive to the four clubs to continue to invest their time into these schemes. But there needs to be a balance with the aims of draft equalisation (unless one is against the whole concept of draft equalisation). It would be a massive advantage to have access to players of Heeney and Mills' calibre every year (even without a draft discount). While it is some way off before that happens, it should be expected that, if the participation numbers are sustained, one or two of the best dozen players each year will start to consistently emerge from the major population centres along the NSW coast. I don't think that limiting the Swans to matching a bid for just one of these very best players each year is that unreasonable in the context of the entire competition and the draft.
    As always Liz, you hit the nail on the head. That is exactly my view as well.

    I hate the short-termism of the VFL clubs in particular 'what's in it for us - they are just rorting the system (GWS zone issue aside)' - when clearly there is an issue, at the current time, that NSW and QLD are not contributing anywhere near the amount of AFL quality players coming through than they should I saw a stat today - just 14 players were drafted from NSW in the period 2004-2014, and 7 of them were compulsory GWS zone selections. That is from an area with roughly a third of the country's population. That alone should be ample evidence to suggest the need for a lot better efforts to develop the talent pool in those areas -and the academies can take a leading role.

    But if the AFL wants clubs to fund and run them - then they should get incentives to do so. When we get to a point that a Heeney or Mills is rolling off the production line every year, its either time for limits to be placed (As the afl appears to be doing) or for the AFL to take control of the academies, fund and run them, and the players to go into the draft pool. But its a long way off that point as it is.
    "You get the feeling that like Monty Python's Black Knight, the Swans would regard amputation as merely a flesh wound."

  5. #17
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    Quote Originally Posted by Mug Punter View Post
    Hopefully we are now at the end game with any tinkering and we can have certainty going forward.
    And bloated Magpie presidents might fly.
    My opinion is objective truth in its purest form

  6. #18
    Travelling Swannie!! mcs's Avatar
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    Quote Originally Posted by Mug Punter View Post
    I watched Gill on AFL 360 and I was impressed with him actually. he just said that from a big picture strategic point of view he didn't see how concessions could apply to kids who already had an existing pathway via an elite Victorian competition (i.e. the Murray Bushrangers in the TAC Cup) and he said frankly he wondered why it was ever allowed in the first case. It does not affect the Riverina so GWS still have a golden patch, who knows they might start giving a damn about the game in Western Sydney.

    I just hope this whole debate can now be put to rest but I suspect you'll hear the squealing any time we recruit anyone good, just waiting for the dirty shin-boners to have a cow when we select Nick Blakey
    That is exactly the point we've all been making about the GWS zone stuff down there - where there are already established pathways, it makes no sense for GWS to have concessions. Where their academy is doing the job as it should and developing talent independently itself, in areas without pathways, then it makes every sense to get concessions.

    I also agree we will hear squealing every time we pick up anyway good, or indeed GWS does - and the shinboners will cry like a bunch of 4 years olds if Blakey ends up coming through our academy.
    "You get the feeling that like Monty Python's Black Knight, the Swans would regard amputation as merely a flesh wound."

  7. #19
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    Quote Originally Posted by mcs View Post
    I also agree we will hear squealing every time we pick up anyway good, or indeed GWS does - and the shinboners will cry like a bunch of 4 years olds if Blakey ends up coming through our academy.
    As would we if the eligible son of say a Nick Malceski ended up playing for the Suns instead of us...

  8. #20
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    Quote Originally Posted by jono2707 View Post
    As would we if the eligible son of say a Nick Malceski ended up playing for the Suns instead of us...
    If Malceski is still coaching at the suns t rhat stage and his kid comes through their academy, i would have no problem with it - as malceski would have given the suns just as much service (in a different role) to the suns as he gave to us.
    "You get the feeling that like Monty Python's Black Knight, the Swans would regard amputation as merely a flesh wound."

  9. #21
    There's still real benefits from this system for us and I think we can now hope that the academy system has some certainty. But I would add that if I was at the Swans I'd be saying to Gill, "we accept the changes and the way the system is now but if you water it down anymore then we'd be expecting the AFL to fund the program in full".

    As an example, based on finishing fourth, which is where we have been roughly for a while we could get the current equivalent picks 10, 25, 39 and 56. That's arguably better than what we got the last draft ( 11, 21, 45 and 48) and we had to trade away Tom Mitchell to get to those picks.

    Of course there will be a real squeeze should Nick Blakey be as good as many of us predict. Let's say he is rated top 5 and goes at Number 4. In that instance if we finished 4th we'd get picks 4, 39, 56 and 57. The only time we'd go into a points deficit would be if he went at number 1.

    There are also the other benefits already mentioned. All kids are in a pretty demanding football programme for four years, any ratbags will be weeded out. It would pretty hard to fool the club that long.

    Plus there is the community engagement factor which I also think is massively understated

  10. #22
    The one thing I've picked up this week is how much talent would go through the draft as a next generation academy pick in previous years. Just one example is Jason Johannisen who would have went through the Fremantle academy. There is a lot more. Just as an exercise when watching games pick out players and look at who they could possibly go to via the afl website. It's a massive change. I think Adam Goodes would have been in the Bulldogs academy

  11. #23
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    Quote Originally Posted by Boddo View Post
    The one thing I've picked up this week is how much talent would go through the draft as a next generation academy pick in previous years. Just one example is Jason Johannisen who would have went through the Fremantle academy. There is a lot more. Just as an exercise when watching games pick out players and look at who they could possibly go to via the afl website. It's a massive change. I think Adam Goodes would have been in the Bulldogs academy
    The AFL has created a bit of a problem for itself in respect of the Next Generation academies with its rationale for taking the Albury and Murray regions away from GWS. Gil's argument was that players in these areas already have access to existing talent pathway development programmes via the TAC Cup. It's hard to see how they can then justify giving the southern clubs priority access to players from a multicultural background who live in non-remote parts of those states, since these players also have access to established talent development pathways.

    I am all for attracting those from non-traditional backgrounds to take up the game but I am not sure that an academy system that overlaps, geographically, with existing infrastructure is defendable. I also suspect (though haven't done an exercise to support this assertion) that if you lined up an All-Stars multicultural team against a NSW SOO team from current AFL playing stocks, the multicultural team would win quite comfortably (especially if you exclude NSW players from the regions now taken out of the Giants' academy zone).

  12. #24
    Go Swannies! Site Admin Meg's Avatar
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    AFL changes academy rules and shafts Giants and Swans

    Like Boddo above, I suspect NGAs are going to allow non-Northern State clubs to draft highly talented players who didn't need academy assistance to be attracted to play AFL or to develop to a top prospect (because of the areas in which they live and the schools they attend).

    As long as NGAs also do bring some kids into AFL whom otherwise might never have played the game, then that is the 'price' the competition has to wear. But clubs will then need to stop complaining about the Swans academy!
    Last edited by Meg; 26th March 2017 at 06:11 PM.

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