I would love to organise dinner with the people who build the AFL fixture. The possible dates would be announced in November, but the time would remain flexible. Thursday is possible; Friday is likely, although there may be a double-header. I would host it, naturally, but at their house. Two guests would arrive together, three would overlap, and somebody would be sent to a 7.30 pm sitting despite the dining room being empty at 8.10 pm.
Then, 25 days out, they would delay the decision because one invitee might become more interesting. A week later, a glossy graphic would declare the inconvenience a massive win for everyone at the table.
A few weeks back, I wrote for Zero Hanger that the AFL fixture was a floating farce. As I write this, we are 25 days from Round 23. The AFL's original draw says the round begins on Friday, August 14. There is no Thursday night game listed. We know the match-ups and venues, but not when any of the nine games will be played.
It was reported on Saturday the AFL will postpone locking in Rounds 23 and 24 until after Round 20. The reasoning is matches such as Carlton versus Fremantle in the final round could become mouth-watering if the Blues keep winning, but dead rubbers if they do not.
Fans want clarity. The league wants maximum drama.
There, in two sentences, is the modern AFL fixture. The floating fixture has benefits. It can keep dead rubbers out of prime time and reward clubs that earn relevance instead of handing marquee slots to the same big Victorian teams in November.
But there is a cost, and the AFL keeps sending the bill to everybody else. Travelling supporters face higher airfares and fewer accommodation options. Shift workers cannot assume a roster written weeks in advance will magically bend around a Sunday night game. Parents need to organise children, friends need to coordinate plans and people have weddings, birthdays, work and lives beyond football.
It must also be a headache inside clubs. Ticketing teams, functions staff, sponsors, venues and matchday activation crews need more than a shrug and a TBC. The AFL has not eliminated uncertainty. It has outsourced it.
After COVID, the league tried drip-feeding the 2022 fixture in blocks. It was hated. A sensible compromise followed: lock in the first 15 rounds, then confirm most of the run home around May, leaving only the final round to float.
Now two rounds are suspended because the league cannot bear the thought that Carlton-Fremantle might be less interesting in four weeks than it looks today.
This obsession with owning the story is silly. Drama in sport is not a product the league can order from a content calendar. It happens organically because players, pressure and consequences collide. The harder administrators try to manufacture it, the more artificial it feels.
If the AFL were fair dinkum about final-round drama, it would start all nine games at the same time.
That is what the Premier League does. Think Sergio Aguero in 2012, winning Manchester City the title in stoppage time while another result unfolded elsewhere.
Older football supporters, especially Melbourne fans, will remember Saturday, August 29, Round 22, 1987.
Four consequential Saturday games unfolded simultaneously, with the final five changing by the minute. Melbourne defeated Footscray to end a 23-year finals drought, but only after Hawthorn came from 15 points down late against Geelong, with Jason Dunstall kicking the final two goals in the last 90 seconds. Then Stephen Kernahan kicked truly after the siren to give Carlton top spot over North Melbourne.
Nobody needed to “maximise” that drama. Of course, the AFL will never do it. The broadcasters would lose their minds. And that exposes the trick: the league does not want maximum drama; it wants maximum programmable drama, separated neatly into television windows and packaged for ratings.
There are better compromises. The NFL locks in its schedule, then uses limited flexing to elevate late-season games. The AFL could set every match in a standard slot and reserve a tightly defined window to move one or two, with notice. Flexibility should be an option, not a wrecking ball.
