by SimonH » Tue Aug 29, 2006 1:10 pm
To declare my bias upfront: I'm a Sydneysider and Swans fan, although I do have some legitimate interest as a long-term Norwood and SANFL supporter. If it came down to choosing, my loyalties lie more with Norwood. Anyway, I thought I might clear up some misconceptions that some people have about what this plan would involve.
Some background about what's been happening with Sydney's seconds:
1. Sydney reserves have been playing in the ACTAFL for 3 or 4 years now. Prior to that, there had been a weird arrangement where some players flew down and played for Port Melbourne in the VFL (VFA), and some stayed in Sydney and played with locals to make up the 'Sydney Redbacks' in the Sydney FL.
2. When the decision was made to create a unified reserves team, the ACTAFL was chosen because it's a stronger competition than the Sydney FL.
3. In the opening couple of years in Canberra, Sydney were a mid-table team and so the level of competition seemed to be a good fit.
4. However, last year Sydney went undefeated on the way to winning the ACTAFL flag. The GF and 2nd semi were quite tight, but Sydney also gave opponents a lot of horribly lop-sided shellackings throughout the year.
5. This year has, if anything, been 'worse'. Apart from one game where Sydney swapped players with bottom side Weston Creek in order to create a meaningful contest (and so the ACT hierarchy ruled that both teams lost on forfeit), Sydney is again undefeated and has a percentage of 270%. And that's not just by thrashing the cellar-dwellers: Belconnen and Eastlake are miles ahead of the rest of the comp in 2nd and 3rd, and it's also handed out 87 point and 120 point canings to each of them.
6. Why have Sydney moved so far ahead so fast? Firstly, having a unified team which trains with the senior squad and which is coached by the club's coaching group, has obviously produced a steady improvement in our 2s. But the main reason is the number of AFL-listed players on the park: which is caused by squad size and injuries. Go back a couple of years, and the Swans reserves were frequently almost half made up of 'top up' players from the Sydney FL. Now, last week (and quite commonly this year) Sydney's reserves is fielding a team that is 100% Sydney Swans squad members. How? Sydney has an allowance of 3 local rookies (on top of the up-to-6 that all AFL teams have), and has taken full use of that allowance in the last few years, meaning it has a net squad size of 47 players (38 senior + 9 rookies). Add the good fortune of a short injury list for most of 2005 and 2006, and you have a full 2nd team of Sydney Swans.
7. Roos has commented this year that the current situation with our reserves is unsustainable from a competitive point of view. The fact that Sydney has just won a flag, and that a number of players (including South Australians Heath Grundy and Tim Schmidt) have debuted this year and made the transition well, doesn't change the fact that the ACTAFL doesn't provide adequate competition at the level that the Swans reserves are now playing at.
So, to address some specific points people have raised, based on my understanding and guesswork (I don't have any inside knowledge here):
Stand-alone club, or spread the players through the other 9 clubs? As is probably obvious from the above, the point of the exercise is for Sydney to have a stand-alone reserves side. It would therefore be a 10th team in the SANFL, and no issue of players being ripped out of clubs come finals time, would arise.
What does SANFL get out of it? Interstate exposure, which should ultimately have some flow-on financial benefits (e.g. Tasmania in the VFL is doing quite nicely for both the club and the comp). A good-quality team ready to step in and play (a Mt Gambier or Iron Triangle team probably wouldn’t cut it, and a NT team may take several years to come up to speed). A large club with sound financials standing behind that team. Plus byes smack of amateur-hour; if you want to give the players a break every 7 weeks or 11 weeks, you can have one or two scheduled split-rounds through the competition.
What about when injuries mean that the Swans can't field 21 players? The current arrangement is that the Swans pick 'top up' players who are generally the most promising youngsters (circa 18 year olds) from the Sydney FL. No idea whether that would continue or whether Sydney would, e.g., try to come to an arrangement with the SAAFL where they 'topped up' from the amateurs when playing in Adelaide.
Would Sydney demand playing home games in Sydney? Probably. Once cost and logistical issues are worked out, though, it is important to remember that this would not result in seeing your team play less, because you're already not seeing them play in the bye week. If the SANFL reverted to a 22-round, no-bye competition, it would mean that you'd get to see your team play once more per year.
Who's gunna pay for travel and costs? Obviously this would have to be worked out between the Swans and the SANFL. For the idea to be a goer, no increased travel costs could be borne by the 9 clubs.
Would it generate any interest in Sydney? Of course, most of the reserves matches would be played as the curtain-raiser to a Swans senior side home game, making it hard to measure independent interest in the match. But, as happens now, some would presumably also be scheduled independently when the Swans senior side is playing away. There are a pretty large number of SA expats in Sydney, and in the longer term, the value of the SANFL having greater exposure in the largest market in Australia would be very good for the competition.
Why not join the VFL? Because the SANFL is a stronger competition, dummy! No doubt it's been explored, but there may be reluctance by the VFL to allow another cross-border team in (Tasmania is already there), and they'd probably point Sydney in the direction of having an 'affiliated club' relationship with Port Melbourne again, which is a bad option. Losing control of the players, and splitting them up, is exactly what the Swans are looking to avoid.
What about SANFL reserves (and U/19s and U/17s)? Yes, unless another team was invited to join these comps, they would continue to be 9-team comps and have byes. Not true to say that the teams wouldn't be playing their equivalent SANFL opponent on the same day, though: the draw could be structured so that each reserve and junior bye fell on the week that the seniors played the Swans.
How good would this team be? Sydney's current list priority is to develop youth. It doesn't much care for the idea of filling up your list with mid- or later-career players who are there for 'depth' and play half of each season in the seconds, e.g. Henry Playfair, Sav Rocca, Dean Rioli etc. Apart from players returning from injury (Jared Crouch, Ben Mathews, Stephen Doyle) or serving penance (Nick Davis), by far and away the oldest player to play regularly in the seconds this year is 25-year-old David Spriggs. So, while it is a talented, very well-drilled and professional team, it is also a very very young team. It might beat any SANFL team on its day, but would be unlikely to flog any of them; and if it made the finals, under the intense pressure of a finals match, having a team filled with 18-21 year olds would be likely to tell against it. In short, it would definitely be competitive, but it also would not dominate.
Ugh-- endless flooding! They'd ruin the fun of SANFL. The idea that Sydney under Rodney Eade invented flooding is one of the great urban myths. As Roos recently said, Sydney actually play a far more man-on-man style than most teams in the AFL. Anyway, it's horses for courses. I don't think you see the Swans reserves flooding too much in the ACTAFL.
Have a trial to see how it goes, with non-premiership point games played in bye week? As long as SANFL clubs didn't mind risking the injuries: sure, why not? Presumably the Swans organisation would trust the professionalism of the SANFL clubs; there's no reason to think that they wouldn't turn up interested to play.
Anyway, this whole thing at the moment is based on a stray comment in a radio broadcast, so may be years away from coming to anything. Some food for thought for the moment, though.
. i prefer the SANFL to remain 9 teams though
