Now that its the new year, let us commence with a new 2017 discussion thread. I'd like to start by asking the question of "what do we do with the Port-GC bye in round 9?" There are three options currently being floated, but if anyone has any other ideas, please put them forward: Take the averages of the missing players, but only if they played in R8. Reduce the number of players required in ORFFU for the round, from 15 down to 13 or 14 per side. Use the extra 2 squad players that we'll have to cover for these outs for one week. Allow OOP players without penalty to cover the bye players. What are everyone's preferences regarding this, or are there any alternate suggestions? Please let us know, so that we can make a final ruling sooner rather than later (as it may effect some trading / drafting strategy).
I don't mind either way but another alternative would be to allow players to play out of position without penalty to cover missing players. Again it should probably only be for those that played round 8.
I think option 1 works best with the added point that the player isnt on the AFL injury report, e.g. played rnd 8 but got injured and would have missed rnd 9 anyway
My opinion started with option two, but I've moved to option three. Quite simply: if a player doesn't play, he can't score points! We're increasing the squad sizes this year, so here is a chance to make use of it (and yes, I'm greatly effected with 5 players missing out - T Jonas, O Wines, B Ebert, J Westhoff, and T Miller).
The problem I have with that option, even though we'll have 28 players, is that the team that Coolgardie plays, if you can't replace those 5 players, that then gives an unfair boost in %, which may come into play, later on maybe in determining final positions. And Banchang has 7 players in that same position or 25% of my team unavailable.......so whoever we play gets a huge leg up.
Going to put this out there; our scores each round depend on who the AFL clubs are playing, even more so in the finals. If we have a team laden with players from clubs that have easy draws in the last part of the season we have an advantage; similarly if your stars are playing tougher teams then it becomes a disadvantage. I would like to think that we would play the round as any other and use our squads to cover players that are out. Yes I'll only be missing two players but one will be my first choice ruck. I was short 4 players due to doping suspensions this year but I knew something was going to happen and was prepared to wear the pain. There is plenty of time prior to the season to trade players out if people want to and when it comes to the draft people can choose which club they are drafting from. I would hope that with a squad of 28 we would be able to cover the guys that are out; even if it means playing OOP at half points.
I think the Geelong v Adelaide clash of 2014 is sort of a 'kind of precedent' for this round, option 1 gets my vote.
I just don't think it is reasonable to expect coaches to rearrange their squads based on one game that isn't a regular occurrence.
I agree, especially when no-one knew this game was happening when putting their squads together. Now, if this game is a success in China, then it will probably become a regular occurrence, maybe not with the same 2 teams however. If that becomes reality, then we need to come up with a solution that is fair to all teams, and I think option 1 is the best way to do that.
Option 1 seems fair but I am a little against it because it takes away some of the realism of our competition. I enjoy the illusion that these are real teams running out against each other every week.
I count 16 people have voted so far. 7 for Option 1... wrightbrendan,insider,fresh, marty,mick,Damo and choppers 9 for Option 3...JPK, tyze, eagle-eyed,bryzza, Tomster, tylo, Yad, batfink, holky THE POLL IS NOW CLOSED AND OPTION 3 GOT THE NOD AND WILL BE IN EFFECT FOR RD 9 THIS YEAR.
all views have merit, I agree that the expanded squads should help cover any losses and we should just have to suck it up... If option 1 gets up (which I think it will) then it should be on proviso that GC / PA players played in the previous week / are not listed as an out / suspended on AFL site