Season length

[taste2taste]

With suggestions of a 30 week and a 22 week season being floated what do you think is the ideal number of games each team should play?

imo, the current season drags on forever.
18 games a season would be ideal.
At the moment we have too many games where only one team shows up. League is too physical for players to put in 110% every week but with less games they could, meaning the quality and intensity of the games goes up to semi finals standard every week.
With high quality games and with only 9 home games crowds would be much larger.
A shorter season means every game matters, you shouldnt be able to start the season 2-6 and still make the top 4.

 

[WaznTheGreat]

Thats why those dopes in the NFL only play 16 regular games a season,there smarter then us.

 

[Red Bear]

each team plays each other once, when we have 18 teams, would be ideal, but it would mean less cash could be earnt from tv rights etc, so will never happen.

 

[MightyBronco]

18 week is perfect.

If they had the balls to chop it short they would increase crowds, increase the standard of footy, increase the pressure. TV numbers will follow as a result.

Throw in dedicated rep weeks and you have a longer season.

Oh and a bloody top 5 or 6 make the finals, not half the bloody comp!

 

[Coaster]

Shorter season, with a second short comp like the Challenge Cup to make up the weeks.

would give us 2 sets of finals, one mid season.

 

[applesauce]

18 with the top 6 playing a home/away finals series with tries as aggregate if the total points are drawn.

More Finals footy, more pressure in the regular season, more tv viewers and more crowds.

 

[Eels Dude]

The more footy the better IMO. 24 games is ideal.

 

[adamkungl]

In an 18 team comp.
1 game against the other 17 teams
+ rematch your 5 biggest rivals
= 22 rounds.

Top 8 finals series.

For example Roosters could play Rabbits, Dragons, Dogs, Brisbane, Wests (the last 2 are interchangable, but the point is to pick games that will draw big more than once) twice and everyone else once.

Imo its a good balance of
-maximising income
-promoting rivalries
-a good playing length
-keeping interest

 

[chrisD]

Thats why those dopes in the NFL only play 16 regular games a season,there smarter then us.

If we did that there would have been no Hayne train last season.

 

[thorson1987]

If we did that there would have been no Hayne train last season.

Zing,

or this year either.

 

[Tap Twist Snap]

AFL are extending their season. So leaving them to have weeks of the season where that is all that is on TV would be disaster. Clubs are hardling making enough money now with the games they have. A longer season with no more trials is the way to go. Either that or work on a decent world club challenge for after the season. I just can't see clubs surviving with even less "product" each year.

 

[adamkungl]

No thanks to a longer season. The middle portion of the season is boring already. Pointless filler.

 

[Lambretta]

f**k me. This is the first time I have ever seen a bunch of blokes argueing in favour of less length.

Next there'll a thread asking for narrower pitches as we need less girth.

Sheesh

 

[Jono1987]

Our season definitely needs to be shortened for the workload on players to decrease, for crowd numbers to increase and most importantly for the quality and standard of our game to increase. Personally I like;

- 16 rounds
- Over a two year period each team would play home and away against eachother
- No byes
- NO interruption to the regular season. SoO to be played a couple of weeks after the Finals with, say, NZ vs Pacific Island Barbarians for example. Maybe even another random comp to be played concurrently such as a Challenge Cup.

The main criticism of reducing the amount of regular season football surrounds TV rights. As I've said before, if the NRL are to be believed, the rights will be sold in blocks. Thus the regular season would receive a smaller amount based on the amount of games but by selling SoO and Test matches separately the difference could be met. Also we're going to received an initial upgrade on our TV rights because our last deal was so undersold.

 

[Goddo]

adamkungl has it spot on... 22 weeks for an 18 team comp, 8 team finals series and stand alone origin/rep games.

Why are people paranoid about having stand alone origin and "giving a week to AFL"? One origin game is as strong as a whole round of AFL... bring it I say.

Got to be better than the low crowd club footy with all the rep players out.

 

[Raidersrawesome]

more games the better.

30 games at least

 

[Sans Souci Sainter]

Sack the pre-season trial games and City v Country game.

Have a a round robin comp as a pre-season (played in regional areas), with the group leaders going to the knock out finals.

The finals are played on the weekends of State of Origin, effectively putting the season proper on hold until SOO is finished.

• Groups of 4 (with crowd drawing rivalries) for the initial pre-season round robin.
• Decent prize money for the winner from the main sponsor.
• Individual prize awards with cash bonuses (salary cap exempt) for leading try scorer, MOM awards, best try as voted by viewers, best first year player in the mini comp
• The knock-out comp could trial different time formats, 3x 20 minute 3rds to differentiate from the proper comp and offer a less gruelling, more free-flowing contest.

This knock-out comp would:

• Add more meaning and interest to games than what trials and City v Country currently does.
• Still spreads the game regionally
• Provides salary cap exempt cash bonus incentives for (non-storm) players to stay in the comp.
• Removes fixture/bye, player availability issues around SOO time, but still offers another form of football during this period.

 

[BIKER_DRAGON]

32 weeks everybody plays each other twice

 

[Tigger Madness]

20/22 rounds with a three week representative window either mid-comp or end of comp.

 

[seanoff]

32 weeks everybody plays each other twice

apart from killing the players, the middle 24 weeks of the season will be terrible. the players will lose interest, the fans will lose interest, the coaches will lose interest.

it would be terrible. almost no one would put out a full strength team on any week, the std of play would suffer, badly. imagine Cronulla v NQ on a sat night in july in week 20 of the season with 12 rounds to go and neither team capable of making the finals. 2000 would be a good crowd.