Aussie Footy

It’s great Mate

Okay, before we start on the game, let me get this off my chest. AFL is the acronym for the Australian Football League. The Australian Football League is the game of Australian rules football played at the highest level.

In my opinion, people do not play AFL, they play Australian Rules, Aussie Rules or just plain footy. But even the AFL head honcho’s are happy with calling the game AFL so they can get more players, supporters and cash from those from the non-traditional Aussie Rules States, New South Wales and Queensland.

So call it what you will, it’s a bloody good game.

The game was born in 1858 and has not stopped growing since despite teething problems in the 1970’s and 1980’s. Players payments threatened to send clubs broke as the powerful (rich) clubs purchased the majority of the good players and the poorer clubs continued to struggle. The League had been run by the clubs but in order to survive, club partisanship was tossed out the window, a non-aligned Commission was put in charge and they adopted the American system of player drafts and salary caps and whooshka, the game hasn’t looked back.

Oh, and they did admit other State’s teams, other than Victorian teams, into the competition and that’s when it truly became the AFL, and not the VFL, Victorian Football League. Don’t ask anyone from Western Australia, they still reckon it’s the VFL.

Some basics

Depending on what organisation auspices the games are being played, there maybe a varying number of players that make up a competing teams. We will go with the norm, both competing teams/sides are made up of 22 players each. That is, 18 players on the field at any one time with 4 other players on the Interchange bench. Players can be interchanged at anytime throughout the game as long as there are no more than 18 on the playing field at any one time.

Basically, the playing surface is oval in shape. Again, basically, each team can be described as having a defensive team, a forward team and mid field team. The mid field team can consist of mid fielders and followers. My terms might be old but I am happy with them.

Traditional Positions

Ground markings

In the images above, the Good Guys, us, are kicking n the direction of the red arrow. Why our goals appear to be placed in the crowd I don’t know the oppositions goal and points posts appear to be in the correct position. The four interchanges players, not shown, come into the game at the coaches whim.

Unique

Let me tell you about the uniqueness of the game. Let me give you some of the uniquesness about the game at the grass root level.

The game DOES NOT have a standard for ground dimensions. The game is played on what can be loosely termed an oval shaped ground. The marquee stadium for the AFL, a football competition, is the Melbourne Cricket Ground, a piece of uniqueness in itself. Those blokes who organised the game back in 1858 were not too fussed when it came to details. The first rules said the ground shouldn’t be more than 200 yards wide and that the length would be agreed to by the captains. Obviously no town planners on the Rules Committee. As people started building houses and the sheep wanted their paddocks back, the ground sizes reduced and a loose standard was developed.

However, differences in ground dimensions still exist today and even in the top tier, the AFL, no two grounds are identical.

The largest ground that I can find a record for is in Deniliquin and it measures 196 metres in length and has a width of 131 metres. That is a massive 560 square metres per player (on ground), a tagger’s nightmare. Based on population density, approx. 630 Vietnamese people would inhabit this area versus the 36 people playing a game of footy.

A couple of the bigger grounds measure as following,

  • MCG is 160 metres by 141 metres, 17,719 square meters or 492 square metres per player

  • SCG is 155 metres by 136 metres, 16,556 square metres or 460 square metres per player

  • Kardinia Park is 170 metres by 115 metres, 15,355 square metres or 427 metres per player

Skinny down the wings in Geelong. Currently the Geelong ground is known as GMHBA Stadium. By the way, I am a stickler for names, it was Kardinia Oval, located in Kardinia Park.

Let’s make a comparison with another couple of sports,

  • A FIFA recommended soccer pitch is 105 metres by 68 metres, 7,140 square metres or 325 square meters per player

  • A NHL standard rink size is 60.96 metres x 34.38 metres for an approximate square meterage of 1,486 square metres or 123.8 square metres per player on the ice.

The point here is that the Aussie Rules grounds are big and entertain a larger number of players on the field than many sports.

Scoring

The game HAS a unique scoring system. Goals, behinds and points make up the scoring. Goals are worth 6 points and behinds are worth 1 point. Goals and behinds are combined for the total points. The words behinds and points are often confused, with points being used often when behinds would be correct. The unique scoring system is tallied by players scoring from a unique set of posts. Two tall posts, called goal posts with a shorter post on each side of the set of taller posts make up the total number of posts. The word mix up starts here with, naturally the two taller posts being called goal posts but the two shorter posts from which behinds are scored are called point posts.

Image borrowed from www.rookieroad.com

From my memory. Plenty of room. Have a ping!

Another scoring method and the Visitors must have just kicked a goal and need 6 points added to their total.(plus 2 points)

Still Scoring

Okay, so know we know that to score the maximum, a goal, we need to get it through the two big sticks, True in itself but not quite as easy as that, this game is unique remember?

GOALS

The ball must be kicked through the big sticks and must pass completely over the line on the ground between the sticks to be a goal.

If the ball pases between the sticks and over the line in any other way other than the above, it is a behind. This commonly referred to as “rushed” on the score sheet.

A kick is counted as connecting with the ball below the knee.

If the ball is touched by another player, of either team, before passing through the sticks and over the line, it is NOT a goal, it is a behind.

If the ball touches any part of the sticks on its way through the sticks and over the line, it is NOT a goal, it is a behind.

BEHINDS

The ball can travel in any method between one of the small sticks and the opposite large stick and it is a behind. The only exception is if the ball has been kicked and has not been touched by another player, of either side, and hits the small stick. The ball is them deemed Out of Bounds (on the full) with a resulting free kick to the opposition.

Note: You can hear supporters mention “Out of Bounce” (on the full). While the team giving away the free kick maybe deflated, the ball is not normally so.

The Rules

Really, there’s rules?

Many times when watching a game of footy, I am reminded of the old school boy excuse “that the dog ate my homework”. If you are new to the game or if you have been a life long follower of the game, at times it appears as if the dog ate the umpires rule book. At the ground, in the pub or on the couch at home, 50% of the supporters will be happy at the same time as 50% of the supporters will swear that a wrong decision has been made.

My tip for learning the rules is to first select a team that you are going to barrack for, support and swear a life long allegiance too. Then, when that team is playing, go to a pub where the members of the public supporting that team are in the majority, wear a team scarf and just before the games starts, find a friendly face and explain that you are new to the game and that you need some help learning the rules. You need to learn the rules as they are applied to your team. You need to learn whether to shout eith “baaaalllllllll” or “maaaaaaaaaaaan” at the appropriate time.

Here are the rules I know that brook no argument.

The game begins with the score at zero each.

At the start of each quarter the ball is bounced in the centre of the ground and a ruckman (tall guy) from each side must be on each side of the centre line located in the centre circle. The same applies after a goal is scored.

At the start of each quarter the ball is bounced in the centre of the ground and there can only be four players from each side in the 50 metre square. The same applies after a goal is scored.

At any point in the game if a player kicks the ball over the boundary line without the ball having bounced or been touched by another player, the opposite team gets a free kick.

There is no off side rule.

That’s it for the rules I would deem clear cut.

In General

In general, I do not try and understand all the new rules that have come in over the last few years as just as I get to understand the rule and the latest interpretation, it is changed. Secondly, when watching the game and a rule has been breached, it takes too long to discuss the merits of the free kick (and the rule) without missing the following two minutes of play.

The expectation that a player can change direction in mid air is a case in point. The other one that really confuses me is the expectation that a player can don an invisibility cloak when standing the mark on occassions and be magically expected to reappear 5 metres away. Maybe they changed this one after Harry Potter missed out on being drafted.

So here we go with some rules and don’t take these as gospel. Maybe they are just the way I remember them or more likely, how I would like to have them remembered. Some people do nor refer to them as rules but rather argument points.

  1. When tackling, the tackle shall be made below the shoulder and above the knee.

  2. A mark is awarded when a player catches the ball from a kick with the ball having travelled a minimum 15 metres and having not been touched, by any player, within that 15 metres.

  3. A player shall not run with the ball greater than a distance of 15 metres without bouncing the ball.

The above three rules are open to slight interpreation. All other rules are open to a great deal of interpretation with interpretations even varying a great deal amongst the 4 central umpires officiating an AFL game.

And that is another beauty of the game. Everyone is right but wrong at the same time.