Dingo wrote: I thought this was interesting and will no doubt create some discussion! Personally I think it's a good model, just my opinion.
ADELAIDE and Port Adelaide are set to follow the lead of many Victorian AFL clubs, fielding their own, stand-alone 'seconds' teams in 2014, if clubs back a SANFL proposal.
The teams would compete in the SANFL, breaking a long tradition of players from the Crows and Power dispersing across local sides.
For Port Adelaide, it means integrating the SANFL Magpies into the Power structure. The Port Adelaide Magpies will become the Power's reserves team.
While Adelaide would run its own reserves side for the first time, it wouldn't be permitted to compete under the Crows name.
The South Australian Football Commission formally presented the new model for the state competition on Monday night.
Club bosses will now present the plan to their respective boards, with final ratification expected within a fortnight.
"It is the Commission's belief that the recommended model protects the integrity, the relevance, game development and club and competition viability," chairman John Olsen said.
"It provides the SANFL and its clubs with certainty about the future of our competition while also providing the Adelaide and Port Adelaide football clubs the best competition outside of the AFL in which to test themselves.
"The alternative to this course of action exposes the SANFL to reduced corporate interest and reduced media coverage while also threatening the relevance of the competition as the best outside of the AFL."
There has been a lot of resistance in South Australia to the prospect of the AFL giants fielding stand-alone sides because of the fear they'd dominate the SANFL competition.
The model aims to limit such a possibility by restricting 'top-up' players for both the Crows and Power sides to 18 to 22-year-olds.
Adelaide's reserves team would not host home games, playing all its matches away, allowing the existing teams to create more competition.
The Power and its SANFL cousins the Magpies have run separate structures in the past, but the new model would see them integrate their football program.
However Port has expressed some concerns about the strict requirements laid out in the SANFL plan.
President David Koch has previously voiced reservations about being forced to shut down the Magpies under-age and reserves teams as part of the proposed restructure.
Adelaide and Port Adelaide would also have to agree not to poach staff from existing SANFL clubs
Whilst I have very little knowledge of the SANFL and the South Australian domiciled AFL teams, if one was cynical whilst the above has all the hallmarks of entities who care one has to question whether the theory would be matched by the practical application. It also doesn't remove the angst of SANFL supporters who may have seen a player develop through the grades and then see them playing against their SANFL club.
It all reeked of 'we'll all be rooned' if you don't agree and then find that you 'are rooned' by agreeing to it. Thanks to John O'Brien and his poem of Said Hanrahan.
