Aker: Scrap pre-season

[amnesiac]

http://www.foxsports.com.au/story/0,8659,23306607-23211,00.html

Scrap pre-season comp: Aker


March 02, 2008

WESTERN Bulldogs star Jason Akermanis says the AFL pre-season competition should be scrapped because no one cares or remembers who wins.

Akermanis said each side should play two practice games, rather than participate in a formal competition.

"This pre-season competition won't go away quickly or quietly because the AFL makes good money from it," Akermanis said.

"But in realistic terms I think we play such a long brutal season perhaps a couple of games is enough ... the players are the ones that have to say we only want two games max."

Akermanis' call follows St Kilda coach Ross Lyon's admission that he was not fussed whether or not his side wins the pre-season grand final.

Sydney coach Paul Roos has been asked for an explanantion by the AFL over an interchange steward's allegation he overheard him tell Jarrad McVeigh to "go forward, just don't kick a goal" in the dying moments of last month's two-point NAB Cup first round loss to Hawthorn at Aurora Stadium.

Roos said: "You only have to look at the match to see the guys were pretty serious about it. We're not going to compromise round one for a NAB Cup game, but that doesn't mean the 20-odd players that go out don't try."

Akermanis said the fact that the Swans have not won a pre-season cup match during Roos' time in charge, yet have made the regular season finals every year, illustrated his point.

"We all probably look at (Sydney) and say `Well, he's done it right, he's got his team up and they've played in finals just about every year while he's been there,'" he said.

"That's what matters, round one and onwards.

"Honestly, I was thinking about who won the pre-season comps the other day and I couldn't remember any of them."

Meanwhile, Akermanis supported the AFL's idea of a second team in Queensland and hoped to one day have a coaching role with the new club.

"I would start (coaching) down here (in Melbourne), but certainly where I finished up, if I finished up in Queensland I don't think that would be a bad thing," the ex-Queenslander and Brisbane Lions triple-premiership player said.

"If they've got two teams up there, I wouldn't want to be the first coach, but certainly if you could come in and help up there and coach in Queensland at some stage that would be a great journey for me."

On his own strong form in the pre-season, the 31-year-old former Brownlow Medallist said he was much fitter than last year and felt he was in for a bumper season.

"Hopefully as good a work as I've done, I think," he said.

"It doesn't mean finishing or anything like that, it just means running and moving and being in the right spots and that will just turn into either goals or tackles or the things that I know I can do.

"I've said it before, but I would be very surprised if this year wasn't a lot better than last year, for sure."

Akermanis was speaking at the March for Melanoma, in Williamstown in Melbourne's west, with the whole Bulldogs squad participating in the walk.

He personally knew the woman, Emily Tapp, whose death in Brisbane in 2006, aged 27, inspired the event.

"We want to enjoy the sun and not let it take what should be our God-given right, I suppose, to have a joyful life," he said.

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I agree. Get rid of the pre-season, nobody cares about it. Longer AFL season will bring more money to the game and award consistency over the entire season.
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"It would be great to be playing in finals and in teams that are winning all the time, but I chose to come to Richmond" - Nathan G. Brown

[cino]

Barely worth reporting on.

Saw this little piece on the news last night. I'm neither here nor there on this, if we've learnt anything, the AFL won't make any amendments to the pre-season if there is revenue to be made.

Aker says it himself.
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WWW.SONSOFTHESCRAY.COM

[amnesiac]

See I think there is a difference. People don't care less about AFL during the pre-season cup until the semi finals and final of the tournament. The arguement generally centres around "well it gets money in". But if you were to replace it with for example three extra rounds of premiership footy, with the teams playing practice games behind closed doors, the ratings would blitz the Wizard Cup.

Quite an interesting debate.
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"It would be great to be playing in finals and in teams that are winning all the time, but I chose to come to Richmond" - Nathan G. Brown