CARLTON coach Daniel Harford has hit out at the lack of clarity surrounding the upcoming list management period, as Collective Bargaining Agreement negotiations continue.
He's not the only one concerned about delays, with club officials across the country wary of the impending time crunch of an expansion Sign and Trade Period and the NAB AFLW Draft, all within the next five to six weeks.
Players have also been vocal on social media about the lack of clarity surrounding season details, especially given their additional work commitments and potential scheduling conflicts for the League's dual code Irish players.
Sad reality…
— Steph Chiocci (@Steph_Chiocci) May 5, 2022
My Leave without Pay has already been approved for Term 3 and 4 in preparation for an August start that may not happen 🤷🏽♀️
Please @aflwomens give us the pre season start dates so we can plan our lives🙏🙏🙏
— Sarah Rowe (@SarsRowe) April 25, 2022
The trade period cannot begin until the CBA is agreed upon, as there are no contracts to sign and the Total Player Payments amount has not been set.
"At some stage, if anyone's listening, a timeline would be nice for the competition, even just for trade and list management and that sort of stuff," Harford said on RSN.
"I've got no idea about anything, no one's saying anything, which is very difficult. I know there's negotiations for the CBA and between the players and headquarters is to-ing and fro-ing and they're having those little moments, and you probably can't do too much without that.
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"But seriously, if it's going to start in August, we'll be starting training in June, and we're in early May. So we'll start training in five weeks, if we're going to start the August timeline, and we don't actually know who's playing for us yet.
"There's no draft timeline. It's a bad outcome. It's a very bad outcome. Just tell us. I'm not sure too many competitions will be running like this around the globe."
