AFL CEO Gillon McLachlan will host his annual dinner with the competition's senior coaches on Monday night with the state of the game sure to be on the agenda.
Since taking over from former League boss Andrew Demetriou in 2014, McLachlan has invited the 18 senior coaches for dinner every year at his home in suburban Melbourne, with the occasion an opportunity to discuss some of the game's most pressing issues in an informal setting.
Every senior coach will be at the MCG before Monday's Queen's Birthday blockbuster between Melbourne and Collingwood to take part in the Big Freeze slide for Fight MND.
But AFL football operations manager Steve Hocking, who will also attend McLachlan's dinner, told reporters on Tuesday about 12 coaches had accepted the CEO's invitation.
"From memory there's about 12. Some have got leave over that period, they're away, that's the only reason (they're not attending)," Hocking said.
"It's a good number."
Asked about the agenda on Monday night, Hocking said nothing specific had been planned, other than "some good red wine, a frustrated coach coming out of Monday's game and some good food – let's put it on Gill to make sure there's some decent food."
Nonetheless, topics likely to be discussed include:
- A mid-season trade period or draft
- AFLX
- Live trading on draft night
- A proposed shorter end-of-season trade period
- Runners
- The trial of four field umpires
But this year's low scoring, however, looms as the issue McLachlan and Hocking will be most keen to get the coaches' feedback on.
After 11 rounds, a team's average score is just 83.3 points a game, the lowest figure since 1968.
In the past five seasons, teams' defensive efficiency has increased significantly despite the fact inside 50s haven’t dropped in that time and scoring chains have increased on average by 20 a game since 2009.
As clubs throw substantial coaching resources at unearthing winning strategies, most of which have a heavy defensive emphasis, the League is trying to stay a step ahead of them on tactical trends and the game's evolution.
Hocking has established a game analysis team that meets once week. It includes himself, AFL officials Patrick Clifton, James Podsiadly, David Rath, Grant Williams, Brett Munro and Hayden Kennedy, and AFLPA representative Tim Harrington.
The League footy boss will also meet on Thursday with prominent media identities Mike Sheahan and Gerard Whateley, and football greats Malcolm Blight, Leigh Matthews and Gerard Healy to seek their feedback on the game's state.
Hocking has similar meetings planned with a group of recently retired players and selected fans over the next few weeks.
Meanwhile, Rath, who joined the AFL in January after serving as Hawthorn's long-time strategy and innovation head, and Clifton are set to embark on a congestion study that will include analysis of player GPS data.
"We are spreading the net fairly wide. Some people might look at that and say, 'Why are you going so wide? Surely that leads to distraction'," Hocking said.
"We've already done a lot of work internally here and what we're trying to understand is are there pieces potentially that we haven’t actually picked up on or even considered that we need to be addressing within the game, or potential opportunities that will actually add to the evolution of the game?
"We're not the font of all knowledge within AFL headquarters. It's really important to understand that."
Recommendations that arise from the AFL's upcoming round of meetings will be put before the Competition Committee at its next meeting on July 26.
