AFL chief executive Andrew Demetriou said on Monday he is a fan of sunshine and open-air football, which means the post-match pleas of North coach Brad Scott and his brother and Geelong counterpart Chris , will go unheeded.
Heavy rain fell during the second half of Sunday's Geelong-North Melbourne clash at Etihad Stadium following a pre-game decision by the AFL to leave the roof open.
"It's open during the day if it's not raining," Demetriou said. "It's not that bad, a little bit of rain.
"We had a little bit of rain at the MCG and we didn't have a roof.
"I wouldn't worry about it. I love Brad and Chris, they're fantastic for the game and great coaches, but I like a bit of open sunshine."
Moments after North's dramatic four-point loss to Geelong on Sunday, Brad Scott confronted the League's match manager to ask why the roof wasn’t closed.
Afterwards, he said: "I just don't understand why we don't close the roof.
"There's a policy that when the sun's shining, the roof's open.
"No one likes it; the fans don't like it, the broadcasters hate it, the players hate it. Close it, it's not that hard."
Both the League and Etihad Stadium management reiterated on Monday that as the venue hirer, it is the AFL that has the final call whether the roof remains open during day games.
Stadium management gets a final weather forecast about two and a half hours before the match, and this is then relayed to the AFL, which makes the final call both before the gates are open to spectators and the competing clubs have to finalise their teams.
On Sunday, the weather forecast was for fine weather. The rain, when it did come, was highly localized, falling mainly on the Melbourne CBD and other areas to the north of the city.
Neither the AFL nor Etihad would confirm that occupational health and safety, as well as the insurance costs that would follow, are the actual reasons why the roof must stay open once spectators are inside the ground.
But there has been robust discussion about the policy between the two bodies in seasons past and there have been examples in earlier years (the stadium opened in 2000) where the decision was made mid-game to close the roof as a result of unforeseen rain.
Former AFL football operations manager Ian Collins, who became chief executive of the stadium in 2000, reportedly had a more pragmatic approach to the stadium roof.
Ashley Browne in a senior writer for AFL Media. @afl_hashbrowne
