The rules are simple. Arm the new boys with bucketloads of cash. Give them an off-season window of opportunity where they can whisper sweet nothings into the ears of AFL stars, or least their managers, promising them riches and titles galore.
Whether this sweet talk is consummated with signed contracts, verbal contracts or looser agreements doesn’t really matter.
The real fun and games start after this, when clubs start to get nervous when players refuse to enter new contract talks. When the media starts to speculate about the players that have been signed, sealed and delivered by the new boys.
Don't expect any announcements before the end of the season, though. That might be the way it's done in the NRL, not in the AFL.
Already the speculation about who the GWS Giants have signed, or at least have in their sights, has started. Eddie McGuire got things started on his Triple M breakfast show yesterday morning when he said he had it on good authority young Melbourne midfielder Tom Scully had signed with the Giants.
This brought responses from Dees coach Dean Bailey and Scully's agent yesterday denying the No.1 pick from 2009 NAB AFL Draft was on his way out of Demonland.
The reaction this morning has been predictable.
In today's Herald Sun, senior football writer, and Melbourne sympathiser, Mike Sheahan, said Melbourne had to move heaven and earth to keep its young star, saying if he left the fallout would be similar to Ron Barassi's defection to Carlton in 1965.
Based on the lessons learned from last year when Gold Coast was the sanctioned poacher, Sheahan thinks Scully will be in the orange and charcoal colours of the Giants next year.
In some ways it's hard to argue. Most of the players persistently linked to the Gold Coast Suns last year - Gary Ablett, Jarrod Harbrow, Campbell Brown, Michael Rischitelli and Jared Brennan - ended up Suns at the end of the 2010.
Sheahan's counterpart at The Age, Caroline Wilson, has a different take on the Scully situation. She thinks he'll resist the Giants' advances and remain a Dee.
Wilson was, however, critical of Scully's decision to hang out until the end of this season before committing to his next career move. It made him look mercenary, she said.
She also had little sympathy for Melbourne, pointing out they had acquired the compensation pick used to acquire Scully against a backdrop of tanking controversy.
But she was sympathetic to young Demons fans who face a drawn-out year of speculation about whether their young star will depart after just two seasons.
Richmond president Gary March added his voice to the debate telling The Age first-round draft picks in their first three to four years at a club should be ruled off-limits to the Giants.
"The integrity of the draft needs to be kept. You can't have a draft and then say to clubs you will lose the players straight away," March said.
There's more than a touch of self-interest in March's comments. If anyone needs to hang on to its recent draftees, it's Richmond.
The Herald Sun also reported the Giants are targetting one of three premiership Mapgies - gun midfielders Dane Swan, Dale Thomas and Scott Pendlebury. As usual, Giants coach Sheedy was the chief pot-stirrer.
"If Eddie McGuire wants to talk about Scully, he ought to watch his own backyard," Sheedy said in the Herald Sun.
"Pendlebury, Thomas and Swan are all superstars. I would be very surprised if Gubby Allan (Giants football operations manager) could not get one of them."
The whispers, rumours and innuendo are going to continue all year. Best get used to it. And, remember, the Giants have been given two years to carry out their raids, so we've got another year of it next year too.
In short
Richmond have signalled it wants to compete with the big boys of the AFL off the field as well as on, announcing plans to raise $6 million from cashed-up fans to bolster their football department spending, the Herald Sun reports.
Richmond CEO Brendon Gale said if the club could eliminate its debt of $4.5 million, the money it saved on interest payments would be rechannelled into its football department, with one of the major goals being to field a stand-alone VFL club. No doubt, some wags, not us, will suggest entering the VFL would be the perfect way for the Tigers to become a powerhouse again.
As round one of the NAB Cup approaches, Fremantle assistant coach Barry Mitchell told The West Australian the Dockers, who face West Coast and Hawthorn in round one at Patersons Stadium on Sunday, want to win the NAB Cup, but not at the expense of blooding new players and trying others in different positions.
Meanwhile, Adelaide Crows coach Neil Craig told AAP he won't be focusing on the scoreboard when the Crows take on Melbourne and Port Adelaide in their round one NAB Cup matches at AAMI Park this Friday night.
He simply wants to see his players show competitive spirit and make good decisions. After the Crows' slow start to the 2010 home and away season, their supporters will be hoping Craig remembers to keep score again by round one.
An ankle injury has ruled Israel Folau out of the Greater Western Sydney Giants' round one NAB Cup games against the Sydney Swans and Gold Coast Suns next week, thwarting a dream match-up of Folau and fellow rugby league convert Karmichael Hunt, The Daily Telegraph reports.
Giants coach Kevin Sheedy had been planning to play Folau on Gold Coast's Hunt, but his star recruit is now expected to make his debut later in the pre-season competition.
