Modern Footy
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The truth about AFL football these days is that nobody plays on each other. If you look around the ground during a game, you will see 36 players standing off from one another. Sure, the full forward and full back may be nearer to each other than most, but nobody is wearing the other, like in the old days. The modern footy game is a high possession, low contest affair that sees the ball move quickly up and down the ground. This higher scoring style of play is by design. Rule changes by those in charge of the AFL have reduced the defensive nature of the game.
The Demise Of The Defender From The Modern Game
If you look at the body types now filling the teams these young men all feature tall, lean, running physiques. Even the defenders, who used to be squat back pocket types have disappeared from the game. Defenders hardly defend anymore, as it is all about attack from the back these days. The only place for a couple of thick set blokes are the inside midfielders. The contest is diminished in favour of fast chains of ball movement up and back the ground. This is one of the reasons why we are seeing blow outs on the scoreboard with teams getting flogged. Few sides can defend when their attack is being beaten. The game has lost its defensive soul.
Players Run Around Unchecked In Modern Footy
It is shameful to watch how easy it is to score for attacking sides in this defensive lite era. I remember the gritty struggles between the Swans and the Eagles in the 2005/6 seasons where defensive contests were king. AFL football is a manipulated sport by the rule modifications, the head knock worries, and 4 umpires paying tiggy touchwood infringements. Where is the nitty gritty in AFL today? Close checking defenders from yesteryear would be scragging in their graves in disgust. No wonder players these days rack up the high possession numbers. There are bugger all man-on-man contests between two opposing players.
Tackles are broken with ease due to lean body types and the lack of real defensive play.
Why Is Modern Footy So Unaccountable?
The powers that be have amended the rules to make it this way. They wanted free flowing, high scoring football to entertain what they thought the fans wanted. There was all this BS about how great the game was back in the tight short days of the 1980s. Well, back then, AFL players played in their positions and only the on-ballers ran around willy nilly. These days, modern footy boasts 30 players playing like ruckrovers.
The Great Big Fear of Concussion & Legal Action
The fear of head injuries and the dreaded concussion has impacted the game like a prostitute becoming a nun. The AFL Commission’s anxieties about future legal action by players has imposed chastity upon body contact. If you shirt front an opponent, you are gone. If you bump and the opponent’s head gets impacted in anyway you are gone for at least 3 weeks. If you tackle too hard and the umpires deem it too rough, you are gone. No wonder modern footy is becoming a tag team affair. Run, kick, handball, run some more, mark, kick, run harder and this is the modern game. Avoid contact and play keepie off. Ball use has become so important to maintain possession.
Keepie off is the name of the game these days.
“On the top of that list sits the existential threat that will continue to be placed at the back of minds until the precise moment it swallows the game whole — concussion.
There is a real chance that the AFL and a number of its clubs could face trial this year in class action case raised by former players. When that moment comes, it will mark the most significant moment yet in an uncomfortable saga which will, regardless of outcome in court, inevitably change the direction of the sport at large forevermore.”
Uncompetitive Contests
Many of the games at the beginning of the 2025 AFL season have been uncompetitive blow outs. This is disappointing for fans watching the games. The lack of defensive power in sides is palpable. It is a contest determined by who has the greater attacking power. It is all about offence and too little about defence. The balance is out of whack. AFL coaches seem to want 23 players in their matchday teams who can all out attack. If they are outgunned in this regard the scoreboard is likely to paint a very poor lopsided picture. Modern footy has lost the defensive pressure so integral to what Australian football has long been about. It is the greatest game, but in need of a tweak or two back in the defensive direction.
There is no shame in honouring gritty defensive play; despite the umpires awarding their votes to onballers who amass possessions like cricket scores. I want to see a team who can bloody defend like the Swans of old. We have to get the balance right between the two aspects of the game. Modern footy is all pretty outside play without any meat on the bone. If they don’t get things right, we will continue to see uneven contests and people will switch off. Gee, the Kayo reception is pretty dodgy by the way.
RSH
Robert Sudha Hamilton is the author of America Matters: Pre-apocalyptic Posts & Essays in the Shadow of Trump.
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