AFL players in VFL teams.

[Rosy]

I recently asked if there were any rules and regulations requiring a certain number of VFL and AFL players in a selected VFL team.

Noone seemed to know the answer so I e-mailed the VFL.

This is the reply.

Thank you for your query.

The VFL doesn’t have a rule which states how many VFL listed players must be selected in a VFL senior team each week.

On the basis that an AFL club has 38 Listed players and 6 Rookies (44 players) and 22 players are named in the AFL side each week, there are 22 remaining AFL players who are eligible to play in the VFL weekly. From these 22 AFL players remaining, exclude injured players, suspensions and players such as rookies who will play with the VFL reserves team, it is highly unlikely that 20 Richmond players would be in the Coburg senior team but as I mentioned before, there is no rule from preventing it if all players were available.

Last year we found, on average, that 12 VFL listed players and 10 AFL listed players played each week in the VFL senior sides.

 

[baktiger]

This is one of Coburg's current president's pet peeves.
Phil Cleary would like a limit on the number of AFL listed
players in a VFL side - something like 12 or so I think he said.

That way, you wouldn't get a situation like this years VFL grand
final where there was a disproportionate amount of AFL players
in the VFL sides. There were players who could have been given
the call up to the AFL grand final in one of the teams.

Then there were the problems at the Bullants/Carlton (spit!).

I'd prefer an upper limit of some kind, not sure on what number
would be appropriate. No more than 18 though

Some clubs apparently have such limits (albeit fuzzy) in their
agreements with their AFL affiliates.

 

[onsl]

It's unlikely that the VFL will make any changes to the setup for the home and away season this year, but I think they will be making it harder for AFL players to qualify for the VFL finals series. The VFL are actually running a poll on their website regarding this issue.

cheers,
ons.
http://www.vflfooty.com