Source :- THE AGE NEWS
It’s been a year. In April, Carlton player Elijah Hollands suffered a highly visible mental health episode during a game and remained on the field as his team succumbed to Collingwood, prompting an AFL probe and hefty fine for the Blues.
In August, five Swans players became subject to a police investigation following allegations of inappropriate touching by three women at the Pullman Hotel; one of the five, Riley Bice, is being treated as a witness, but the futures of the other four remain clouded.
Their suspensions could not be surmounted by their spirited teammates in the preliminary final, and whose long-admired club sustained considerable reputational dents.
Brisbane Lions champion Lachie Neale has spent the entire season in the crosshairs of cameras and as Instagram fodder over his personal travails and marriage separation, a salacious saga that will see him leave the Lions for Collingwood in October, having so very nearly missed the grand final due to a low blow in the preliminary final. That imbroglio’s cloud will loom large over Saturday’s showpiece.
And, in the same few weeks, Carlton’s fallen former president Luke Sayers and the wife from whom he separated in acrimony, Cate Sayers, have reached a court settlement. That settlement saw Luke Sayers forced to apologise and also recant on any suggestion or inference to the AFL’s integrity unit that Cate was responsible for the uploading of an unedifying image of his penis on social media. Inexplicably, the AFL was enmeshed in the Sayers’ battle by dint of its brand-conscious propensity to render moral judgements on active players and officials.
Geelong were also put in the dock (and eventually fined) for their handling of a player with repeated concussions, Jake Kolodjashnij, instigating a probe which the AFL chairman Craig Drummond was forced to recuse himself from because the player had signed a “waiver” – designed to limit the club’s legal exposure – when the AFL boss was Geelong president. It has also had to deal with off-field questions about its relationship with a sponsor who partied with its stars at the same time as allegedly defrauding a charity, which last month led to 300 fraud charges.
Amid the scandals was the standard fare of sacked coaches, as Carlton nudged Michael Voss out, Essendon dismissed Brad Scott and, finally, North Melbourne not only sacked four-time premiership coach Alastair Clarkson but offered an unusually candid appraisal of his failings.
Frailty, thy name is football.
If these stories of human foibles provided the underbelly of the 2026 AFL season, the field of play – where players such as Hawthorn’s diminutive “Wizard” Nick Watson, Collingwood’s midfield maestro Nick Daicos, Bulldogs great Marcus Bontempelli and others dazzled – showcased some of the most memorable games seen during the 21st century, fuelled partly by a highly successful suite of rule changes.
Indeed, the wonder of the game was never more on display than in last Saturday’s preliminary final, when Hawthorn and Brisbane produced a game hailed as perhaps the best in the code’s history, given the lead changes, momentum shifts and individual feats, headlined by Watson’s striker-like skills (and six goals), plus the contentious holding the ball denouement producing the game-deciding goal with 18 seconds left.
Thus, 2026 is a season to be remembered for much mesmerising football, especially in finals – the wildcard final between the Bulldogs and Collingwood was decided after the siren, Geelong fell to the Dockers in a Perth semi-final that was played with frenetic speed and exceptional skill, and both preliminary finals elevated the goose-bump levels. The Dockers dragged themselves off the canvas at the SCG, overturning a 21-point final-quarter deficit, to redeem what would have been an ignominious end against the depleted Swans, putting themselves in a position to claim their club’s first flag this Saturday.
The influential chief justice of the US Supreme Court and one-time California governor Earl Warren once said that he would turn to the sports pages of newspapers first, because they “record people’s achievements”. Warren added: “The front page has nothing but man’s failures.”
Warren’s claim of sport’s pure glory is no longer accurate, given that the AFL – like other large and commercially focused sporting competitions around the world – is a business and a locus of human failures, as the various scandals attest. Those who cover the AFL in this masthead are compelled to be not only football experts, but crime writers, business, culture and race-relations reporters.
Yet, we will also be reminded again on this grand final day, when 100,000 will fill the MCG and millions will tune into the broadcast, when Fremantle and Brisbane will stand to attention for the national anthem before the solemnity is broken, as per tradition, by the roar of each team’s fans, of Australian rules football’s special place in the nation and particular in the city, now exceeding five million people, that birthed it in 1858.
Fremantle’s quest for a first flag since entering the competition in 1995 will likely make it the favourite of the non-aligned fans. If the Lions prevail, they will complete an improbable “three-peat” of premierships under their sage coach Chris Fagan, who would match two coaches he’s worked alongside, Clarkson (at Hawthorn) and the great Leigh Matthews, now a Lions board member who has dinner with Fagan every week.
For those without much interest in the game, they can tune in for the pre-game entertainment, when Kylie Minogue will occupy the same turf on which Robbie Williams (2022), KISS (2023), Katy Perry (2024) and rapper Snoop Dogg performed and Meat Loaf (2011) did not find his best.
The 2026 AFL season has underscored that, no matter what mistakes and missteps are made by clubs, players and AFL headquarters, no matter how deep in scandal they can stumble, the game itself is one that rightly holds our hearts.
The Age’s View – Since The Age was first published in 1854, the editorial team has believed it important to express a considered view on the issues of the day for readers, always putting the public interest first.
