{"id":272718,"date":"2025-11-09T06:58:09","date_gmt":"2025-11-09T06:58:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/272718\/"},"modified":"2025-11-09T06:58:09","modified_gmt":"2025-11-09T06:58:09","slug":"wildcard-round-could-see-teams-as-low-as-10th-qualify-in-2026","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/272718\/","title":{"rendered":"Wildcard round could see teams as low as 10th qualify in 2026"},"content":{"rendered":"

Clubs are expecting the AFL to introduce a wildcard round in 2026, giving teams that finish as low as 10th on the ladder after the home-and-away season a chance to qualify for finals and win the flag.<\/p>\n

The wildcard round would mean the team that finishes seventh on the ladder in the home-and-away season would play the team that finished 10th, and the team that finished eighth would play the ninth-placed team.<\/p>\n

It would add intrigue to where clubs finish inside the top eight too, as the top six would be rewarded with the week\u2019s break.<\/p>\n

\"The<\/p>\n

The Lions played in four finals in each of their two premiership years on their way to winning the flag. Credit: Eddie Jim<\/p>\n

The winners would then advance to the finals under the same final eight system as has been in place since 2000.<\/p>\n

The decision, which is still to be finalised but likely, according to three competition sources who preferred to remain anonymous, comes after a season when nine teams were virtually out of finals contention with six rounds remaining (when ninth place was three wins ahead of 10th-placed Sydney on the ladder).<\/p>\n

Although Sydney remained fixed in 10th spot after each of their final eight matches, the diminished number of potential outcomes led to a flat end to the season. If a wildcard round had been in place, Fremantle, the Giants, Gold Coast and Hawthorn would have been in a battle for the coveted fifth and sixth spots as all four teams spent a week in that position over the concluding four rounds.<\/p>\n

It is expected a wildcard round would be played on the weekend of the pre-finals bye, which was introduced in 2016. It would be a money-spinner for the league and good for the broadcasters.<\/p>\n

\"Mac<\/p>\n

Mac Andrew\u2019s decisive mark against Fremantle gave them the Suns their first finals win. However, with a wildcard round they would have had to qualify to play in the elimination final.Credit: AFL Photos<\/p>\n

By the end of the 2025 season, the Western Bulldogs finished ninth to miss finals, despite winning 14 matches. They were one game below eighth spot but had the third-best percentage at season\u2019s end. Sydney finished three matches out of the final eight in 10th spot.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Clubs are expecting the AFL to introduce a wildcard round in 2026, giving teams that finish as low…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":272719,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[43,44,41,39,42,40],"class_list":{"0":"post-272718","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-headlines","8":"tag-headlines","9":"tag-news","10":"tag-top-news","11":"tag-top-stories","12":"tag-topnews","13":"tag-topstories"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/272718","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=272718"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/272718\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/272719"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=272718"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=272718"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=272718"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}