{"id":273213,"date":"2025-11-09T12:32:10","date_gmt":"2025-11-09T12:32:10","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/273213\/"},"modified":"2025-11-09T12:32:10","modified_gmt":"2025-11-09T12:32:10","slug":"afl-to-introduce-wildcard-weekend-for-2026-season-with-teams-outside-the-eight-a-chance-to-play-finals","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/273213\/","title":{"rendered":"AFL to introduce wildcard weekend for 2026 season with teams outside the eight a chance to play finals"},"content":{"rendered":"

The AFL<\/a> will introduce a divisive wildcard round from next year, giving teams ranked ninth and 10th an opportunity to win the premiership.<\/p>\n

All clubs have been told the league will implement what is essentially an extra week of finals, starting in 2026.<\/p>\n

The AFL will confirm the move in coming days when they will also release the fixture for next season.<\/p>\n

Know the news with the 7NEWS app: Download today \"Download<\/a><\/p>\n

Taking the system from the NBA, the wildcard round would pit the team that finishes seventh on the ladder in the home-and-away season against 10th.<\/p>\n

The other wildcard game would be eighth against ninth.<\/p>\n

Both games will take place on the weekend that is currently set aside for the pre-finals bye.<\/p>\n

The winners would be seeded seventh and eighth in the finals, with the rest of the four-week series remaining as it has since 2000.<\/p>\n

If the wildcard round was in place this year, seventh-placed Gold Coast would have hosted Sydney (10th), and Hawthorn (eighth) would have played the Western Bulldogs (ninth).<\/p>\n

However, there are concerns about the legitimacy of teams that finish ninth and tenth as genuine finals teams.<\/p>\n

While the Dogs were only four points away in 2025, the Swans were three games off the pace.<\/p>\n

AFL chief executive Andrew Dillon said the two extra finals were a win for the fans.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe\u2019re thrilled to deliver fans an extra weekend of finals footy, while giving more clubs and players the opportunity to play finals footy and win a premiership,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe Wildcard Finals Round reflects our ongoing commitment to evolve our competition structure, building on recent additions like Gather Round and AFL Origin, ensuring our game continues to grow.<\/p>\n

\u201cThis also means that all teams who finish in the top eight of ten will host a home final, giving fans a chance to see their club play at home in September.\u201d<\/p>\n

Wildcard weekend adds to what is set to be a new-look AFL season in 2026, with a raft of rule changes, including the last touch rule, to change the way teams play.<\/p>\n

Next year also sees the return of the history-laden State of Origin format with Western Australia to take on Victoria at Optus Stadium in February.<\/p>\n

Some of the game\u2019s biggest stars have already put their hands up to pull on the Black Swan and Big V jumpers.<\/p>\n

– With The Nightly<\/p>\n

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<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The AFL will introduce a divisive wildcard round from next year, giving teams ranked ninth and 10th an…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":273214,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[560],"tags":[638,64,63,55,639,588,85],"class_list":{"0":"post-273213","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-afl","8":"tag-afl","9":"tag-au","10":"tag-australia","11":"tag-australian-football-league","12":"tag-australianfootballleague","13":"tag-sport","14":"tag-sports"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/273213","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=273213"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/273213\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/273214"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=273213"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=273213"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=273213"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}