{"id":280829,"date":"2025-11-13T02:26:12","date_gmt":"2025-11-13T02:26:12","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/280829\/"},"modified":"2025-11-13T02:26:12","modified_gmt":"2025-11-13T02:26:12","slug":"afl-fixture-the-clubs-facing-the-most-five-day-turnarounds-in-2026-afl-news","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/280829\/","title":{"rendered":"AFL Fixture: The clubs facing the most five-day turnarounds in 2026 – AFL News"},"content":{"rendered":"

<\/a><\/p>\n

While the once-dreaded five-day turnaround does not pose as difficult as a challenge in years past, with teams improving their capability to deal with the reduced recovery, it still holds implications, particularly early on in the gruelling six-month-long AFL<\/a> season.<\/p>\n

With the release of the 2026 AFL<\/a> Fixture, it has been revealed that 13 clubs will be tasked with at least one five-day break before Round 16, with a further four being handed multiple in that time.<\/p>\n

The Hawthorn Hawks<\/a>, while granted eight primetime games in the early stages of next season, will also face some challenging turnarounds, required to tackle a league-high three five-day breaks before Round 16.<\/p>\n

It’s a fixturing surprise, given that no team faced more than two five-day breaks before Round 16 in 2025, but it comes as a caveat for the bizarre 18-day break Hawthorn will have to endure between their Round 2 Thursday night blockbuster against Sydney and the Round 4 Easter Monday duel with Geelong.<\/p>\n

There are limits on five-day breaks, with the recent CBA permitting three five-day breaks per club, per season – an increase from one under the previous deal – meaning once Hawthorn gets past their Round 11 clash with Adelaide, they won’t be given another for the remainder of 2026.<\/p>\n

Geelong, who are already dealing with the most difficult fixture in 2026, based on the 2025 ladder, have been handed a further challenge with two five-day breaks before Round 16.<\/p>\n

Only the Adelaide Crows<\/a> and Richmond Tigers<\/a> join them in that category, with the Tigers faithful hoping their young side will have the energy to bounce back against Melbourne in Round 7 and Essendon in Round 11.<\/p>\n

Meanwhile, several clubs have got off scot-free, managing to avoid the dreaded five-day turnaround. Those sides are Gold Coast, North Melbourne, Port Adelaide, West Coast, and the Western Bulldogs<\/a>.<\/p>\n

In 2025, all of those five clubs but the Eagles had at least one five-day break between games before Round 16.<\/p>\n

AFL clubs with the most five-day breaks<\/p>\n

Adelaide – 2
Brisbane – 1
Carlton – 1
Collingwood – 1
Essendon – 1
Fremantle – 1
Geelong – 2
Gold Coast – 0
GWS – 1
Hawthorn – 3
Melbourne – 2
North Melbourne – 0
Port Adelaide – 0
Richmond – 2
St Kilda – 1
Sydney – 1
West Coast – 0
Western Bulldogs<\/a> – 0<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"While the once-dreaded five-day turnaround does not pose as difficult as a challenge in years past, with teams…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":280830,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[560],"tags":[638,64,63,55,639,85],"class_list":{"0":"post-280829","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-sports"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/280829","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=280829"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/280829\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/280830"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=280829"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=280829"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=280829"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}