{"id":513475,"date":"2026-03-02T08:06:09","date_gmt":"2026-03-02T08:06:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/513475\/"},"modified":"2026-03-02T08:06:09","modified_gmt":"2026-03-02T08:06:09","slug":"afls-opening-round-and-origin-here-to-stay-dillon","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/513475\/","title":{"rendered":"AFL’s Opening Round, and Origin here to stay: Dillon"},"content":{"rendered":"

AFL boss Andrew Dillon has defended the Opening Round concept and also emphasised State of Origin is here to stay after its recent successful revival.<\/p>\n

The competition’s chief executive was in Sydney on Monday to promote the Opening Round which includes home games for all four NSW and Queensland clubs and just one match in Victoria.<\/p>\n

Andrew Dillon speaks to the media at the 2026 AFL Opening Round launch.\u00a0Photo by Mark Kolbe\/AFL Photos\/via Getty Images<\/p>\n

While many have queried the absence of a full round of fixtures and a lack of games in Victoria, Perth and Adelaide, Dillon says the format has resulted in bumper crowds for round one.<\/p>\n

“What we’ve found in the last couple of years is that focus on NSW and Queensland is helping to grow awareness in NSW and Queensland and at the same time it hasn’t taken away from our round one,” Dillon said<\/p>\n

“The last two round ones have been the two highest attended rounds we’ve ever had of over 400,000 – last year 451,000 people attended, a record for round one.<\/p>\n

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“New South Wales is super important for the AFL to continue to grow our game and Opening Round is key to that.<\/p>\n

“Increasing awareness, increasing participation, attendance and increasing viewership across New South and Queensland.<\/p>\n

“The Swans and the Giants and the Lions and the Suns all had membership record rises and record crowds last year on the back of Opening Round.”<\/p>\n

Dillon said he did watch a little of the NRL’s opening round in Las Vegas on the weekend.<\/p>\n

“As they’ve done the last few years, executed it really well,” said Dillon, who added the AFL and NRL worked together closely on a number of things.<\/p>\n

“It’s a good way for them to start their season. We do things differently.”<\/p>\n

Dillon recently travelled to India and while he wouldn’t commit to AFL games being played there, he was encouraged by the reaction.<\/p>\n

“What I did see in India is a whole lot of potential for our game,” Dillon said.<\/p>\n

“Nearly 10,000 boys and girls playing the game. I was fortunate to see the national championships with 10 states registered there.<\/p>\n

“It was interesting to see the love and enjoyment that the boys and girls have for our game.”<\/p>\n

Dillon said he had positive feedback from the players involved in the recent State of Origin game between Western Australia and Victoria.<\/p>\n

He suggested the concept would continue to evolve over the next three to five years, but didn’t confirm an Allies team of players from Queensland and NSW would definitely feature.<\/p>\n

“The feedback was they (the players) would have preferred to extend the time in camp,” Dillon said<\/p>\n

“They achieved a lot in terms of training, getting to know their teammates, school visits and the like, so we’ll work through that.<\/p>\n

“But it (Origin) is certainly here to stay in one form or another.<\/p>\n

“I found the All Stars last year and Origin this year, pre-season seems to work.”<\/p>\n

He was positive about the impact of the various rule changes, though some, including Melbourne ruck Max Gawn, have expressed concern.<\/p>\n

“What we will see is changes that will speed up the game and keep the ball in motion longer, that’s what our fans want, fast moving footy,” Dillon said.<\/p>\n

He also said there might be a way for Australian Rules football to feature in some form at the Brisbane Olympics in 2032.<\/p>\n

“The reality is there’s a precedent for that back in 1956 in Melbourne where Australian Rules football was an exhibition sport,” Dillon said.<\/p>\n

“I think our sport is a sport that should be on that stage.”<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"AFL boss Andrew Dillon has defended the Opening Round concept and also emphasised State of Origin is here…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":513476,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[560],"tags":[638,64,63,55,639,85],"class_list":["post-513475","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-afl","tag-afl","tag-au","tag-australia","tag-australian-football-league","tag-australianfootballleague","tag-sports"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/513475","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=513475"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/513475\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/513476"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=513475"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=513475"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=513475"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}