{"id":567844,"date":"2026-03-27T13:06:22","date_gmt":"2026-03-27T13:06:22","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/567844\/"},"modified":"2026-03-27T13:06:22","modified_gmt":"2026-03-27T13:06:22","slug":"fremantle-versus-richmond-game-to-go-ahead-despite-tropical-cyclone-narelle-super-rugby-western-force-game-also-impacted","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/567844\/","title":{"rendered":"Fremantle versus Richmond game to go ahead despite tropical cyclone Narelle; Super Rugby Western Force game also impacted"},"content":{"rendered":"

The AFL<\/a> is pushing ahead with Saturday afternoon’s clash between Fremantle<\/a> and Richmond<\/a> at Optus Stadium, despite severe tropical cyclone Narelle pushing through the north of the state.<\/p>\n

The category-three storm is sweeping down and expected to impact 800km of coastline on Friday from Pilbara down through Gascoyne.<\/p>\n

The cyclone itself isn’t expected to reach as far south as Perth, but the city is still expected to be hit by gale-force winds and potentially up to 100mm of rain across the weekend. <\/p>\n

READ MORE: AFL admits error in ‘farce’ non-call that swung thriller<\/a><\/p>\n

READ MORE: Icon took $725k from broke league that ripped off Aussies<\/a><\/p>\n

READ MORE: Gather Round in jeopardy as fans baulk at rising costs<\/a><\/p>\n

\"Fremantle<\/p>\n

Fremantle fans sit in the rain.\u00a0AFL Photos via Getty Images<\/p>\n

Naturally, the chief concern is the safety of everyone involved.<\/p>\n

AFL executive Laura Kane told 9News Perth on Thursday that the game would proceed at this stage.<\/p>\n

“We know that there’s heavy rain predicted, but at the moment, we play on,” she said.<\/p>\n

Winds of up to 60km\/h are anticipated on Saturday. <\/p>\n

Narelle is expected to be downgraded as it continues to head south and with Perth 6000km away, it is unlikely to reach the city.<\/p>\n

The wild weather will also impact the Super Rugby<\/a> on Saturday night, with the Force<\/a> hosting the Chiefs at HBF Park.<\/p>\n

Watch the 2026 Super Rugby Pacific season with every match streaming live and on demand on the home of rugby, Stan Sport<\/a><\/p>\n

That game will take place just as the AFL is finishing up six minutes down the road.<\/p>\n

At this stage, both sports will proceed as planned, though both games will certainly be impacted by the wild weather.<\/p>\n

The AFL postponed multiple games in 2025 due to tropical cyclone Alfred, which hit South East Queensland during Opening Round. <\/p>\n

The Dockers and Tigers game gets under way at 1:15pm AWST on Saturday. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The AFL is pushing ahead with Saturday afternoon’s clash between Fremantle and Richmond at Optus Stadium, despite severe…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":567845,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[560],"tags":[638,64,63,55,639,85],"class_list":["post-567844","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\/567844","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=567844"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/567844\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/567845"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=567844"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=567844"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=567844"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}