That included preliminary talks in 2020<\/a> over a game against Essendon, played in Los Angeles or San Francisco, before the pandemic hit and saw the plans scrapped.<\/p>\n\u201cOur priority is Sydney and Canberra and we travel a lot. But there\u2019s no better way to showcase our game than by taking a four-point game to the most populated state of America,\u201d outgoing GWS CEO Dave Matthews told the Herald Sun.<\/p>\n
\u201cWith cricket returning to the Olympic slate in 2028, it provides the opportunity to potentially overcome some previous infrastructure challenges and secure a game in California.<\/p>\n
\u201cBeing able to take Australia\u2019s game to the world, particularly at a time where the global focus is on California would be incredibly valuable not only to the AFL but to promoting our country globally.\u201d<\/p>\n
It would be the first home and away match played overseas since Port Adelaide\u2019s final game in Shanghai in 2019, against St Kilda.<\/p>\n
The Saints previously hosted three games in Wellington, New Zealand in the mid-2010s.<\/p>\n
Paddy Ryder of the Power and Callum Wilkie of the Saints during the 2019 AFL round 11 match between the St Kilda Saints and the Port Adelaide Power at Adelaide Arena at Jiangwan Stadium on June 02, 2019 in Shanghai, China. (Photo by Michael Willson\/AFL Photos)Source: Getty Images<\/p>\n
Matthews argued the league should follow the NFL and turn a pre-season game, such as the current week of AAMI Community Series match-ups, into a proper game for points.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe current fixture already has a built-in opportunity via the pre-season matches to account for the additional game. By converting one or both pre-season matches to four-point games, you would effectively have the 24th game within current constraints,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n
\u201cThere\u2019s a significant opportunity to grow both AFL and AFLW in NSW and Queensland by delivering marquee events. Any extra content delivered in these markets would help accelerate interest and grow demand in these regions, delivering uplift for the whole industry.\u201d<\/p>\n
The first 19-team season will also require one side to be on a bye each week.<\/p>\n
The introduction of a 20th club following the Devils is viewed as likely within the footy industry, which could then see a fixture with one game against the other 19 clubs, plus Gather Round, and four double-ups.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The AFL is being tipped to expand the home and away season to 24 games after next year,…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":621254,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[560],"tags":[638,64,63,55,639,85],"class_list":{"0":"post-621253","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\/621253","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=621253"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/621253\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/621254"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=621253"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=621253"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=621253"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}
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