Adelaide coach Matthew Nicks has moved to reassure fans that his club’s aggressive player-rotation and load-management policy will have zero impact on player workload, on account of the fact that finishing lower on the ladder as a direct result of resting players simply means the club will need to win two additional finals matches instead.
“Look, we’re really comfortable with where our learnings are at on this,” Nicks told reporters on Thursday, standing in front of a whiteboard that appeared to show a ladder with Adelaide sliding from fourth to seventh. “By managing bodies through the back half of the year, we’re actually protecting our best assets for finals footy. Yes, technically, we now need to win two extra sudden-death matches against fresher, higher-seeded opponents to reach the same round we’d have reached anyway. But look at the load management gains.”
Asked whether it wouldn’t be simpler to just finish top four and play one fewer must-win game against a worse team, Nicks paused for what club staff later described internally as “an uncomfortably long time.”
Sports scientist and Adelaide’s Head of Athlete Management, Dr. Helen Softtissue, said the club’s modelling showed resting key players for four rounds reduced injury risk by 12 per cent, while increasing the risk of “having to beat Geelong away in an elimination final” by 84%.
“We look at hamstrings, we look at hip flexors, we look at general fatigue markers,” Dr. Softtissue said. “What we don’t really factor in winning or ladder position, because that’s more of a football department decision, and I’m a science person.”
The club’s rotation policy came under renewed scrutiny this week after retiring star forward Taylor Walker was rested for a second time in a month. A spokesperson for club called the decision to take Walker to Perth but not play him as, “administrative,” and couldn’t deny that it might have been related to expiring frequent flyer points.
Adelaide members were divided on the strategy. Long-time member Graham Kickitlong, 61, said he was fully supportive of the club’s approach.
“I don’t mind it,” Pursehouse said. “More finals mean more chances to wait for four hours in the Ticketek virtual waiting room only to get to the head of the cue, have your payment method fail, get kicked out and start all over again. Then get seats in a section of Adelaide Oval where the nearest bar is two flights of stairs away. Which, I personally love.”
In a statement, the AFL condemned Adelaide’s innovative approach to player welfare. “Clubs have a moral responsibility to play their best players when available. How else will we hit our merchandising profit goals? These fucking scarves aren’t gonna sell themselves,” said AFL CEO Andrew Dillon.
Nicks was adamant the club’s finals hopes remained bright, noting that Adelaide’s extra-finals pathway “does wonders for adversity, resilience, all that stuff we talk about in the four-year plan.”
When pressed on why the four year plan was now entering its seventh year, Nicks simply noted, “It’s not so much a plan to win premierships, more just a plan to make sure myself and the players all keep getting paid hundreds of thousands of dollars a year.”
The Register has learnt that Nicks plans to rest Jordan Dawson for the first final. More to come.
