‘I don’t agree’: Swann swats down brash ‘tanking’ claim as AFL boss, Lyon clash over ump call

AFL executive general manager of football performance Greg Swann has flatly denied a St Kilda boss’ brash claim on the league’s new draft rules.

It came as the AFL’s executive general manager of football performance featured on Wednesday night’s edition of AFL 360 to talk through the key issues facing the competition.

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Swann and the league formally introduced a suite of changes ahead of this November’s national draft, but it was the new compensation mechanism that drew the ire of Saints president Andrew Bassat.

Starting from this year’s draft, bottom-five clubs whose first-round pick slides due to matched bids on concessional players will receive a second-round compensation pick.

“That was to cover off things like what happened to Richmond last year – they started with Pick 2 and ended up picking at 7,” Swann told Fox Footy on Wednesday night.

“Whether that’s adequate compensation, we just felt that they should get something for being shuffled, and that’s the pick they’ll get.”

But Bassat claimed the new measure would “almost certainly” incentivise tanking to finish in the bottom five.

“The problem that needed to be solved is the draft is incredibly compromised and they’ve not only gone weak on the changes that were necessary to ensure fairer price, but they’ve added new compromises in this new system,” Bassat told AFL Media earlier on Wednesday.

“I think it is an error as we need less, not more, distortion and will be unwound in no time. It will lead to all sorts of issues, including almost certain tanking to ensure a bottom-five finish.”

Swann, though, was categorical in his rejection of that idea.

“I don’t agree with that,” he said.

“I mean, nobody’s going to go down the bottom to get a pick in the 20s.

“That’s not going to happen. I disagree.”

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The other major change confirmed at league headquarters on Wednesday was to the draft bidding system.

From this year onwards, clubs are only permitted to use two picks to match any bid placed on a concession player.

It means Port Adelaide and Carlton will have to pay up with two premium first-round choices when Dougie Cochrane (Power NGA) and Cody Walker (Blues father-son) inevitably attract top-five rival bids.

“We’re furious. It is putting the V back in AFL,” Port Adelaide chairman David Koch said on Wednesday.

“To change the rules so dramatically like this, and bring them in just months before the draft, rather than … ease them in over two or three years, we just bring them in, bang.”

Asked if the AFL had upset ‘almost everybody’ with the changes, Swann said: “Not everybody, probably half.

“And I’m not saying that flippantly. I’ve already seen the comments; ‘it’s too hard, it’s too easy, it’s unfair’.

“I mean, we flagged this in July last year that there were going to be changes … we probably would have liked to have landed it earlier, but it’s landed where it has.

“There were two parts. Once you got past the option of having an uncompromised draft — because you’re dealing with father-sons, NGAs, northern academies — once it was established that they would remain, then it was about what was fair value.

“That was the debate. It’s about fair value.”

Based on the current ladder, if Richmond bid on Cody Walker at Pick 1, Carlton would have to fork over Picks 3 and 27.

“It’s doable,” Swann said. “It’s their own pick, and 27. That’s doable.”

Asked about whether the changes could have been deferred 12 more months, Swann said: “Then there’s someone else (a club-tied player).

“That’s the problem. They (the Blues) had Harry Dean last year – it nearly got implemented last year – so they got Dean through the system. There was pressure from some clubs to do this last year.

“So, we took longer to get it done … but if there’s a grandfather clause (for the Power and Blues), there’s somebody else’s (club-tied prospect) coming.

“We’ve ripped the bandaid off … there’s some that aren’t happy about it, but we decided that was what was best for the majority of the clubs, and that’s what we’ve done.”

Swann has been the subject of some criticism for introducing the rules after leaving Brisbane – which benefitted from the old ones by ‘pick farming’ to get their hands on the Ashcroft brothers in recent years.

“We knew at the time in Brisbane that it was very generous that you could do that (stack lesser picks to match an early bid),” he said.

At a point in Swann’s AFL 360 appearance, he and show co-host Garry Lyon became relatively emotive when discussing the contentious Ben Miller 50-metre penalty for not standing the mark last Friday.

Swann had said at a Monday press conference that the right call was made in penalising Miller, who was made to stand Brody Mihocek’s mark instead of running on alongside opponent Max Gawn.

On Wednesday night, the issue was revisited.

Lyon put to Swann: “(Miller had) no involvement in the marking situation, he’s against an opponent that he’s been running with for 40 metres, and he’s expected to come back and stand that mark, and let Max Gawn go. We can’t have that in footy, Swanny.”

Swann paused for a moment, before saying: “He is expected, because he’s in that protected zone. You stop, like George Wardlaw did the other night.”

Lyon replied: “So, you let Max Gawn (go) and give him a free run inside forward 50?”

Swann: “You have to. That’s part of it. You stand, otherwise everyone just starts running off the mark again.”

Lyon: “Do you think that’s a good look for the game?”

Swann conceded: “It’s not ideal, but as I said the other day, they call ‘stand’ 200 times a game. There’s less than one free kick paid (on average), so that’s an outlier.”