The AFL has switched the venues for two of its matches this weekend, while Melbourne is waiting on the results of COVID-19 testing ahead of their Friday night match at the Docklands stadium.
Key points:
- The AFL has moved the Suns-Hawks match from Darwin to Sydney
- The Tigers will now play the Crows in Sydney instead of Melbourne
- Demons players and officials are isolating after undergoing COVID-19 testing
The Gold Coast-Hawthorn match — originally scheduled to be played in Darwin — will now take place at the SCG on Saturday night.
Richmond was due to host Adelaide at the MCG on Sunday, but the two teams will now play at Sydney’s Giants Stadium.
The Power’s match against Fremantle at Adelaide Oval has been pushed back 40 minutes and will now begin at 5:20pm (AEST) as the umpires will be travelling from Perth.
All other matches will remain as scheduled.
AFL chief executive Gillon McLachlan said no crowds would attend the round-11 matches in Melbourne in the wake of the Victorian government’s decision to impose a seven-day lockdown from midnight.
“The changes are in place for this round only and we will continue to monitor the situation in coming days before making any decisions on future rounds,” McLachlan told a media conference in Melbourne.
“It’s disappointing for fans in Victoria to not be able to attend the footy this weekend.
“But the events of the last 24, 48 hours reiterate the reasons why we have put in place the contact-tracing requirements at matches.”
McLachlan confirmed Demons players and staff were awaiting COVID-19 test results while isolating ahead of facing the Western Bulldogs on Friday night.
A Demons player had visited a Tier 1 COVID-19 exposure site last Sunday.
“Pending negative test results, players and staff will be cleared in time for tomorrow night’s game,” McLachlan said.
McLachlan said the roof at the Docklands stadium would be open on Friday should the Bulldogs-Demons match go ahead as planned.
He said the AFL was adopting a flexible approach should further changes to the fixture need to be made.
“We were walking through [scenarios] as late last night on the contingencies and possibilities,” he said.
“But we didn’t know until this morning about how it was going to play and then obviously you don’t know how the other states are going to react, so we feel like we are back in it.
“The team (AFL officials) know what they are doing. we’ve got great partnerships from state governments, health officials and we will continue to navigate through this.
“There may be bumps … but we have nine games going ahead.”
