Alastair Clarkson in need of wise counsel
Alastair Clarkson's behavioural slips over the journey have always been a backroom issue for the Hawthorn Football Club.
Caroline Wilson has been chief football writer for The Age since 1999. She was the first woman to cover Australian Rules football on a full-time basis and the first woman to win the AFL's gold media award. She has won the AFL Players' Association's football writer of the year (1999) and the AFL Media Association's most outstanding football writer and most outstanding feature writer (2000, 2003, 2005). In 2014 she won the Melbourne Press Club's Graham Perkin award as Australian journalist of the year. She also won a MPC Quill Award in 2003.
Alastair Clarkson's behavioural slips over the journey have always been a backroom issue for the Hawthorn Football Club.
The AFL Women's competition looks set to welcome two more clubs by 2019, according to CEO Gill McLachlan.
Jake Melksham's failure to fully disclose details of his betting accounts and subsequent punishment from head office have exposed yet again the fraught relationship between the AFL and gambling which continues to cast a shadow over the game's integrity.
AFL bosses have been shown a radical proposal to short-circuit pay negotiations with the AFL Players Association by putting an offer directly to the footballers.
Geelong and St Kilda have reinforced their bid to join the national women's league in 2018, putting forward separate submissions to be considered this week by the AFL Commission.
The showdown looming between the AFL and its umpires over the future of the bounce is all the more staggering when you consider the game's bosses claim they never saw it coming.
Hawthorn are playing down the old-school tactics reportedly adopted by the team after the club's shock loss last weekend on the Gold Coast.
A raft of punitive measures including lifetime bans for racially abusive football supporters will be debated at the AFL Commission table next week as the game looks to up the ante in its fight against racism.
AFL players would get a pay rise this year of almost 25 per cent after the league put forward a revised offer to the players union in the protracted pay talks recent days.
Any AFL player considering moving mostly for money should heed this cautionary tale, writes Caroline Wilson.
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