Coaches have united to ensure they are heard loud and clear by the AFL on the future of the interchange system.
Collingwood coach Nathan Buckley says there are concerns that individual coaches speaking out about proposed rule changes are too easily dismissed.
So coaches from all 18 clubs have organised a series of meetings to form a consensus view, which they believe will pack more punch when they deliver it to league headquarters.
“There’s been a decision made on behalf of the coaches and coaches association,” Buckley told reporters on Friday.
“Rather than making individual comments and that being perhaps (vulnerable to) a divide and conquer type mentality, the coaches as a whole and clubs as a whole will come up with a united perspective.”
Buckley said it was too early to say what position the coaches would take.
But he is one of numerous coaches to have previously spoken out against AFL proposals to further reduce interchange numbers.
The four-man interchange bench was cut to three interchange players and a substitute last season.
The AFL trialled a further reduction, to two interchange players and two substitutes, in this year’s pre-season competition, and have left the door open to making that change for next year’s season proper.
Laws of the game committee member Kevin Bartlett this week proposed an even more radical change, to six or eight substitutes but no interchange players, to ease congestion in the game.
That proposal received some support from fellow committee member and AFL great Leigh Matthews, who said it was worth considering.